Prediction of Absenteeism from Attitudes, Prior Absenteeism, and Performance

In a four‐year longitudinal study, data from 117 mental health employees in two organisations were used to examine baseline year absenteeism, performance, and attitudes as predictors of subsequent absenteeism. Results indicated that baseline absence behaviour was a strong predictor of subsequent absenteeism over the comparatively long temporal course of the study. Performance contributed little unique variance as a predictor when the influence of baseline absenteeism was accounted for. Baseline year attitudes increased in strength as predictors of subsequent absenteeism over the four years. Moreover, the substantial total variation explained by the set of variables showed in little deterioration between the first (adjusted R⊃2 = 0.29) and last (adjusted R⊃2 = 0.27) criterion years of this four year study. Results are compared to earlier findings in a framework of tentative implications for future research.