Recharged and ready: a week-level diary study exploring an integrated model of weekend recovery, incorporating circadian and boundary perspectives, and their relationship with weekly performance

Schroeder, Callum

Recharged and ready: a week-level diary study exploring an integrated model of weekend recovery, incorporating circadian and boundary perspectives, and their relationship with weekly performance

Thesis / Dissertation

2025

Publisher

University of Cape Town

Department

Organisational Psychology

Faculty

Faculty of Commerce

Abstract

The ability to effectively recover from work-related stressors during weekends is increasingly recognised as vital for the well-being and performance of employees. Given their theoretical alignment with recovery, this study extends an integrated model of weekend recovery by incorporating a boundary perspective (i.e., psychological reattachment to work) and a circadian perspective (i.e., sleep characteristics), offering a more comprehensive understanding of how these components interact with employees' recovery and ultimately influence their weekly job performance. In addition, positioning the weekend as the recovery context provided the opportunity to examine the impact of culture, religion, and spirituality on recovery, particularly as they relate to activities performed during leisure time. Using a longitudinal research design with repeated measures, quantitative data was collected from employees (N = 88) across various companies in South Africa over the course of three weeks before and after weekends. Multilevel model results, primarily at the person level (n = 57), indicated that low-duty activities positively predicted weekend recovery experiences (including psychological detachment, relaxation, and mastery experiences), with physical activities and cultural activities being the most conducive to the recovery experiences. Conversely, high-duty activities were not found to be significant negative predictors of weekend recovery experiences. It was also found that religious and spiritual activities, while not conducive to overall recovery experiences, were positively predictive of psychological detachment from work. Interestingly, inspection of the results for sleep quality and weekend catch-up sleep revealed that sleep quality positively predicted weekend recovery experiences only when high-duty and low-duty activities were removed from the model. Weekend catch-up sleep was not found to be a significant predictor of weekend recovery experiences among the current sample. Week-level findings (n = 102) indicated that weekend recovery experiences positively predicted the state of being recovered on Monday; however, they did not promote psychological reattachment. Nevertheless, it was found that psychological reattachment to work on Monday was found to be the most beneficial recovery-related outcome for optimal weekly job performance (i.e., task performance and work engagement), as opposed to the state of being recovered, which solely promoted employees' task performance for the remainder of the workweek. Ultimately, the relevant implications, limitations, and suggestions for future research are presented.