Work and Organizational Psychology
| Work is an important part of our lives. How do we experience work? How can performance and wellbeing at work be explained, predicted, and improved? Our department actively examines these aspects of our lives, through research, professional dialogue and publication. |
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Work and Organizational Psychology team
at the Justus Liebig University Giessen in Germany
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While psychology addresses humans’ experiences and behaviors in numerous contexts, the area of work and organizational psychology focusses on a context that affects nearly everyone in the one or the other way: Their work. Thus, the area of work- and organizational psychology addresses topics such as work and unemployment, careers and professional aspirations, personal, work, team or organizational factors that cause stress and/or enthusiasm at work and that impact our development, experiences, and attitudes towards ourselves, our work, teams, professions, and organizations. Yet beside looking at work from the individuals’ side, work- and organizational psychology also addresses some organizational interests: How best to organize work, ensure a workforce that excels at its job while remaining sustainably motivated and satisfied, how to craft jobs and select suitable employees – and when to leave the job-crafting to employees themselves. When you listen to people talk about ‘their work’ – the leadership (and what they like and don’t like about it), group processes and politics, fairness and justice and the differences and similarities between colleagues in terms of culture, values, interests, motivation and skills, or their thoughts and feelings about looming or ongoing organizational changes … then you will hear topics related to the core of work- and organizational psychology. The area of work- and organizational psychology is thus both diverse and – at its best – very close to people’s experiences at work. Conceptually, we sometimes borrow from neighboring disciplines such as social, clinical, and educational psychology or organizational theory – but just as often do we create genuinely new knowledge that extends a mere application of what others have found. |
 Information about the members of our team |
Research interests  A selection of our core research topics |
 A selection of our academic and professional publications |
Teaching Courses taught by our team |
 Organizations and partners |
Directions / Contact  How to find us |