br Discussion This study found particularly high levels of p

Discussion This study found particularly high levels of poor psychological health amongst Japanese women in professional and managerial occupations. In our sample, women in professional/managerial occupations were 70% more likely to report poor psychological health than women in manual/service occupations. The Equal Employment Opportunity (EEO) Law in Japan protects women from unequal treatment at work based on their gender. Nevertheless, Japanese society still carries the legacy of male domination in managerial and some professional occupations (Benson et al., 2007; Ministry of Internal Affairs and Communications, 2013; Webb, 2010). Sekine et al. (2009) found that a higher occupational grade was associated with better psychological health among male Japanese civil servants, but not among female counterparts. The authors suggested that the better psychological health of Japanese men in higher grade positions might be due to authoritative power which was not enjoyed by women in the same occupational position. Evidence suggests that those employed in more senior occupational positions experience greater job control and less effort–reward imbalance, which may be beneficial to their psychological health (Bonde, 2008; Stansfeld, 2002; Stansfeld, Fuhrer, Shipley, & Marmot, 1999); however, this Ruxolitinib may not be the case for women, especially in the Japanese context (Sekine et al., 2006). For example, job control has been found to be lower among women compared to men across occupational positions in Japan (Kawakami et al., 2004). In addition, a Japanese study found that women in senior positions experienced more effort–reward imbalance than women in other occupational positions, while the opposite was true for men (Kawaharada et al., 2007). In the male-dominated work environment, female workers may need to dedicate great effort in demonstrating the same level of commitment to the firms as that of male colleagues in an attempt to fulfil occupational roles and gendered social roles (Ogiwara et al., 2008). Despite their dedication to work, women still have fewer prospects for career advancement in contemporary Japanese society (Futagami, 2010). These conditions may have resulted in their perception that their work is less rewarding without being held in high esteem for their occupational achievement. We found that women in manual/service work had lower effort–reward imbalance than women in professional/managerial work. This may reflect less demonstrative effort and time commitment required in these occupations, allowing women in these positions greater flexibility in meeting domestic demands, combined with lower expectations regarding job rewards (Futagami, 2010). This does not imply high levels of job quality in these positions as previous work has shown that Japanese women with manual/service occupations experience greater job insecurity and worse career prospects than women with other occupations (Futagami, 2010). Contrary to our hypothesis, we did not find an association between occupational position and psychological health in Japanese men. This finding contradicts a previous study showing that men in higher occupational grades had better psychological health than those in less advantaged occupational positions in Japan (Sekine et al., 2009). This may be due to differences in sample populations in these two studies (civil servants vs. employees from private firms). Ongoing economic recession since early 1900s in Japan may have impacted the working conditions of employees in private firms and in civil service differently. Compared to civil service, workers at private firms experienced greater job insecurity and wage restructuring, which did not exempt workers in senior positions (Casey, 2005). Bringing greater threat against one’s occupational privilege, phospholipids condition may have caused greater stress on men in senior positions (Hiyoshi, Fukuda, Shipley, & Brunner, 2012). We found strong, significant associations between psychosocial work characteristics and poor psychological health independent of household income in both men and women. The strength of the association was larger for effort–reward imbalance than in job control, which is consistent with previous findings (Calnan, Wadsworth, May, Smith, & Wainwright, 2004; de Jonge, Bosma, Peter, & Siegrist, 2000). We also found that the occupational patterning differed between our two indicators of psychosocial job characteristics – job control and effort–reward imbalance. Levels of job control increased with the increasing status of occupational positions in both genders. Conversely, effort–reward imbalance was highest for women in the highest status occupations and was not associated with occupational position for men. Furthermore, occupational position was not related to psychological health in an expected direction, while increasing income level was associated with better psychological health. These findings reinforce the notion that occupation can be a complex, multi-dimensional construct with psychosocial elements that do not always correspond with advantageous material or social circumstances (Siegrist et al., 2009, 2004).