Institute for Employment Research » IER News & blogs (tag [health])

Sustainable work and musculoskeletal health

Tue, 27 Jan 2026 12:00:00 GMT

The IER's Prof Chris Warhurst, Prof Gill Dix, Prof Philip Taylor, Dr Eli Dutton, Hilda Ragnarsdottir and Dr Laura Boothman were pleased to co-host a sandpit with Orthopaedic Research UK on 21 January. Prof Martin Underwood and Dr Fatema Dhaif from the Warwick Medical School also joined the event, alongside sector representatives and Government leads on health and work.

The event's focus was on 'Designing sustainable work to support and prevent musculoskeletal conditions across the working life course'. A key theme was the sustainability of jobs and careers. The group discussed opportunities both to prevent poor musculoskeletal health and accommodate the needs of those with health conditions to enable them to thrive in the workplace.

What does a healthy job look like?

Thu, 24 Jul 2025 11:00:00 GMT

IER’s Professor Chris Warhurst presented new research at the Society for the Advancement of Socio-Economics (SASE) annual conference in Montreal on 9 July 2025. Drawing on findings from projects funded by Deloitte and the National Institute for Health Research (NIHR), his paper explored the deceptively simple question: what would a healthy job look like?

Linking work and health data - challenges and benefits

Fri, 20 Jun 2025 12:00:00 GMT

This week IER's Professor Chris Warhurst was invited to the annual Society of Occupational Medicine conference in Brighton to speak on a panel about improving work and health data. Along with the other panel members, Chris outlined the legal, ethical and practical challenges in linking existing health and work data. However, the prize is having this linked data opportunity to generate better understanding of the relationship between health and work, and then identify what causes ill-health at work and develop interventions to create healthier jobs.

IER researchers present GIG-OSH findings at Creating Sustainable Work Conference 2025

Fri, 06 Jun 2025 11:00:00 GMT

IER researchers presented their papers at the Creating Sustainable Work Conference 2025, held in Stockholm, Sweden from 7-9 May 2025, including findings from a project focusing on the occupational health and safety of gig workers (GIG OSH). The conference brought together experts and stakeholders to explore sustainable work practices and their implications for worker wellbeing and policy development.

IER leads new research on creating healthy jobs

Fri, 04 Apr 2025 12:03:00 GMT

IER has been awarded £1.5 million by the National Institute for Health and Care Research (NIHR) to lead a major study on job quality and health. Led by IER’s Director Professor Chris Warhurst, the project will explore how job design affects workers' mental and physical well-being. Poor job quality has been linked to long-term sickness absence and economic inactivity. For more information see the University of Warwick press release.

Is it the past or the present? Employment quality, unemployment history, psychological distress and mental wellbeing in the UK

Tue, 12 Nov 2024 12:15:00 GMT

Low employment quality and precarious employment have been associated with adverse mental health outcomes, yet the extent to which this association may be explained by the experience of unemployment “scarring” has not yet been explored. Drawing on UK data the article, assessed the links between individuals’ employment quality, unemployment history, and mental well-being and psychological distress. The results help further understanding of employment quality as a social determinant of health and highlight the need for both life course and gender-sensitive research in this area.

Tackling workplace dementia the focus of a new project

Fri, 09 Aug 2024 08:15:00 GMT

Warwick Institute for Employment Research is a research partner on a new project led by the University of the West of Scotland (UWS) that has secured a grant of £1.2 million aimed at tackling dementia in the workplace. Other research partners are Lancaster University, Northumbria University, Edinburgh Napier University, and Wilfrid Laurier University.

World Mental Health Day: Highlighting the role of job quality - Blog by Rebeka Balogh

Tue, 10 Oct 2023 06:00:00 GMT

The 10^th of October is World Mental Health Day and this year’s theme stresses that good mental health should be a human right for all. Currently, this is sadly far from reality.

Mental health conditions may be a barrier to work. And it is increasingly clear that mental health inequalities are also present amongst those in work. The quality of jobs and employment have implications for workers’ mental health and wellbeing.

Establishing a new National Centre for Creating Healthy Jobs

Wed, 15 Mar 2023 08:28:00 GMT

IER hosted a meeting at the RSA in London in mid-March on its initiative to establish a new National Centre for Creating Healthy Jobs.

The aim of the centre is to minimise the number of jobs that lead to ill-health and increase the number that support good health.

Investing in adult education: health and well-being benefits

Wed, 03 May 2017 10:28:13 GMT

The APPG for Adult Education commissioned the Warwick Institute for Employment Research in 2016 to conduct research into the needs of adult learners. This work was supported by the Institutes for Adult Learning (IALs). The nine Specialist Designated Institutions (SDIs), including City Lit, Morley College, Hillcroft College, Northern College, Ruskin College, Working Men’s College, Mary Ward Centre, Fircroft College and the Workers’ Educational Association (WEA),– each has its own identity, mission and distinctive approach, which adds to the rich diversity of adult education.

Our primary focus was on adult education, and on adults returning to learn. Learning can occur in education or training institutions (offline or online), the workplace (on or off the job), the family, or cultural and especially, community settings. Findings from this in-depth study highlighted local and newly Combined Authorities will be accountable for the allocation of funds with Local Enterprise Partnerships (LEPs) in setting the agenda and identifying priorities within local communities. It is, therefore, critical that the contribution of adult education, including its contribution to improving health and well-being (which are pre-requisites for progression into and within employment), must not be lost or forgotten within current and any new devolution arrangements.

It is clear that most providers of adult education have invested in reaching out to people who are disadvantaged one way or the other. Many of whom would not otherwise know about adult education and what it could do for people in their circumstances. Adult education providers have developed the expertise, teaching skills and resources to deliver non-qualification provision and/or bite-sized units that successfully engage these adults in learning again, offering a stepping stone to success. Therefore, any policy or practical interventions need to reflect this and provide flexibility. Post-devolution, local Skills Commissioners will be required to make investment decisions - which is why their role is so central to the sustainability of adult education now and in the future.

IER'’s formal ‘Call for Evidence’ in 2017 has a distinctive focus on adult education, health and well-being. The main purpose is to gather the views of key stakeholders, partners and providers on the contribution of adult education to health and wellbeing outcomes. We have deliberately not attempted to define the parameters of the Call For Evidence too tightly as we want respondents to explore many different aspects of health and wellbeing. We hope to hear from those interested in any aspect of physical or mental health, including health and wellbeing in the context of age, disability, ethnicity, gender and location. For further information contact: Dr Deirdre Hughes OBE, [email]deirdre.hughes@warwick.ac.uk[/email].