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Y. S. SCHARP
RESEARCH
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Compulsory citizenship behavior of food delivery riders under algorithmic management: A resource perspective
Yang, M., Scharp, Y., Sun, J. M., & Zhao, J. (2026). Personnel Review, 1-20.
Purpose: This study aims to examine how perceived algorithmic control (PAC) influences compulsory citizenship behavior (CCB) among gig workers, with a focus on the mediating role of organizational dehumanization and the moderating role of prosocial motivation.
Design/methodology/approach: Drawing on Conservation of Resources (COR) theory, this study conducted a two-wave time-lagged survey of 214 food delivery couriers in China. Structural equation modeling was used to test the hypothesized mediation and moderation effects.
Findings: Results showed that PAC was positively associated with CCB through the mediating effect of organizational dehumanization. Furthermore, this indirect relationship was stronger for workers with lower levels of prosocial motivation, indicating a significant moderated mediation effect.
Originality/value
This research offers novel theoretical insights by applying COR theory to explain how perceived algorithmic control can undermine worker self-worth and foster compulsory citizenship behavior through organizational dehumanization. It extends prior literature by demonstrating a moderated mediation mechanism rarely examined in gig economy contexts.
A recipe for successful aging: Playful work design and other key ingredients
Scharp, Y. S., & Bakker, A. B. (2025). In A. H. de Lange & T. Furunes (Eds.), Research handbook on older workers and occupational health and safety (pp. 173-195).
This chapter explains how individuals can proactively shape their career trajectories as they age. Drawing on job demands-resources theory and the aging literature, it develops the dynamic and adaptive aging framework. The framework proposes that successful aging is explained by resource accumulation and resource allocation to manage the demands associated with aging. The authors emphasize the role of proactive strategies, including playful work design, proactive vitality management, and job crafting, in determining trajectories. Such strategies enable people to sustain work engagement and work motivation, while also enabling them to thrive despite aging demands. They conclude that successful aging differs across people and settings and, therefore, necessitates a unique blend for each individual and situation. Yet, the most important principle derived is that aging is not a predetermined path or a straight line. Aging is much more dynamic. Successful aging is something everyone can actively shape with each choice they make.
The bright and dark side of playful work design: Navigating work engagement and workaholism
Costantini, A., Scharp, Y. S., Avanzi, L., Van Iperen, L. P., & Vignoli, M. (2025). Journal of Business and Psychology, 1-20.
Play often equates to positive experiences, but could there also be drawbacks? To answer this question, we built on the energy management perspective of play to investigate the direct, configurational, and multiplicative effects of playful work design (consisting of designing fun and designing competition) on work engagement and workaholism. We proposed that playful work design represents an effective energy management strategy for work engagement, but may also increase workaholism when designing competition overshadows designing fun. We tested our hypotheses and replicated our findings in two heterogeneous samples. Specifically, we conducted a cross-sectional (Study 1; N = 1262) and daily diary study (Study 2; N = 742 individuals, n = 2774 days). As hypothesized, designing fun and designing competition promote work engagement, while designing fun decreases workaholism, and designing competition increases it. We also found support for the configurational hypotheses. Namely, work engagement is especially high when employees enact playful work design congruently, and workaholism decreases when employees design fun more often than they design competition. Taken together, these findings underscore the paradoxical nature of playful work design: the same strategies that energize employees can also either fuel or prevent maladaptive overinvestment, depending on how they are orchestrated. The findings have important implications for research and practice.
Playful sport design and sport engagement: A diary study among amateur athletes
de Vries, J. D., Scharp, Y. S., & Bakker, A. B. (2025). Psychology of sport and exercise, 81, 102953.
