thesis topics on stress in the workplace

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Stress at the Workplace and Its Impacts on Productivity: A Systematic Review from Industrial Engineering, Management, and Medical Perspective

2022, Industrial Engineering & Management Systems

In every fast-paced surrounding, stress is present in every life aspect, including at the workplace. It is a deeply personal experience, with various stressors affecting every individual differently. This study assessed the past and present workplace stress-related information and analyzed its impact on productivity. It primarily concentrates on the field's philosophical principles, while providing a collection of directions for future study as well. This study was formed in the statement of PRISMA (Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis). The impact of stress at the workplace on the employee's productivity was observed in the cohort and cross-sectional studies from the perspective of industrial engineering, management, and medicine. Four eligible studies were qualitatively assessed from 2,642 identified literature through four databases (Cochrane, Science Direct, Scielo, and PubMed) using keywords stress, impact, productivity, industrial engineering, management, and medicine. The study was convinced that stress at the workplace contributes to worsening relationships at home, worsening relationships between superiors and subordinates as well as contracting diseases. It has a potential negative impact on productivity. Furthermore, the work environment plays a significant contribution in inducing workplace stress because of human physiologic response. Noxious stress is detrimental to the human body, especially if maintained in the long run. Therefore, stress management is imperative before it is too late.

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Stress is much in the news at present but it isn't a new problem. Pressure is part and parcel of all work and helps to keep us motivated. But excessive pressure can lead to stress which undermines performance, is costly to employers and can make people ill. Research reveals that many working days are lost to stress, depression and anxiety. Work-related stress costs a huge burden to the society. Stress takes many forms as well as leading to anxiety and depression it can have a significant impact on an employee's physical health. Research links stress to heart disease, back pain, headaches, gastrointestinal disturbances and alcohol and drug dependency. Individuals are more willing to admit that they are suffering from stress if they can expect to be dealt with sympathetically. In some cases good counseling may be all that is needed. This paper aims at studying the stressors that affects an individual at work, to examine the effects of stress and suitable measures which employe...

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Bonita Long

Michael Murray

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In today's age of automation, advanced technology & high competition, man has great dreams of a luxurious living & enjoys at the thought of experiencing it. It is a well-accepted fact that every human being is an individual with his own unique characteristics & ways of responding & behaving. These various ways of responding & behaving can be either positive or negative & these can make one's life a happy or a miserable one. These facts are true for every individual in every sphere of life. In today's fast moving world every individual strives hard to achieve their dreams & the best of luxurious living but faces stress in the process of doing so. The present study will bring to light the stress level, sources of stress & stress management strategies.

Littera Scripta

Andrea Bencsik

Erick Onsongo

Over the past few decades the stress had become a growing dilemma in organization and cause unfavorable effects on job performance. Stress is a universal element that affects employees worldwide. There are many barriers that affecting the employees in the workplace. Work stress often affects the employees in the workplace, where each employee will feel it at least once in their workplace. Work stress is a real life problem that not only affects the organization, but the employees mainly become victims of stress. stress become a familiar element in organization and nowadays the workplace become more complicated, which bring more negative impacts to the employees compared to positive impacts. Stress among workers is greater than before which also effect on the whole performance of the employees. Stress which occurred in workplace declared as harmful to physical and emotional responses that happen within a human being when the requirement of the job do not match the employees‟ capacity...

Norliyana Zakaria

The systematic review in this study is looking at the causes of stress in the workplace. The authors will identify the most leading causes of work-related stress, as well as their impacts on employees’ physical well-being, mental health and work performance. In addition, the stress factors arising from work environment or atmosphere, workplace relationships, organizational culture, career growth, role conflict, and work-life balance are highlighted. Finally, the authors discuss on several stress coping approaches, namely getting social support, attending stress coping or stress management programmes, upgrading work environment, and reforming organizational culture.

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• Int J Psychol Res (Medellin)
• v.10(2); Jul-Dec 2017

Language: English | Spanish

Psychological Resources and Strategies to Cope with Stress at Work

Recursos psicológicos y estrategias de afrontamiento con estrés en el trabajo, edna rabenu.

