164 Chapter 6 limited size of the population (i.e., individuals with chronic liver disease), the sample size in our study is relatively small, limiting statistical power. This may have affected the robustness of the model tests. Finally, even though chronic liver patients encounter many obstacles that are representative of other chronic illnesses, the results may not be generalizable to chronic patients with every other kind of medical condition. Moreover, the current sample consisted of chronically ill individuals who were still, or again, working to some extent. Accordingly, our findings may not generalize to individuals with a chronic health condition who are – at present – more severely ill and are not currently working. Future Research The current research suggest that chronically ill employees may be able to directly influence their own health impairment and motivational processes through the use of proactive vitality management. Nonetheless, further research is needed to examine when chronically ill employees may be more inclined to proactively manage their vitality than others. Theoretically, wemay assume that individuals with a chronic health condition have ample reason to proactively manage their vitality in order to remain functional. However, while individuals need reason-to motivation to be proactive about something first and foremost, proactive behavior is driven by ‘can-do’ motivation as well. Can-do motivation involves perceptions of self-efficacy and feasibility regarding the goal one aims to achieve (Parker et al., 2010). In practice, and perhaps particularly for chronically ill individuals, can-do motivation may sometimes pose an obstacle to bringing about proactive behavior. More specifically, they may not always feel able or confident to change the status quo, and influencing their own occupational health and performance may not always seem (or be) feasible for them. Indeed, research shows that chronic illness can have a negative effect on work self-efficacy (Beatty, 2012). In addition to self-efficacy, can-do motivation may also be affected by the relative presence or absence of job demands and available job resources. The current investigation focuses on proactive behaviors aimed at changing aspects of the self. Nevertheless, every job comes with potentially fluctuating levels of demands and resources. To what extent these job demands and resources play a role in the proactive vitalitymanagement process is a question beyond the scope of the current study, but may be worth addressing in future research. For example, individuals may show different
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