Abstract

Five hundred and twenty employees from 2 pharmaceutical factories were divided randomly to 2 groups and were assigned to physical or social activity during 15 min prior to lunch time for 7 months. Prior to following treatment, employees were asked to rate how frequently they experienced 12 health symptoms. The data were subjected to a RM-ANOVA procedure for each symptom separately using treatment, gender, age, perceived physical effort (PPE) and time (pre-post) as independent variables. The results indicated that when production demands increase, physical activity is beneficial for employees engaged in moderate to hard physical effort during working time in that the number of headache complaints and general health remain constant. Under the same physical conditions, these symptoms worsened through 7 months in employees engaged in social activity. In 10 of the 12 symptoms, differences between social and physical treatments were not significant. However, several significant differences were found with respect to PPE, gender, and age. The results are discussed in relation to other findings, which have not considered PPE as a factor in studying health-related symptoms in the industrial environment. Verf.-Referat