Using Work Ability to Understand Successful Aging at Work

Donald Truxillo
Kemmy Business School, University of Limerick, Ireland

Abstract:

The workforce in industrialized societies is aging due to longer lifespans and later retirement ages. Organizations, researchers, and policymakers are increasingly interested in the concept of successful aging at work (SAW), that is, workers’ well-being, performance, and motivation across their work lifespan. One marker of SAW is work ability, which is a person’s ability or their perceived ability to meet their job’s requirements. Although the work ability concept was originally developed in the occupational medicine literature (Ilmarinen, 1991), it has recently gained attention in the field of organizational psychology due to its relationship with outcomes such as well-being, performance, turnover, work disability, and retirement.  Further, organizational psychology research has provided greater theoretical basis for the work ability construct using JD-R theory, identifying the individual and organizational antecedents of work ability and differentiating work ability from established variables such as person-job fit and self-efficacy. New, psychometrically sound measures of work ability, including multi-dimensional measures, have also emerged. This presentation will also identify work ability’s implications for research in the organizational sciences and conclude with a discussion of lingering research questions.

Donald Truxillo is a Professor at the Kemmy Business School, University of Limerick, Ireland; Distinguished Visiting Professor at University of Trento, Italy; and Professor Emeritus at Portland State University in Portland, Oregon, USA. He studies age differences at work, the applicant experience, and workplace safety and health.  His current research on age and work focuses on age discrimination, work ability, and successful aging at work. His research has been supported by the National Science Foundation, the SHRM Foundation, and the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health. He served as associate editor for the Journal of Management and is currently an associate editor at Journal of Applied Psychology and Work, Aging and Retirement. He is the author of over 140 peer-reviewed journal articles and chapters and has coauthored two textbooks. He has received three Fulbright grants and is a fellow of APA, APS, SIOP, and IAAP.

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