Anxiously engaged: general anxiety as a moderator of techno-insecurity and work engagement

As technology advances in the workplace, employees are feeling left behind and increasingly subjected to new stressors, such as techno-insecurity. Techno-insecurity is defined as employees feeling threatened about their job security due to the increasing integration of technologies (Ragu-Nathan et al., 2008). According to the Conservation of Resources (COR) theory (Hobfoll, 1989), techno-insecurity represents an anticipated loss of resources (e.g., job, income) due to technology. Consistent with the broader job insecurity research (Jiang & Lavaysse, 2018), this resource threat may undermine employee motivation, such as work engagement (WE; i.e., a positive state characterized by persistent work-related focus, commitment, and energy, Schaufeli et al., 2006). Thus, we hypothesize that techno-insecurity is negatively related to WE (H1). Contrarily, COR theory also suggests that employees may enact job preservation strategies as investments of resources into protective and promotive work efforts to secure their jobs (Shoss et al., 2023). WE indicates a job preservation strategy that illustrates employees’ workplace motivation. We hypothesize that general anxiety (e.g., experiencing general worry, fear, and irritability outside of work; Spitzer et al., 2006) moderates the relationship between techno-insecurity and WE (H2) to explain the theorized differential effects. We expect employees with higher levels of general anxiety to have a positive relationship with WE; their heightened sensitivity to threat provokes them to mobilize energy into job preservation strategies to combat being viewed as disposable. We expect a negative relationship for employees with lower levels of general anxiety; the threat posed by techno-insecurity may not trigger the same urgency for job preservation efforts. We recruited 489 participants from Prolific to complete assessments for techno-insecurity (Ragu-Nathan et al., 2008) and general anxiety (Spitzer et al., 2006) at Time 1 and WE (Schaufeli et al., 2006) at Time 2. Techno-insecurity was not related to WE (b = .04, p = .429), failing to support H1; however, general anxiety moderated this relationship (b = .13, p = .040). The relationship was positive for employees with high (+1 SD) general anxiety levels (b = .15, p = .030), whereas the relationship was negative but insignificant for employees with low (-1 SD) general anxiety levels (b = -.06, p = .490), partially supporting H2. General anxiety’s moderating role in the relationship between techno-insecurity and WE suggests that some employees may be engaging with their work out of desperation for job preservation rather than healthy motivation.