1 School of Behavioral Sciences, Netanya Academic College, Netanya, Israel., School of Behavioral Sciences, Netanya Academic College, Netanya , Israel

2 School of Business administration, Bar-Ilan University, Ramat-Gan, Israel. , School of Business administration, Bar-Ilan University, Ramat-Gan , Israel

Introduction:

the choice of strategies to cope with stress has differential effects on individual and organizational outcomes (e.g. well-being and performance at work). This study examined to what extent individuals differing in their positive psychological resources (optimism, hope, self-efficacy and resilience) implement different strategies to cope with stress in terms of change, acceptance, or withdrawal from a source of stress in an organizational setting.

A questionnaire was filled out by 554 employees from different organizations representing a wide range of jobs and positions.

Structural Equation Modeling (SEM; χ 2 (7) = 27.64, ρ < .01, GFI = .99, NFI = .91, CFI = .93, RMSEA = .07)

Conclusion:

the results indicated that psychological resources (optimism, hope, self-efficacy and resilience) were positively related to coping by change and by acceptance and negatively related to withdrawal. The theoretical implications are discussed.

Introducción:

la elección de estrategias de afrontamiento al estrés, tiene efectos diferenciales en los resultados individuales y organizacionales (por ejemplo, el bienestar y el rendimiento en el trabajo). En este estudio se examinó hasta qué punto las personas que difieren en sus recursos psicológicos positivos (optimismo, esperanza, autoeficacia y resiliencia) implementan diferentes estrategias para hacer frente al estrés en términos de cambio, aceptación o retirada de una fuente de estrés en un entorno organizacional Método: 554 empleados de diferentes organizaciones que representan una amplia gama de puestos de trabajo y puestos respondieron un cuestionario.

Resultados:

modelado de ecuaciones estructurales (SEM; χ 2 (7) = 27.64, ρ < .01, GFI = .99, NFI = .91, CFI = .93, RMSEA = .07)

Conclusión:

Los resultados indicaron que los recursos psicológicos (optimismo, esperanza, autoeficacia y resiliencia) estaban relacionados positivamente con el afrontamiento por el cambio y por la aceptación, y negativamente relacionados con la retirada. Las implicaciones teóricas son discutidas.

1. Introduction

The perception of stress and the ability to cope with it are very much determined by an individual's personal characteristics (e.g. Pal & Bhardwaj, 2016 ). However, what differentiates people in the ways they cope with stress remains unclear. In the current research we hypothesize that optimism, hope, self-efficacy and resilience, psychological resources that make up positive psychological capital (PsyCap), are related to specific coping strategies. In particular, the relationship between hope and resilience with coping strategies is explored to help resolve the conceptual ambiguity between these variables and extend the limited research on these relationships in the workplace.

1.0.1 Strategies for coping with stress

Coping strategies are basic categories used to classify how people actually react to stress. The best known classification (Lazarus & Folkman, 1984 ) identified two major process-oriented functions of coping strategies: problem-focused coping and emotion-focused coping. In the former, the individual gathers information about what to do and takes steps to change the reality of the troubled person-environment relationship. The latter function is aimed at regulating the emotions associated with the stress situation. This can involve avoiding thinking about the threat or reappraising it, without changing the realities of the stressful situation ( Lazarus, 1999 ).

This classification of coping provided a broad practical framework for research and practice. Since then, many other classifications have emerged. These differ in terms of the number and range of coping categories (see Skinner, Edge, Altman, & Sherwood, 2003 ).

In this study, coping was broken down into three strategies (Clarify this reference). Change corresponds to problem-focused coping as in Lazarus and Folkman (1984) which is aimed at managing stressors. In change coping strategy, the individual actively seeks to solve the problem created by stress. Acceptance is included in emotion-focused coping ( Lazarus & Folkman, 1984 ). The individual accepts the stressor as a fact that cannot be changed and decides to adapt and adjust (his thoughts and feelings) to the stressful situation. Acceptance can also be theoretically classified as meaning-focused ( Folkman & Moskowitz, 2007 ). In this case people use their beliefs, values, and goals to find or remind themselves of the benefits of experiencing stress as a way of supporting coping. Withdrawal is also based on Lazarus and Folkman (1984) emotion-focused coping. The individual feels "trapped" in a stressful environment without being able (subjectively) to change it. Therefore, the individual withdraws physically and/or psychologically from the stressful work environment. For further explanation of the reasons for the distribution into three strategies (see Rabenu, Elizur, & Yaniv, 2015 ).

