Fire Walk with Me: Exploring the Role of Harmonious and Obsessive Passion in Well-being and Performance at Work

Abstract

This dissertation discusses the construct of passion for work. Built on motivational theories that separate the quantity and the quality of work motivation and integration, the dualistic model of passion intends to better describe individual differences in strong work involvement and how it relates to employee well-being and performance. There are, however, certain questions that need to be addressed in order to fully comprehend the passion for work construct.

Through three papers, the dissertation contributes to theory and research on passion by identifying and tightening three gaps in the current literature: (a) Passion for work’s ability to explain variance in well-being and performance over and beyond similar constructs, (b) passion’s role in explaining change in outcomes over time, and (c) the extent to which the context is able to reduce some of the negative outcomes of particularly obsessive passion for work.