Building evidence for active work through a bibliometric review of employee physical activity and job performance

Stanković, Tamara (author), Slavec Gomezel, Alenka (author)

Physical activity (PA) is widely recognized as beneficial for employee health and well-being, yet research linking employee PA to job performance remains fragmented across disciplines, outcome conceptualizations, and theoretical perspectives. Although prior systematic reviews and meta-analyses report generally positive effects of workplace PA on health-, absenteeism-, and productivity-related outcomes, they provide limited insight into how this research field is intellectually structured or how it has evolved over time. To address this gap, we conduct a comprehensive bibliometric review of the employee PA–job performance literature. Using performance analysis alongside co-citation, co-occurrence, and bibliographic coupling techniques and interpreting results through the invisible colleges framework, we trace the field's development, identify its dominant research streams, and integrate them into a coherent conceptual account. The findings reveal a shift from early outcome-focused health and productivity studies toward more differentiated streams addressing employee well-being, cognitive functioning, and productivity-related outcomes. Building on this synthesis, we develop an integrative framework of the employee PA–job performance field, portraying its historical development, underlying theoretical underpinnings, conceptual space, and nomological network and offering guidance for future research at the intersection of employee PA, well-being, cognition, and job performance.

• Language: English
• Keywords: personnel, occupational health, well-being, employee physical activity, job performance, workplace well-being, organizational productivity
• Work type: Article
• Typology: 1.01 - Original Scientific Article
• Organization: EF - School of Economics and Business
• Publication status: Published
• Publication version: Version of Record
• Publication date: 01.06.2026
• Year: 2026
• Number of pages: Str. 127-154
• Numbering: Vol. 28, iss. 2, article no. 4
• PID: 20.500.12556/RUL-183254
• UDC: 331.3
• ISSN on article: 2335-4216
• DOI: 10.15458/2335-4216.1372
• COBISS.SI-ID: 280177667
• Publication date in RUL: 09.06.2026

Record is a part of a journal

• Title: Economic and business review
• Publisher: Ekonomska fakulteta
• ISSN: 2335-4216
• COBISS.SI-ID: 268649216

Licences

• License: CC BY 4.0, Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International
• Link: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/
• Description: This is the standard Creative Commons license that gives others maximum freedom to do what they want with the work as long as they credit the author.

Secondary language

• Language: Slovenian
• Keywords: kadri, zdravje pri delu, dobro počutje, delovni učinek