Sport engagement is essential for athletes' performance and long-term commitment. Drawing on self-regulation and play literature, we propose that athletes can proactively enhance their sport engagement and, indirectly, performance (i.e., goal progression) by enacting Playful Sport Design (PSD). PSD involves proactively adding play elements to training by “designing fun” (DF; incorporating creativity, humor, and fantasy) and “designing competition” (DC; fostering self-imposed challenges, keeping score, and driving self-improvement). Additionally, we explored how PSD's effectiveness varies across different sports settings: solitary versus group training and coached versus non-coached sessions. To investigate this, athletes who trained at least twice a week participated in a four-week weekly diary study using reconstruction methodology (N = 99 individuals, n = 616 sport activities). The sample consisted mostly of amateur athletes (88 %), with an average age of 28.4 years (65 % women, 35 % men). Strength sports was the most common sport (33 %), followed by fitness (19.2 %), athletics (16.2 %), and ball sports (7.1 %). On average, they trained 3.7 times per week and had 14.2 years of experience. Supporting our hypotheses, multilevel regression analyses revealed that DF and DC both enhanced goal progression through increased engagement. Notably, DF was more effective in group settings than in solitary sessions, whereas DC was more effective in either the presence of a coach (vs. no coach) or in solitary settings (vs. group settings). The findings demonstrate that athletes can initiate play to drive their own engagement and goal progression, as well as highlight the sports environments in which this behavior is most effective.
Managing daily work intrusions: An intervention to reduce attention residue and exhaustion
van Zoonen, W., & Scharp, Y. S. (2025). International Journal of Stress Management, 32(4), 395–407
Play often equates to positive experiences, but could there also be drawbacks? To answer this question, we built on the energy management perspective of play to investigate the direct, configurational, and multiplicative effects of playful work design (consisting of designing fun and designing competition) on work engagement and workaholism. We proposed that playful work design represents an effective energy management strategy for work engagement, but may also increase workaholism when designing competition overshadows designing fun. We tested our hypotheses and replicated our findings in two heterogeneous samples. Specifically, we conducted a cross-sectional (Study 1; N = 1262) and daily diary study (Study 2; N = 742 individuals, n = 2774 days). As hypothesized, designing fun and designing competition promote work engagement, while designing fun decreases workaholism, and designing competition increases it. We also found support for the configurational hypotheses. Namely, work engagement is especially high when employees enact playful work design congruently, and workaholism decreases when employees design fun more often than they design competition. Taken together, these findings underscore the paradoxical nature of playful work design: the same strategies that energize employees can also either fuel or prevent maladaptive overinvestment, depending on how they are orchestrated. The findings have important implications for research and practice.
Playful study design: A novel approach to enhancing student well-being and academic performance
Costantini, A., Bakker, A. B., & Scharp, Y. S. (2025). Educational Psychology Review, 37(2), 47.
We use three studies to develop and validate the new concept of playful study design – the cognitive-behavioral orientation towards study tasks with the aim to make these tasks more fun and/or more challenging. Based on play and proactive motivation theories, we propose that playful study design can be assessed by items indicating two dimensions: designing fun and designing competition. Results of exploratory (N = 378 students) and confirmatory (N = 375 students) factor analyses support the two-factor structure of the playful study design instrument in a first study. In addition, we use the data of the whole sample of Study 1 to test the convergent and incremental validity of the construct. Results indicate that playful study design predicts students’ social integration, study engagement, and well-being over and above psychological capital and core self-evaluations. In Study 2 (N = 591 students), we used playful study design to predict course grades. Results show that particularly designing competition was beneficial for study performance. In Study 3 (N = 28 students), we conducted a quasi-experimental evaluation of a training intervention to demonstrate that students who learned to playfully redesign their study tasks increased their use of fun and competition when studying. As a result, they showed greater active learning, study task proactivity, and absorption over time compared to the control group. We discuss how the construct of playful study design adds to the educational psychology literature and has implications for educational practice in university settings.
It pays to play: Playful work design
Bakker, A. B., & Scharp, Y. S. (2025). In S. K. Parker, C. Knight, F. E. Klonek, F. Zhang (Eds.), Transformative work design: Synthesis and new directions, 465-480.