1.1 Positive psychological capital (PsyCap)

PsyCap is a multifaceted construct which includes beliefs about the self (self-efficacy) and personal resources including resilience, hope, and optimism. Specifically, PsyCap is the individual's positive psychological state characterized by having the confidence (self-efficacy) to take on challenging tasks and invest the effort needed to succeed in them. This includes, making positive attributions (optimism) about succeeding, persevering toward goals in order to succeed (hope) and persevering in the face of problems or difficulties, to transcend them (resilience) ( Luthans, Youssef-Morgan, & Avolio, 2015 ).

PsyCap is an evidence-based construct ( Luthans & Youssef-Morgan, 2017 ). In the organizational context, PsyCap has been shown to be positively related to job satisfaction, job engagement, well-being, mental health and employee performance and negatively related to stress, turnover intentions, substance abuse and counterproductive workplace behaviors ( Avey, Reichard, Luthans, & Mhatre, 2011 ; Aybas & Acar, 2017 ; Krasikova, Lester, & Harms, 2015 ; Rabenu, Yaniv, & Elizur, 2016 ). For a review, (see Newman, Ucbasaran, Zhu, & Hirst, 2014 )

1.2 Coping with Stress and psychological capital (PsyCap)

Three kinds of personal variables are especially important in shaping stress appraisals (and hence coping): goals, beliefs about the self and the world, and finally the individual's personal resources can be tapped in interactions with the environment ( Lazarus, 1999 ). Lazarus and Folkman (1984) argued that the ways people cope depend heavily on the resources available to them. The pooling of resources enables the coping process ( Westman, 2004 ).

The effort motif is central to both PsyCap ( Avey et al., 2011 ) and coping (Lazarus & Folkman, 1984 ). However, in PsyCap, which is considered a resource, effort is general and not focused on a specific situation. Conversely, in coping, effort is specific to the stressful situation. Support for this idea can be found in COR theory ( Hobfoll, 1989 ). According to this theory, even when not experiencing stress, people are motivated to obtain, retain and protect their resource reservoirs. Westman (2004) found that each coping blend is based on both acquiring new resources and preventing the loss of resources. This further supports the idea that PsyCap precedes coping because general motivation is translated into specific efforts to cope with the stress. It goes without saying that there is a feedback cycle between resources and coping. A pool of resources enables the coping process while the later affect the content and quantity of the pool of resources ( Westman, 2004 ).

1.3 Coping with stress and the psychological resources that make up positive psychological capital (PsyCap)

1.3.1 psycap self-efficacy.

PsyCap efficacy is defined as the individual's confidence in his or her abilities to summon the cognitive resources, motivation, and actions needed to succeed in a task ( Luthans et al., 2015 ). Self-efficacious people set high goals for themselves, welcome and thrive on challenges and persevere in the face of obstacles ( Luthans et al., 2015 ).

Self-efficacy has been shown in the literature to be particularly important as a coping resource ( Holahan, Moos, & Schaefer, 1996 ). A longitudinal study exploring coping strategies of workers during a merger found that self-efficacy positively predicted the use of problem-focused coping but did not predict coping by avoidance ( Amiot, Terry, Jimmieson, & Callan, 2006 ).

Accordingly, we hypothesized: H1 - Self-efficacy will be positively related to coping by changing the source of stress.

1.3.2 PsyCap optimism

Optimists attribute positive events to personal, permanent, and pervasive causes, and negative events to external, temporary, and specific factors. On the other hand, pessimists attribute positive events to external, temporary, and specific attributes and negative events to personal, permanent, and pervasive causes ( Seligman, 1998 ). Thus, optimists are positive and confident about their future even when confronted with negative events while pessimists tend to blame themselves for the negative aspects of their lives, and suppress their own growth opportunities ( Luthans et al., 2015 ).

