ORIGINAL RESEARCH article
Front. Psychiatry
Sec. Public Mental Health
This article is part of the Research TopicWorld Mental Health Day: Mental Health in the WorkplaceView all 40 articles
A Mediating Effect of Sense of Coherence on the Association between Work-Family Conflict and Workplace Ostracism among Medical Staff
Provisionally accepted
Na Li1
Huifeng Zhang1
Hui Zhao2
Congmin Zhang3Huinan Zhang1Fenghui Ma1
XiaoJia Tang4Cuicui Wang5
Jing Huang1*- 1Department of Health and Management, Tangdu Hospital, Air Force Medical University, Xi'an, China
- 2Department of Health Examination Center, Second Affiliated Hospital of Dalian Medical University, Dalian, Liaoning Province, China
- 3Henan Vocational College of Nursing, Henan, China
- 4Department of Rehabilitation Medicine, Northern Jiangsu People's Hospital, Yangzhou University, Yangzhou, Jiangsu Province, China
- 5Department of Gastroenterology, 986th Hospital, Air Force Medical University, Xi'an, Shaanxi Province, China
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Background: The mental health of medical professionals has garnered increasing attention in recent years. This study aims to explore the relationships and interactions among workplace ostracism, work-family conflict, and sense of coherence (SOC) within this population. Methods: From January 2022 to December 2023, a survey was conducted involving 527 medical staff from three diverse hospitals. The research utilized the Work-Family Conflict Scale, the Workplace Ostracism Scale, and the Sense of Coherence Scale. Descriptive statistics and correlation analyses were performed on the collected data. Additionally, mediation analysis was employed to assess indirect effects, utilizing bootstrap sampling to estimate confidence intervals for these mediated effects. Simple slope analysis was also conducted to interpret significant interaction effects within moderation models. Results: A significant positive correlation was found between work-family conflict and workplace ostracism (correlation coefficient = 0.613; P < 0.001). Furthermore, sense of coherence partially mediates the relationship between work-family conflict and workplace ostracism (β = 0.330; P < 0.001). As levels of sense of coherence increase, the impact of work-family conflict on workplace ostracism diminishes progressively. Conclusion: Work-family conflict is a significant positive predictor of workplace ostracism among medical staff; moreover, sense of coherence serves as a mediator in this relationship—an effect that is particularly pronounced among those with lower levels of sense of coherence.
Keywords: Mental Health, Medical Staff, Workplace ostracism, work-family conflict, Sense ofcoherence, mediation effect
Received: 26 Feb 2025; Accepted: 19 Dec 2025.
Copyright: © 2025 Li, Zhang, Zhao, Zhang, Zhang, Ma, Tang, Wang and Huang. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.
* Correspondence: Jing Huang
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