Job design research of the past two decades has clearly shown that individuals can thrive in jobs that are challenging and resourceful. However, it is more difficult to thrive when work is characterized by hindrance job demands, such as bureaucratic hassles and interpersonal conflicts. Even advanced work tasks may eventually be experienced as unfulfilling when these tasks become repetitive or monotonous. How do employees stay engaged on the days they are confronted with such hindrance demands? This chapter discusses a new bottom-up approach to job design called playful work design—"the proactive cognitive-behavioral orientation aimed at fostering fun and challenge during work activities through creating, seeking, and resolving surprises and complexities". Whereas job crafting is a job design strategy referring to proactively changing the prevailing job demands and job resources, playful work design takes place at the task-level and reflects proactively using an alternative approach to work without necessarily changing the nature of the job. After discussing the role of play at work, the chapter introduces the playful work design concept, and reviews recent research on its predictors, outcomes, and boundaries. It considers opportunities for future research and outlines how organizations may foster playful work design through leadership and training interventions.
Daily self-leadership and playful work design: Proactive approaches of work in times of crisis
Bakker, A. B., Breevaart, K., Scharp, Y. S., & de Vries, J. D. (2023). The Journal of Applied Behavioral Science, 59(2), 314-336.
This study investigates how employees may use proactive work strategies to satisfy their basic psychological needs during the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic. We use self-determination theory to hypothesize that daily self-leadership (e.g., goal setting, constructive cognition) and playful work design (PWD; redesigning work to be more fun/challenging) satisfy basic psychological needs and facilitate job performance. We also predict that the use of these proactive strategies is particularly important when individuals ruminate a lot about the COVID-19 crisis. Daily diary data collected among a heterogeneous group of employees largely confirm these theoretical predictions. For organizational practitioners, this study thus suggests that it is important to encourage employees to be proactive. Although this may be challenging during crises, leaders could provide autonomy and feedback to foster self-leadership and PWD. In addition, organizations may offer training interventions so that employees learn to apply these proactive work strategies.
Playful work design: Conceptualization, measurement, and validity
Scharp, Y. S., Bakker, A. B., Breevaart, K., Kruup, K., & Uusberg, A. (2023). Human Relations, 76(4), 509-550.
In three different studies, we challenge the traditional view that work and play are mutually exclusive phenomena. We introduce the concept of playful work design – the proactive cognitive-behavioral orientation that employees engage in to incorporate play into their work activities to promote fun and challenge. In Study 1, we utilized expert-ratings and iterative exploratory factor analyses to develop an instrument that measures (1) designing fun and (2) designing competition. Additionally, Study 1 evidences the divergent and convergent validity of the subscales as well as their distinctiveness. Specifically, playful work design was indicative of proactivity as well as play, and designing fun especially correlated with ludic traits (i.e. traits focused on deriving fun; e.g. humor), whereas designing competition particularly correlated with agonistic traits (i.e. traits focused on deriving challenge; e.g. competitiveness). Study 2 cross-validated the two-factor structure, further investigated the nomological net of playful work design, and revealed that playful work design is distinct from job crafting. Finally, Study 3 examined the predictive and incremental validity of the playful work design instrument with self- and colleague-ratings two weeks apart. Taken together, the results suggest that the instrument may advance our understanding of play initiated by employees during work.
Samenhang van platformwerk met werkomstandigheden en welzijn
Scharp, Y. S., ter Hoeven, C., Bakker, A. B., Gorgievski, M., den Dulk, L., & Koster, F. (2022). Tijdschrift Voor Arbeidsvraagstukken, 38(4), 580-600.
Platformwerk is een arbeidsovereenkomst die zich kenmerkt door het gebruik van digitale platformen om arbeid en monetaire beloning uit te wisselen. Steeds meer mensen werken via online platformen. Daarom is het belangrijk om mogelijke verschillen met andere arbeidsovereenkomsten in kaart te brengen, zodat kan worden nagegaan of een specifiekere aanpak nodig is. In deze bijdrage bekijken we daarom de resultaten van een onderzoek dat de samenhang van platformwerk met werkomstandigheden en welzijn peilt (N = 3620). We bekijken hoe platformwerk samenhangt met demografische variabelen, werkomstandigheden en de mentale gezondheid. Uit de resultaten blijkt dat platformwerk in Nederland voornamelijk wordt uitgevoerd door jonge mensen zonder kinderen. Opvallend is dat personen die platformwerk verrichten minder autonomie, verhoogde werkbelasting, meer monotoon werk, vaker onheuse bejegening, en minder emotionele steun rapporteren. Met name platformwerkers zagen zowel de kansen als bedreigingen van technologische ontwikkelingen voor hun werkzame leven. Platformwerkers rapporteerden minder balans tussen werk en thuis, meer baanonzekerheid, hogere uitputting en minder bevlogenheid dan mensen die geen platformwerk verrichten. Uit de analyses bleek dat hogere uitputting en lage bevlogenheid onder platformwerkers kan worden verbeterd als platformwerkers zelf proactief hun welzijn verbeteren, bijvoorbeeld door playful work design.