Optimism has been shown to be an especially important resource for coping ( Holahan et al., 1996 , p.31). Optimism has been associated with greater use of problem-focused coping strategies (especially when the situation is within their control), and less use of emotion-focused strategies (e.g. Epstein-Mathias, 2003 ; Luthans et al., 2015 ). Optimists are less likely to cope by withdrawal (disengagement, avoidance, etc.; see for example Carver & Connor-Smith, 2010 ).

Optimists attribute negative events (such as chronic stress at work) to external, temporary, and specific factors ( Seligman, 1998 ) and they continue to look favorably and confidently toward the future ( Luthans et al., 2015 ). Accordingly, optimism is positively associated with vigor and dedication ( Wang, Liu, Zou, Hao, & Wu, 2017 ). In contrast, pessimists tend to more passive reactions such as denial, escape, fatalism or cognitive avoidance ( Luthans et al., 2015 ). This led to the following hypothesis:

H2 - Optimism will be negatively related to coping by withdrawal from the source of stress.

1.3.3 PsyCap hope

? defined hope as "a positive motivational state that is based on an interactively derived sense of successful (1) agency (goal-directed energy) and (2) pathways (planning to meet goals)" (p. 287). Accordingly, hope is a cognitive state in which an individual sets challenging (but realistic) goals, and then strives for them with determination and energy ( Luthans et al., 2015 ).

Hope appears in the literature as a coping strategy or as a resource for coping. Korner (1970) referred to hope as a tool for emotional coping with distress, similar to mechanisms of defense. Similary, Lazarus (1999) described hope as an aspect of emotional coping strategy, but also as a state of mind. Many see hope as a personal characteristic or resource that affects the way the individual's copes (e.g. ? ). The perception of hope as a resource has become more dominant, especially in light of the transition from a more emotion based to a more cognitively based definition. Here, hope is defined within the cognitive definition of PsyCap.

The connection between hope and stress in the workplace has received little if any attention in research, but there is compelling evidence from hope research in other contexts (e.g., clinical and sports psychology) which suggests that hope may be a positive resource in stressful situations ( Avey, Luthans, & Jensen, 2009 ). Hope may have an impact on individual coping with stress by increasing the motivation to cope with a given situation. It may also operate and through cognitive change by causing an appraisal of the situation as less threatening ( Lazarus & Cohen-Charash, 2001 ). Individuals high in hope can produce alternatives for achieving their goals when the original ways are blocked ( Snyder, Rand, & Sigmon, 2002 ). Their willpower and persistence motivate the search for new ways (Snyder, 2002). Therefore, high hope individuals in stressful situations have the ability to find alternatives for action that arouse their energy and engender a sense of control rather than helplessness. Their willpower to achieve their goals in the face of obstacles/challenges leads them to cope successfully with various difficulties including stress due to changing circumstances and/or adapting to stressful situations. Behavioral or psychological withdrawal from work is not consistent with goal achievement but rather with helplessness, which does not characterize those high on hope. We thus hypothesized that among individuals in stressful situations, being high on hope, should decrease withdrawal from the workplace.

H3 - Hope will be negatively related to coping by withdrawal from the source of stress.

1.3.4 PsyCap resilience

Resilience is a dynamic process of positive adjustment or adaptation to adversity ( Luthans, Vogelgesang, & Lester, 2006 ). Resilience also refers to the ability to return to the previous level of functioning ( Carver, 1998 ) and not just "survive" but even thrive in a changing environment, (Luthans et al., 2015). According to Hobfoll (2011) , resilience refers to people's ability to withstand the most negative consequences of stressful challenges and remain vigorous, committed and engaged in important life tasks. In other words, resilience is a resource (an ability or potential) that allows individuals to withstand or recover from major stress ( Hobfoll, 2011 ).

