Embed Size (px)
Citation preview
Are We Coping with Stress ?
Philip DeweDepartment of Organizational
PsychologyBirkbeck
University of London
Stress “Working Conditions Causing More
Stress” “Stress The Modern Day Killer” “Job Stress,Trauma and the
Working Population” “What Ever Happened to Work Life
Balance?”
“A large number of patients
complaining of morbid anxiety, unaccountable fatigue and irrational fears”
“the diagnosis of nervous exhaustion became part of the office furniture of most physicians.”
“Sometimes I need some time out,
to get away, change the setting, so I get out of the area, doing something different.”
“I don’t get visibly upset, I say it doesn’t bother me but I know it does. I have high blood pressure.”
“ I’ll go home at night and I don’t
even want to talk about work. I’m done with it.”
Tired, frustrated, exhausted and anxious – too ready to take problems home – no incentive to cope”
“ I just wanted to cry”
The Context
• Rediscovering stress in the 20th century
• Defining stress – what exactly are we talking about when we talk about stress – from stress to emotions
• The different causes of stress at work • Coping with stress at work from capacity techniques to coping behaviours
Learning from history
• Is it a disease of our time?
• Has it in some guise always been with us?
• Does it serve a social purpose?
• Whatever the label is it some attempt to explain the relationship between the individual and the environment?
Defining Stress
Stress as an interaction
•Stress as Stimulus – the properties of a demanding situation or event that have the potential to cause stress
•Stress as a Response – ‘being under stress – those behavioural, physiological and cognitive responses to a demanding event
• Stress becomes the interaction between a stimulus and a response
Stress as an interaction
• Stress is more complicated than a simple interaction between stimulus and response
• The idea is that the nature of the interaction between the stimulus and the response is influenced by a ’moderator’ variable.
• So, other things like for example, age, gender, experience, personality all influence the stimulus-response interaction.
Stress as an transaction
• The problem with interaction definitions is that they tell us nothing about the dynamics of the relationship between the stimulus and the response
• What we need to understand is what are those processes that link the stimulus to a stress response
• So, we need to think of stress as some sort of a transaction between the individual and the environment.
Stress as a transaction
• If we think of stress as a transaction then we can begin to think about what makes an event stressful
• The process that an individual goes through to determine whether an event is stressful is determined by how the event is appraised.
• So, appraisals become the key ideas to understand the true nature of stress
Stress as a transaction
It is believed we make what are called two appraisals
• Primary appraisal – ‘what is at stake?’
the significance of the event and its meaning to us
• Secondary appraisal – ‘what can I do about it?’ What resources are at my disposal and what control do I have over the situation
Causes of stress at work
• Role overload – too much work to do in the time available (quantitative overload) – job becoming more and more complex (qualitative overload)
• Role conflict – conflict between colleagues (interpersonal conflict); conflicting job requirements (inter role conflict); conflict between an individual and manager (intrasender conflict)
Causes of stress at work
• Role ambiguity – ambiguity as to how your performance is being judged and ambiguity as to what is expected of you.
• Career development – e.g. opportunities; promotions; sense of achievement
• Organizational factors – e.g. culture; leadership; new technology; electronic performance monitoring; physical environment.
Causes of stress at work
• Work- life balance – e.g. long hours; conflicts between home and work; balance; travel; dual careers.
• Job insecurity – e.g. employment relationships; redundancy; mergers, takeovers and downsizing.
• Violence at work – e.g. bullying; harassment; dangerous situations; criminal activity.
Stress responses
• Behavioural – e.g. absenteeism (job flight); performance mistakes and errors (work disruptions); vandalism, self damaging activities; rumour spreading (work behaviours).
• Physiological e.g.- heart rate; blood pressure.
• Psychological e.g. – tension, boredom; exhaustion; burnout; depression; self confidence.
Stress responses
What about emotions?
• Perhaps the best way to understand stress is to discard the term stress and think in terms of emotions
• Thinking in terms of emotions allows us to link particular emotions to how the situation is appraised
• Emotions include anger, frustration, hope, resentment; irritation; happiness; relief; anxiety
Coping
Two types of Coping
• Capacity Techniques – techniques that build our capacity to cope with stress
• Specific behaviours – problem-focused strategies and emotion focused strategies
Remember that coping is embodies in secondary appraisal – ‘what can I do about it?
Coping
Capacity Techniques• Exercise• The relaxation response• Meditation• Biofeedback• Philosophy of Life
CopingSpecific StrategiesProblem-Focused
(Rational Task Oriented Behaviour)
‘set objectives/priorities’‘work harder’‘try to find out more about the situation’‘Consider a range of plans for handling
the situation’‘Stand back and try and rationalize the situation’
CopingEmotion-Focused Coping
Emotional Relief‘Lose your temper for a moment’‘Express your irritation to other work colleagues to
be able to let off steam’‘Take your feelings out on staff or whoever
happens to be around’‘Get rid of the tension by expressing some
irritability and frustration to yourself – swearing, slamming things down, crumpling up paper’
‘Express your feelings and frustration to others so you can think rationally about the problem’
CopingUsing Home Resources
‘Talk things over with your partner when you get home at night’
‘Leave the problem and try and solve it later by talking it through at home’
‘Forget work when finished for the day’‘Face the situation knowing that your family give
you help and a sense of proportion to the problem’
‘Take some of your work home and work on it there’
CopingPreparing yourself to deal with the problem
‘Move onto other work activities that you know that you can get satisfaction from’
‘Take a break and come back to the problem late’
‘Tackle routine work so that you can cool down and get composure back’
‘Simply drop what you are doing and take up something totally unrelated’
‘Try and get as much rest as possible so you will be fresh and alert at work’
CopingDistracting Yourself
‘Make an effort to distract yourself with some fun or pleasurable activity’
‘Go and have a few beers or other drinks’‘Leave your desk and go to another part of the
office for a while’‘Just become more involved in life away from
work- leisure, hobbies’‘Leave the office and go home early’‘Take a day off’
CopingPassive attempts to tolerate the effect
‘Just let the feeling wear off’‘Just give up and accept what is happening’‘Do nothing and try and carry on as usual’‘Try to reassure yourself that everything is
going to work our all right’‘Get support from the fact that not all
problems can be solved even at a national level’
‘Try not to worry or think about it’
Coping
Coping effectivenessThe key question here is:
‘effectiveness for whom and at what cost.’
Summary• Less emphasis on the word stress and
more emphasis on thinking in terms of emotions
• Seeing primary appraisal (‘what is at stake’) as the key link
• Recognizing that coping is significantly linked to the meaning we give to the situation – i.e. primary appraisal
• Agreeing that the effectiveness of coping is a complex issue and needs to be seen in contexts.