Playful work design and employee work engagement: A self-determination perspective
Scharp, Y. S., Bakker, A. B., & Breevaart, K. (2022). Journal of Vocational Behavior, 134, 103693.
Drawing on self-determination and play theories, we develop a process model that proposes that daily playful work design (PWD; designing fun, designing competition) positively relates to employees' daily work engagement through basic psychological need satisfaction. A total of 162 Dutch employees filled out short surveys at the end of each workday for 2–5 days (603 observations). As hypothesized, employees were more engaged on the days they designed their work to be more playful, which was explained by the satisfaction of their needs for autonomy, relatedness, and competence. Moreover, as expected, designing fun and designing competition differed in how and why they related to work engagement. In addition, we found that daily PWD was related to same-day, but not next-day need satisfaction and work engagement. Most path coefficients were statistically invariant across levels of analysis (between- vs. within-person levels), suggesting their meaning and function is equivalent across levels. However, additional analyses revealed synergetic effects between overall use of designing fun and designing competition. These findings expand self-determination and play theories by revealing how and why a proactive and playful approach to work activities and relationships fosters work engagement.
Using playful work design to deal with hindrance job demands: A quantitative diary study.
Scharp, Y. S., Breevaart, K., & Bakker, A. B. (2021). Journal of Occupational Health Psychology, 26(3), 175–188.
All job demands are exhausting, but hindrance job demands are particularly stressful since they also impede personal growth and goal attainment. In the present study, we use the dual perspective model to distinguish between agency hindrance job demands (ie, task-related stressors that cost energy and offer few opportunities for mastery and competence) and communion hindrance job demands (ie, social stressors that cost energy and limit the probability of experiencing close relationships). We hypothesize that daily agency hindrance job demands and daily communion hindrance job demands have unique indirect and negative associations with daily job performance (ie, in-role and extra-role performance behaviors) through daily work engagement. In addition, we used theories about proactivity and play to hypothesize that the association of both types of hindrance job demands with work engagement will be moderated by playful work design—the process of proactively creating conditions during work activities that foster competition or fun. Employees from various occupational backgrounds filled out an online questionnaire at the end of each workday (N= 202× 5.61 days= 1,133 observations). The results of structural equation modeling analyses supported our mediation hypotheses. In addition, as predicted, the negative association between agency hindrance job demands and work engagement was buffered on days when employees designed competition, whereas the negative relation between communion hindrance job demands and work engagement was buffered on days when employees designed fun. We discuss the theoretical and practical implications of these findings.
Playful work design: Introduction of a new concept.
Bakker, A. B., Scharp, Y. S., Breevaart, K., & De Vries, J. D. (2020). The Spanish Journal of Psychology, 23, e19.
This article introduces the concept of playful work design—the process through which employees proactively create conditions within work activities that foster enjoyment and challenge without changing the design of the job itself. First, we review play theory and the motives people may have to play during work. In addition, we use the literature on proactive work behavior to argue that individuals can take personal initiative to increase person-job fit. Combining these literatures, we provide a theoretical framework for playful work design. We discuss the development and validation of an instrument to assess playful work design, and review recent studies to elucidate the psychological effects of playful work design and its possible outcomes. Finally, we briefly discuss practical implications.
Daily playful work design: A trait activation perspective
Scharp, Y. S., Breevaart, K., Bakker, A. B., & Van der Linden, D. (2019). Journal of Research in Personality, 82, 103850.
Scharp, Y. S., Breevaart, K., Bakker, A. B., & Van der Linden, D. (2019). Daily playful work design: A trait activation perspective. Journal of Research in Personality, 82, 103850.
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