Although coping and resilience have been explored as separate areas, coping can be confused with resilience since there is no general agreement about the concept of resilience (e.g. Rabenu et al., 2016 ). Therefore, we would like to clarify the differences between the two concepts (coping and PsyCap Resilience) before sharing our hypotheses. First, resilience is frequently defined as obtaining good results following exposure to adversity (e.g. Carver, 1998 ). Also, researchers emphasize subsequent growth (e.g. Luthans et al., 2015 ). However, coping is defined independently of its outcomes. That is, coping refers to efforts made to manage demands, regardless of their subsequent success ( Folkman, 1984 ).

Second, according to Luthans et al. (2015) "PsyCap resilience is not just a minimal coping or neutralizing agent for difficult times" (p.155). In other words, resilience is an extensive process and not specific and short term as coping.

Luthans et al. (2015) simulated the risk to vaccination and speculated that approach-coping techniques would be more positively associated with resilience, whereas avoidance-coping techniques would be associated with a negative impact on resilience (see also Holahan et al., 1996 ).

In order to thrive, people need to cope, at least partially, with the problem itself (coping by change). High-resilience individuals experience more positive emotions and less negative ones ( Smith, Tooley, Christopher, & Kay, 2010 ), so they can effectively engage in problem-focused coping ( Folkman, 1984 ). However, it requires significant internal work to emerge reinforced from moments of crisis. It has been suggested that a great deal of coping is done through the self: accepting the source of stress and adjusting to the demands. We would like to emphasize here the definitions of resilience as positive adjustment and adaption to adversity (e.g. Luthans et al., 2006 , 2015; Masten & Wright, 2010 ). The high resilience individual's use of positive emotions as a strategy for coping with stress over time may make it automated, thus requiring minimal attention or cognitive effort, which is extremely beneficial in coping ( ? ). If so, there should be a relationship between resilience and coping through change, and an even stronger relationship between resilience and coping through acceptance. Moreover, as an individual's coping ability shows wider range and variety (that is coping repertoire- the total number of different coping strategies used by the individual) it should give the individual more protection ( Epstein-Mathias, 2003 ). Since resilience refers to the ability to recover and thrive, not just "survive", it should increase the use of both change and acceptance. Thus, we hypothesized:

H4a - Resilience will be positively related to coping by changing the source of stress.

H4b - Resilience will be positively related to coping by accepting the source of stress.

Figure 1 depicts the model and its hypotheses.

2.0.1 Sample and procedure

The sample was made up of 554 employees in organizations in Israel, representing a wide range of jobs; 51% female and 49% male. Ages ranged from 18 to 67 (M = 37.8, SD = 9.57). Duration of employment in the organization was between two weeks and 45 years (average = 8.18, SD = 8.08), and in their current job between two weeks and 35 years (M = 4.46, SD = 5.07). Of the respondents, 44% worked in the hi-tech industry, 13% in traditional industries, 31% in services, and 12% in other industries; 20% were employed in public institutions, 73% in private organizations, and 7% in other settings (NGOs, etc.). Forty-four percent held various levels of managerial positions, and 56% were not managers.

The participants were sampled in three ways: 100 hardcopy questionnaires were filled out by Business Management or Behavioral Sciences graduate students at Netanya Academic College (delivered by the researcher); 459 questionnaires were distributed by a "snowball" method convenience sample, of which 367 were filled out electronically by means of a designated online questionnaire. The remaining 92 questionnaires were distributed by hardcopy. Five questionnaires were not fully completed, and were excluded from the sample.

2.0.2 Measures

2.0.3 coping questionnaire - special methodology.

Rabenu et al. (2015) pointed to the need to create a new coping questionnaire in response to criticism of the ways in which coping items in validated questionnaires were derived (from theory or somewhat arbitrarily) and worded ( Dewe, O'Driscoll, & Cooper, 2010 ). In addition, statistical analyses of coping strategies can be improper. For most researchers, factor analysis is the preferred tool to create coping components. Nevertheless, researchers over the years have raised a number of concerns about the data-reduction features of this technique, especially whether using factor loadings as a method for including or excluding coping items reduces the comprehensiveness of the measures (see Dewe et al., 2010 ). Therefore, we wrote a structured self-report questionnaire to assess ways of coping with stress. The questionnaire was constructed based on Facet Theory ( Elizur, 1984 ). A facet is "a classification of item domains of a given content universe according to some rule" (p.380).

