10.2190/WR.16.1.e U5235782TG768262 5 Personal Internet Usage at Work: A Source of Recovery 63 81 20120810 20120810 20120810 20120810 U5235782TG768262.pdf http://baywood.metapress.com/link.asp?target=contribution&id=U5235782TG768262 1 Lars Ivarsson Patrik Larsson Karlstad University, Sweden Despite enormous productivity increases during recent decades, it has been claimed that workers' engagement in non-work-related activities severely damages companies' productivity development. Currently, personal Internet usage seems to be the most upsetting of these activities. There is a widespread notion among management-friendly researchers, employers, and the media that all non-work-related activities are deviant and should be defeated at all costs. This conceptual article gives an overview of the organisational behaviour literature dealing with non-work-related activities at work. The prohibitive approach is both inconsistent and in practice unenforceable. This is especially true since an increasing proportion of today's private Internet usage at work is carried out by employees using their private smartphones, a fact that has not been considered in previous research. This article contrasts theories and ideas that private Internet usage at work is deviant with theoretical overviews arguing that non-work-related activities are an expression of normal action and behaviour, which can be explained with the help of both work-life balance theory and theories on resistance. An additional concept is recovery, which has not previously been used in the debate on Internet usage. Today's workplaces are populated by engaged employees who work at a fast pace and need recovery, well-deserved micro-pauses, and breaks from demanding work. Furthermore, some Internet surfing is actually a consequence of organisations' inability to come up with decent work tasks to fill the whole day. The aim of this article is to point out the recovery functions of personal Internet usage in today's working life, primarily in terms of employees' well-being and dignity. This article contributes to the debate by proposing eight situations in which the employee should be allowed to "cyberloaf" without being disciplined. The article also suggests empirical investigations that may be carried out with regard to the views and effects of personal Internet use at work in four different settings, that is, where employees' private Internet usage is officially forbidden, seemingly forbidden, allowed, or encouraged.

Ackroyd, S., & Thompson, P. 1999. Organizational misbehaviour. London: Sage.

Adams, J. S. 1963. Toward an understanding of inequity. Journal of Abnormal and Social Psychology, 67: 422-436.

Amabile, T. M. 1996. Creativity in context. Boulder, CO: Westview Press.

Anandarajan, M. 2002. Internet abuse in the workplace. Communications of the ACM, 45: 53-54.

Baldamus, W. G. 1961. Efficiency and effort. London: Tavistock.

Bateman, T. S., & Organ, D. W. 1983. Job satisfaction and the good soldier: The relationship between affect and employee citizenship. Academy of Management Journal, 26: 587-595.

Behrend, H. 1957. The effort bargain. Industrial and Labour Relations Review, 10: 503-515.

Beynon, H. 1980. Working for Ford. Harmondsworth, UK: Penguin.

Blanchard, A. L., & Henle, C. A. 2008. Correlates of different forms of cyberloafing: The role of norms and external locus of control. Computers in Human Behavior, 24: 1067-1084.

Block, W. 2001. Cyberslacking, business ethics and managerial economics. Journal of Business Ethics, 33: 225-231.

Boye, M. W., & Slora, K. B. 1993. The severity and prevalence of deviant employee activity within supermarkets. Journal of Business and Psychology, 8: 245-253.

Brown, J., Mulhern, G., & Joseph, S. 2002. Incident-related stressors, locus of control, coping, and psychological distress among firefighters in Northern Ireland. Journal of Traumatic Stress, 15: 161-168.

Callaghan, G., & Thompson, P. 2002. "We recruit on attitude": The selection and shaping of routine call centre labour. Journal of Management Studies, 39: 233-254.

Challenger, Gray & Christmas Inc. 2012. Challenger March Madness Report. 2.5 million workers spending 90 minutes a day watching basketball; it must be March. Retrieved from <a target="_blank" href='http://www.challengergray.com/press/PressRelease.aspx?PressUid=214'>http://www.challengergray.com/press/PressRelease.aspx?PressUid=214</a>

Collinson, D., & Ackroyd, S. 2005. Resistance, misbehavior, and dissent. In S. Ackroyd, R. Batt, P. Thompson, & P. S. Tolbert (Eds.), The Oxford handbook of work and organization: 305-326. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

Colquitt, J. A., Scott, B. A., Judge, T. A., & Shaw, J. C. 2006. Justice and personality: Using integrative theories to derive moderators of justice effects. Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes, 100: 110-127.

