Objective: The aim of the study was to examine the cross-sectional multilevel association between unit-level workplace social capital and individual-level work engagement among employees in health care settings.
Methods: The data were collected from employees of a Japanese health care corporation using a questionnaire. The analyses were limited to 440 respondents from 35 units comprising five or more respondents per unit. Unit-level workplace social capital was calculated as an average score of the Workplace Social Capital Scale for each unit. Multilevel regression analysis with a random intercept model was conducted.
Results: After adjusting for demographic variables, unit-level workplace social capital was significantly and positively associated with respondents' work engagement (P < 0.001). The association remained significant after additionally adjusting for individual-level perceptions of workplace social capital (P < 0.001).
Conclusions: Workplace social capital might exert a positive contextual effect on work engagement of employees in health care settings.