Based on the literature, we differentiated two basic independent facets to define the coping with stress domain: A -modalities of coping (including the cognitive, emotional and instrumental coping elements), and B - direction of coping (including the change, acceptance and withdrawal elements). Sample items are: During stressful situations at work I: "Re-evaluate the situation as positive", and I: "Look for another job". Items were answered on a 6 point Likert-type scale (1 = Very infrequently; 6 = Very frequently).

The empirical results from a Similarity Structure Analysis (SSA) ( Elizur, 1984 ) supported the construct as highly valid ( Rabenu et al., 2015 ). An exploratory Factor Analysis yielded three factors (eigenvalue > 1) that explained 57.82% of the variance, and represented the elements "withdrawal", "change", and "accept" the source of stress. The Cronbach's alpha was .65 (10 items). The Cronbach's alphas for the elements were: change (3 items) α = .71, accept (3 items) α = .53 and withdrawal (4 items) α = .76.

It is difficult to achieve high item reliability because the items express various modalities (Facet A) and partially contradictory coping directions (Facet B), although all of them examine coping as a whole. Guttman (1946) showed that low reliability is to be expected under certain conditions, for instance as a function of the type of data.

2.0.4 Psychological Capital (PsyCap) Questionnaire (PCQ)

PsyCap was measured with twenty-four items ( Luthans et al., 2015 ) to test self-efficacy, optimism, hope, and resilience. Each of the four components of PsyCap was measured by 6 items. The resulting score represents an individual's level of positive PsyCap. We translated the PCQ and had it back translated into English by an independent specialist. The back translation was reviewed by Prof. Luthans to assure that the PCQ items were translated properly. Sample items are: "I feel confident presenting information to a group of colleagues" (efficacy), "I feel there are lots of ways around any problem" (hope), "I usually manage difficulties one way or another at work" (resilience), "I always look on the bright side of things regarding my job" (optimism). Items were answered on a 6-point Likert-type scale (1 = Strongly Disagree; 6 = Strongly Agree).

The reliability of the original PCQ questionnaire was α = 0.90. However, the results for optimism (α = .59) and resilience (α = .74) were lower than the ones reported by the developers of the questionnaire. Further examination found that one question reduced the reliability of the resilience variable, and three questions reduced the reliability of optimism. All were subsequently removed. The Cronbach's alpha then became .92.

2.0.5 Background Questionnaire

Demographic variables (age, gender, family status, number of children, and level of education) as well as organizational variables (seniority in the organization, seniority in the current job, employment setting, industry, management, and team work) were examined.

Table 1 presents the mean scores, standard deviations, and inter-correlations of the study variables as well their reliabilities.

Notes: n = 554. * ρ < .05, ** ρ < .01.

Coping by change showed a correlation with coping by acceptance. In other words, change and acceptance tended to be aligned, and the higher the coping by change, the higher the coping by acceptance. On the other hand, there was no significant correlation between coping by withdrawal and the other modes of coping.

PsyCap capacities were correlated weakly with coping by change, more strongly with coping by acceptance, and negatively with coping by withdrawal

3.0.1 Structural Equation Modeling

We performed Structural Equation Modeling (SEM) with AMOS version 7 to examine the hypotheses. SEM analysis examines the degree to which the proposed model fits the research data, and examines the model as a whole. The results are presented according to McDonald and Ho (2002) .

Figure 2 depicts the model as a whole. Several measures of approximation were employed. In the Normed Fit Index (NFI), the Goodness-of-Fit Index (GFI), and the Comparative Fit Index (CFI) a degree of fit above 0.90 is considered sufficient ( McDonald & Ho, 2002 ). The approximation measures found here were above 0.90, and therefore met the approximation criteria (GFI = .99, NFI = .91, CFI = .93). In addition, lack-of-fit was measured by the RMSEA (root mean square error of approximation), where the value of a suitable fit should be lower than 0.1 ( Jöreskog & Sörbom, 1989 ). In the current study, the results for lack-of-fit were sufficient (RMSEA = .07). It is recommended that χ 2 /df be less than 2; this was not the case in this study A χ 2 test to examine the difference between the model and the data found the X 2 to be significant; i. e., a statistical difference between the proposed model (SEM) and the resulting data of: X 2 (7) = 27.64, p < .01 ( McDonald & Ho, 2002 ). The percentage of variance of the endogenous variables explained by the model was reasonable, between 2. 4% and 16. 1% for the coping variables.