Conlin, M. 2000. Workers, surf at your own risk; More and more companies are monitoring their employees' abuse of the Internet. Retrieved from <a target="_blank" href='http://www.businessweek.com/2000/00_24/b3685257.htm'>http://www.businessweek.com/2000/00_24/b3685257.htm</a>

Coser, L. A. 1974. Greedy institutions: Patterns of undivided commitment. New York: Free Press.

Coyne, I., & Bartram, D. 2000. Personnel managers' perceptions of dishonesty in the workplace. Human Resource Management Journal, 10(3): 38-45.

D'Abate, C. P. 2005. Working hard or hardly working: A study of individuals engaging in personal business on the job. Human Relations, 58: 1009-1032.

Du Gay, P. 2006. Machinery of government and standards in public service: Teaching new dogs old tricks. Economy and Society, 35: 148-167.

Eddy, E. R., D'Abate, C. P., & Thurston Jr, P. W. 2010. Explaining engagement in personal activities on company time. Personnel Review, 39: 639-654.

Edwards, R. 1979. Contested terrain: The transformation of the workplace in the twentieth century. New York: Basic Books.

Eriksson, B. 1998. Arbetet i människors liv. Göteborg, Sweden: Sociologiska institutionen, Göteborgs universitet.

Eriksson, B., & Larsson, P. 2009. Våra arbetsmiljöer. In T. Berglund & S. Schedin (Eds.), Arbetslivet: 135-166. Lund, Sweden: Studentlitteratur.

Franklin, A. L., & Pagan, J. F. 2006. Organization culture as an explanation for employee discipline practice. Review of Public Personnel Administration, 26: 52-73.

Frone, M. R., Russell, M., & Barnes, G. M. 1996. Work-family conflict, gender, and health-related outcomes: A study of employed parents in two community samples. Journal of Occupational Health Psychology, 1: 57-69.

Furåker, B. 2012. Work attitudes, employment and work mobilization. A comparison between Anglo-Saxon and Nordic countries. In B. Furåker, K. Håkansson, & J. C. Karlsson (Eds.), Commitment to work and job satisfaction: Studies of work orientations: 67-85. London: Routledge.

Garrett, R. K., & Danziger, J. N. 2008. On cyberslacking: Workplace status and personal Internet use at work. CyberPsychology and Behavior, 11: 287-292.

Geurts, S. A. E., Kompier, M. A. J., Roxburgh, S., & Houtman, I. L. D. 2003. Does work-home interference mediate the relationship between workload and well-being? Journal of Vocational Behavior, 63: 532-559.

Ghiselli, R., & Ismail, J. A. 1998. Employee theft and efficacy of certain control procedures in commercial food service operations. Journal of Hospitality and Tourism Research, 22: 174-187.

Göransson, A. 2008. Nu surfar vi dubbelt så mycket på jobbet. Metro, May 20: 1.

Greenfield, D. N., & Davis, R. A. 2002. Lost in cyberspace: The web @ work. Cyber-Psychology and Behavior, 5: 347-353.

Gustavsson, B.-O. 1997. Det goda tjänstearbetet—förutsättningar för arbetstillfredsställelse i kundintensivt tjänstearbete. Centrum för tjänsteforskning (CTF), Högskolan i Karlstad.

Hamermesh, D. S. 1990. Shirking or productive schmoozing: Wages and the allocation of time at work. Industrial and Labor Relations Review, 43: 121-133.

Harris, L., & Ogbonna, E. 2006. Service sabotage: A study of antecedents and consequences. Journal of the Academy of Market Science, 34: 543-558.

Hasenfeld, Y. 1983. Human service organizations. Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice Hall.

Healy, C. M., & McKay, M. F. 2000. Nursing stress: The effects of coping strategies and job satisfaction in a sample of Australian nurses. Journal of Advanced Nursing, 31: 681-688.

Hochschild, A. R. 1983. The managed heart: Commercialization of human feelings. Berkeley: University of California Press.

Hochschild, A. R. 2001. The time bind: When work becomes home and home becomes work (2nd ed.). New York: Holt.

Hollinger, R. C. 1991. Neutralizing in the workplace: An empirical analysis of property theft and production deviance. Deviant Behavior, 12: 169-202.

Ivarsson, L., & Larsson, P. 2009. Service work and employee experience of the service encounter. Karlstad, Sweden: Karlstad University Studies 2009, no. 61.

Ivarsson, L., Larsson, P., & Pettersson, S. 2011. Konsumenters upplevelser av telekombranschen. Karlstad, Sweden: Konsumentverket, Rapport 2011, no. 18.

Kamp, J., & Brooks, P. 1991. Perceived organizational climate and employee counter-productivity. Journal of Business and Psychology, 5: 447-458.

