Crowding, density and the job satisfaction of clerical employees

The objective of this study was to investigate the relation between perceived crowding, density, and job satisfaction for a sample of 195 public service employees. Contrary to predictions and previous findings, it was found that crowding was unrelated to satisfaction with work itself, coworkers, supervision, and pay. Employees in less dense sections reported higher satisfaction with work itself than those in denser sections. These results were found using multiple regression and statistically controlling for skill‐utilization, influence, variety, pressure, age, education, tenure, and income. There was a small negative association between crowding and satisfaction with promotion opportunities. However, analyses of this association using two stage least‐squares procedures did not identify any causal relationships between crowding and promotion satisfaction. The results were similar for both males and females, although crowding accounted for more of the variance in job satisfaction for females than for males. The strongest predictor of job satisfaction was skill‐utilization which accounted for up to 42% of the variance whereas crowding accounted for less than 6% of the variance. The results were interpreted in terms of the task demands of clerical jobs which, being routine and simple, were relatively unaffected by changes in crowding and density. The importance of the task as a moderator of the crowding‐satisfaction relationship was briefly discussed.