Effect of Mental Workload on Employees Cyberloafing: Mediating Role of Social Undermining

The aim of present study is investigating the Effect of mental workload on employee cyberloafing at workplace with considering the mediating role of social undermining.

Present study is an applied research in terms of purpose and a descriptive-survey research in terms of method. The statistical population of this research is personnel of high schools in Yazd city. A sample comprising of 120 members was selected using clustering random sampling method. The statistical instruments consisted of three questionnaires including cyberloafing scale (Stoddart, 2016), mental workload scale (Rubio-Valdehita, López-Núñez, López-Higes & Díaz-Ramiro, 2017) and social undermining scale (Hamza, 2018). Reliability of the scales were confirmed by Cronbach’s Alfa and composite reliability. Validity of the scales were confirmed by confirmatory factor analysis. Data analysis, was done using descriptive statistics (mean, standard deviation, skewness and kurtosis) and inferential statistics (correlation test, confirmatory factor analysis and structural equation modeling) using SPSS 22 and Smart-PLS 2 softwares.

The results showed that there were significant correlations between all research variables. Also, mental workload has direct, positive and significant impact (0.515) on cyberloafing. Mental workload has indirect and significant impact (0.159) on cyberloafing too. Mental workload can predict social undermining at workplace positively and its direct effect is 0.723. Also, social undermining has direct, positive and significant impact (0.712) on cyberloafing.

Mental workload has direct effect on cyberloafing at workplace and also indirect effect via the mediating role of social undermining and indirect effect is more than direct effect.