IMPACT OF COVID-19 PANDEMIC CRISIS ON EMPLOYEES PSYCHOLOGICAL WELL BEING: A SYSTEMATIC LITERATURE REVIEW

Abstract

Stress, sadness, and anxiety of employees can lead to decreased job performance and increased absenteeism. Although there is evidence that many common mental health disorders in the workplace are preventable and curable, the working population's use of psychological therapies is low. During this epidemic crisis, identifying the factors that affect the employees' psychological well-being is important in the human context and countries' economic context, as employees are the main asset of each company or sector individually. The psychological behavior of employees has a distinct impact on their job performance. This study aims to review the past literature, determine the factors that affect employees' psychological burden and mitigate psychological burden during this COVID-19. This study would assist policymakers in responding to how to overcome the psychological burdens of the employees during this epidemic crisis. This paper reviews literature from 2018 to present according to PRISMA criteria to identify the findings and gaps in the previous literature, in the areas of factors affecting psychological burden and factors mitigating psychological burden in the COVID -19 pandemic both in Sri Lankan and foreign industrial and service sectors. The finding workload, infection risk, work-related relationships, uncertainty on future, information receiving frequency, and concern towards family were identified as the factors affecting psychological burden. Psychological support at home and office, hobbies, resiliencies, access to healthcare, protective materials, infrastructure, and monitory compensations were identified as the factors releasing psychological burden. Thus, this study highlights the factors that less research has done in the Sri Lankan context regarding factors affecting psychological burden and mitigating psychological burdern in this COVID-19 pandemic.