Karasek, R. A. 1979. Job demands, job decision latitude, and mental strain: Implications for job redesign. Administrative Science Quarterly, 24: 285-308.

Karasek, R., & Theorell, T. 1990. Healthy work: Stress, productivity, and the reconstruction of working life. New York: Basic Books.

Karlsson, J. C. 2012. Organizational misbehaviour in the workplace: Narratives of dignity and resistance. Basingstoke, UK: Palgrave.

Korpela, K., & Kinnunen, U. 2010. How is leisure time interacting with nature related to the need of recovery from work demands: Testing multiple mediators. Leisure Science: An Interdisciplinary Journal, 33: 1-14.

Kramer, R. M., & Tyler, T. R. 1996. Trust in organizations: Frontiers of theory and research. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage.

Lim, V. K. G. 2002. The IT way of loafing on the job: Cyberloafing, neutralizing and organizational justice. Journal of Organizational Behavior, 23: 675-694.

Nolan, J. 2002. The intensification of everyday life. In B. Burchell, D. Lapido, & F. Wilkinson (Eds.), Job insecurity and work intensification: 112-136. London: Routledge.

Parent-Thirion, A., Fernandez-Macias, E., Hurley, J., & Vermeylen, G. 2007. Fourth European working conditions survey. Dublin, Ireland: European Foundation.

Paulsen, R. 2010. Maskning = motstånd? En typologi över tomt arbete. Arbetsmarknad and Arbetsliv, 16: 11-26.

Persson, A. J., & Hansson, S. O. 2003. Privacy at work—Ethical criteria. Journal of Business Ethics, 42: 57-70.

Podgor, E. S. 1991. White collar crime in a nut shell. St Paul, MN: West Publishing Company.

Recupero, P. R. 2010. The mental status examination in the age of the Internet. Journal of the American Academy of Psychiatry and the Law, 38: 15-26.

Robinson, S. L., & Bennett, R. J. 1995. A typology of deviant workplace behaviors: A multidimensional scaling study. Academy of Management Journal, 38: 555-572.

Rothlin, P., & Werder, P. R. 2008. Boreout! London: Kogan Page.

Roy, D. F. 1959. Banana time: Job satisfaction and informal interaction. Human Organization, 18: 158-168.

Sandal, G. M., Endresen, I. M., Vaernes, R., & Ursin, H. 1999. Personality and coping strategies during submarine missions. Military Psychology, 11: 381-404.

Sennett, R. 1998. The corrosion of character: The personal consequences in the new capitalism. New York: W. W. Norton.

Slora, K. B. 1989. An empirical approach to determining employee deviance base rates. Journal of Business and Psychology, 4: 199-219.

Sonnentag, S. 2003. Recovery, work engagement, and proactive behavior: A new look at the interface between nonwork and work. Journal of Applied Psychology, 88: 518-528.

Sonnentag, S., & Zijlstra, F. R. H. 2006. Job characteristics and off-job as predictors of need for recovery, well-being, and fatigue. Journal of Applied Psychology, 91: 330-350.

Stroh, L. K., & Reilly, A. H. 1997. Rekindling organizational loyalty: The role of career mobility. Journal of Career Development, 24: 39-54.

Vardi, Y., & Weitz, E. 2004. Misbehavior in organizations: Theory, research and management. Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates.

Verton, D. 2000. Employers OK with e-surfing. Computerworld, 34(1): 16.

Vitak, J., Crouse, J., & LaRose, R. 2011. Personal Internet use at work: Understanding cyberslacking. Computers in Human Behavior, 27: 1751-1759.

Von Arndt, K. 2007. Facebook—Fara eller förmån. Dagens Möjligheter, 5: 4-5.

Wærness, K. 1984. The rationality of caring. Economic and Industrial Democracy, 5: 184-211.

Waldenström, K., & Härenstam, A. 2008. How are good and bad jobs created? Case studies of employee, managerial and organisational factors and processes. Växjö, Sweden: Arbetsliv i omvandling 2008, no. 4.

Warhurst, C., & Nickson, D. 2001. Looking good, sounding right: Style counselling and the aesthetics of the new economy. London: Industrial Society.

Westman, M., & Etzion, D. 2001. The impact of vacation and job stress on burnout and absenteeism. Psychology and Health, 16: 595-606.

Whitty, M. T., & Carr, N. 2006. New rules in the workplace: Applying object-relations theory to explain problem Internet and email behaviour in the workplace. Computers in Human Behavior, 22: 235-250.

Zeithaml, V. A., Bitner, M. J., & Gremler, D. D. 2009. Services marketing: Integrating customer focus across the firm. Boston: McGraw-Hill/Irwin.