The GHOSTWORK-project started with a survey focused on where in the E Currently, our efforts are focused on drafting the first interview-based article elaborating on the emergent process of ‘negotiation’ workers demonstrated in navigating the precarity of platform work and the precariousness of the microworking experience. The findings suggest the importance of seeing workers as active agents navigating platform work conditions. We have disseminated this knowledge at two conferences: British Sociological Association Work, Employment & Society Annual Conference 'Rethinking Resistance in the Workplace' (Glasgow, Sept 13-15 2023); International Network on Digital Labor 6 'Digital Labor in the Wake of Pandemic Times' (Berlin, Oct 9-11 2023). In the second Subproject, a comprehensive literature review was performed to conceptualize the working conditions in microwork. This review identified six novel working conditions very specific to microwork that were corroborated with the interview data from first Subproject. Nine working conditions from established models appeared prominently in the literature and were adapted for the measurement instrument to assess microworkers' work conditions. This resulted in a total of 15 definitions of novel and established working conditions.The initial pool of items and definitions were subjected to content validation procedures with academic experts and workers, rating the items regarding their relevance, representativeness, and clarity. Based on the content validation feedback, concept definitions were refined, and the initial item pool was reduced. To validate the newly developed measurement scale, a survey containing the new items was created and distributed among workers on the platforms MTurk, Microworker, Clickworker, and Picoworker (N=407). A 15- factor model showed sufficient fit. Item reduction was performed in an iterative manner. Based on these analyses the scale was shortened to comprise 61 items, four to six items per dimension. Model fit shows excellent fit of the data in a 15- factor model, establishing a psychometrically sound measurement scale. We have disseminated this knowledge at two conferences: The SISEC conference in Italy (2024) and the Junior Research Day of the Department of Public Administration and Sociology (Erasmus University Rotterdam).
Subsequently, in Subproject 2, we address the short-term dynamics of microwork for workers' work conditions and well-being by investigating intraindividual processes and the importance of interindividual differences. We measured stable individual differences in motivation for platform work, daily indicators of well-being, daily activities (platform, job, household, social, physical, and low-effort activities), and playful work design (i.e. proactive play during activities). 122 individuals filled out 457 days and 3582 activities. We found that the intrinsic and extrinsic motivation to enter microwork has important implications for well-being in terms of exhaustion, work engagement, and detachment, as well as how the daily hours expended impact their well-being. In addition, we found that designing fun and designing competition primarily attenuate how extrinsically motivated activities are experienced. In contrast, playful work design mainly had main effects during intrinsically motivated activities. Taken together, the findings elucidate how inter- and intraindividual differences determine well-being of microworkers. This study enables us to discern the unique effects of platform activities and time spent on these activities on well-being while correcting for the effects of other activities and time spent on them. The study represents a significant methodological development in the field of platform work. We have disseminated this knowledge at two conferences: The SISEC conference in Italy (2024) and the Work Design Conference in Australia (2024).
