Eating A Lot To Relieve Negative Emotions? The Effect Of Job Demand On The Intern's Emotional Eating

With the tightening of the job market,more and more college students regard internship as an important task before employment.However,as interns are just entering the workplace,many work affairs cannot be completed well.At the same time,in order to reduce costs,many companies hire a large number of interns to deal with tedious work affairs,so the phenomenon of high job requirements is frequently seen among interns.At present,studies have found that high job demands can make many negative effects on employees,such as leading to job burnout(Moore,2000),psychological separation,work-family conflict(Thomas,2007),high resignation intention,mental and physical health(zhang shuyue,2006),and reducing life satisfaction(Lu L&Kao SF&Siu OL,2011).However,there are few studies focusing on the eating behavior of employees,especially the emotional eating behavior of corporate interns.Based on this,this study attempts to introduce job demand and job burnout into the research on emotional eating,and investigates the mechanism of the influence of job demands on emotional eating.Based on the job requirement-resource model,20 interns were selected to participate in this study.In addition,a 20-day journal study was conducted to explore the effect of job demand on emotional eating,the mediating effect of internship burnout and the moderating effect of supervisor support.The data's collection was divided into two parts.The first part collected some demographic variables and internship duration of the interns.The second part started from the evening of December 12,2018,and collected data for 20 consecutive working days until the evening of January 29,to investigate the daily job demand,internship burnout,supervisor support and emotional eating of the subjects.The results show that:(1)interns' job demand can positively predict their internship burnout.(2)the job demand of interns can positively predict emotional eating and negatively predict healthy eating.(3)intern' job burnout can positively predict emotional eating and negatively predict healthy eating.(4)internship burnout plays an intermediary role in the positive impact of job demand on emotional eating.(5)perceived supervisor support plays a moderating role in the relationship between interns' job demand and internship burnout,that is,it is perceived that higher supervisor support can reduce the positive impact of job demand on internship burnout.(6)perceived supervisor support moderates the mediating role of internship burnout in the relationship between job demand and emotional eating:the stronger the sense of supervisor support,the less the indirect relationship between job requirement and emotional eating through internship burnout.On the contrary,the indirect relationship is stronger.This research has certain significance in theory and practice.In theory,it firstly expands the research on the influence of job demand on employees'physical and mental health.Secondly,the study on the eating behavior of interns in the workplace is expanded.Finally,this study expands the research on the moderating effect of perceived supervisor support.In terms of practical significance,this study suggests that companies employing interns need to reduce the work requirements for interns and assign them appropriate work content.Secondly,interns can also take the initiative to put forward the requirement of reducing work tasks to the supervisor when they feel that the perceived supervisor support are high,so as to reduce their work pressure.In addition,interns should be aware of the negative emotions generated by high job demand when eating at night,and try to reduce the overeating behavior.Finally,when taking interns,the supervisor should also give more support and care to the interns,so as to effectively alleviate their sense of tiredness and promote healthy eating behavior.