Workplace happiness and employee mental health: A bibliometric analysis and research trends

In an increasingly complex work environment, attention to happiness and health at work emerges as a fundamental area of study. The problematic addressed here focuses on the scarcity of rigorous scientific mapping analyses concerning the relationship between work happiness (WH) and employees' mental health (MH), as well as their link to individual and organizational well-being. The central purpose was to contribute to closing this knowledge gap through a bibliometric and narrative analysis of available literature. To this end, 256 documents on the WH-MH relationship were collected from Web of Science and Scopus databases. Bibliometric techniques and co-citation analysis were employed using the Tree of Science platform. Results revealed research trends in four main areas: job satisfaction, mental health and burnout, work psychology, and leadership. Practical implications are also discussed for entrepreneurs, managers, and academics seeking to understand mechanisms influencing workplace well-being, including individual wellbeing, organizational effectiveness, and labor policy formulation. This study significantly enhances understanding of determinants of workplace well-being and provides recommendations for future research and labor practices.