A study of certain correlates of job satisfaction among judicial personnel, in a district of Western Maharashtra

BACKGROUND: In present scenario, the legal profession has gained utmost importance, which makes the job of a lawyer the most challenging, with lots of mental and physical strain. The rewards can be great, but so are the pressures. High job demands lead to imbalance between what is expected and what is received (job dissatisfaction) which, in turn, leads to job strains. So, the present study focused on the impact of certain variables on job satisfaction of the judiciaries. OBJECTIVES: To study the level of job satisfaction among judicial personnel; to identify the impact of job level (hierarchy) in the experience of job satisfaction; to find the gender difference (if any) for the level of job satisfaction; and to examine the pattern of relationship of certain variables with job satisfaction. MATERIALS AND METHODS: A cross-sectional study was conducted in 1 year duration, in total 965 judicial personnel of different courts in the district of Sangli, which involved data collection using predesigned proforma. A scale, having 15 different independent predictors was used as a validated screening tool, to calculate their job satisfaction score. The most contributing variable and its correlation with job satisfaction was found by stepwise multiple regression and correlation analysis using SPSS Version-16. RESULTS AND CONCLUSION: Out of the total, Class I judiciaries were 692 (71.7%). A majority (71.4%) of the study subjects were male. Overall mean job satisfaction score was 5.38 ± 2.7. Twenty-three percent females, compared with only 9% males, had low job satisfaction (P < 0.5). The best predictor of job satisfaction in males and females was emotional exhaustion (β = 0.191) and conflicts between values and practice (β = 0.252), respectively. Higher is the job satisfaction score, lesser the level of job satisfaction. The findings of the study revealed that job satisfaction was found to be significantly (P < 0.0005) and positively correlated with all the variables in the study.