ABSTRACT
In the occupational psychology literature and in work by epidemiologists that draws upon it, the view has emerged that autonomy and control in work reduce stress and thereby ill-health arising from jobs and how they are organized. Embodiment has implications both for the medical model of disease and for the sociological model of illness and sickness. Humans not only have bodies. They are embodied. Control of labour power and effort may be analytically separable, but they combine. The key is a contest between employer and employee to control time. Time varies in meaning in this context from the pace of work at this instant, to security in the rest of an employee’s life or the future of the employer’s business. Health has both positive and negative meanings. The positive meaning attaches to well-being, having or believing one has a quality of life that fulfils one’s needs and ambitions.