As shown in Figure 2 , Structural Equation Modeling (SEM) generally confirmed the validaty of the research model. Self-efficacy affected coping by change (hypothesis H1 confirmed); hope negatively affected coping by withdrawal (hypothesis H3 confirmed); and resilience affected coping by acceptance and coping by change (hypotheses H4b, and H4a confirmed).

Contrary to expectations, optimism did not have an effect on withdrawal (refuting hypothesis H2). The relationships between self-efficacy, hope, optimism, and resilience were expected in light of their relationship as multiple components of one structure, namely PsyCap. Moreover, there was a significant association between coping by acceptance and change, and between coping by withdrawal and change. There was no association between coping by acceptance and withdrawal.

4. Discussion

The research model assumed that the psychological capital capacities of self-efficacy, optimism, hope and resilience, would serve as a personal resource for coping, since coping evolves from resources and resources precede and influence coping ( Lazarus & Folkman, 1984 ). The basic premise was that the more psychological resources the individual has, the more he or she will choose coping by change and/or acceptance rather than withdrawal. These hypotheses were confirmed.

As hypothesized, the highest correlation between psychological resources and coping by change was found for self-efficacy. Individuals high in self-efficacy were disposed to view stress as a challenge to be overcome, and tend toward action and problem-focused coping. Nevertheless, all the psychological resources related significantly to coping by change. Consequently, the locus of control (in self-efficacy, optimism, and hope), viewing stress as a challenge (in self-efficacy and hope), and a strategic-pragmatic approach (in resilience) may lead to coping by changing the stressor.

Coping by acceptance was moderately correlated with each of the psychological resources, whereas the main contributors were resilience (as hypothesized) and optimism (not hypothesized). The ability to adapt, relearn, and be flexible, (resilience), as well as the expectation that good things will happen in the workplace (optimism), may lead to coping by acceptance. The relationship of withdrawal to each of the psychological resources was very low and negative. Thus, creativity in finding new ways to cope in the workplace (hope), faith in one's ability to be successful at work (self-efficacy and hope), and perseverance (hope and resilience) may help individuals high in psychological resources avoid withdrawal.

As hypothesized, hope was negatively correlated with coping by withdrawal. Behavioral or psychological withdrawal from work is not consistent with achieving goals firmly but rather with helplessness. Optimism, contrary to the hypothesis, was found to have close to a zero correlation with withdrawal. The findings showed that optimism was mainly related to acceptance.

Although not predicted, all the psychological resources (self-efficacy, optimism, hope and resilience) correlated more strongly with coping by acceptance than with coping by change. In addition, resilience affected acceptance more than any of the resources affected coping. Consequently, psychological resources may prompt the individual to adapt to demands while framing the situation in a more positive way, rather than trying to change the stressors.

One way of accounting for these findings is to consider that the type of stress serves as a moderator of the relationship between psychological resources and coping. As suggested by (Eden 2011; quoted in Pines, 2011 ), the changeableness and continuity of stress can affect the direction of coping. In changeable situations with ongoing stress, direct-active coping is preferable, but when the stressor cannot be changed, direct-active action is not feasible. People can find temporary (by means of venting or diversion) or permanent (by means of self-change) relief, and adjust to the situation. The present study addressed chronic work stress as the object of coping. However, the interviewees may experience these stressors as fixed, such that the most efficient coping direction would be acceptance rather than change or withdrawal. If other stressors that are perceived as changeable had been examined, we might have found stronger relationship between psychological resources and change than between psychological resources and acceptance.

An alternative explanation is to consider that psychological capital, unlike human or social capital, primarily affects an individual's psychological abilities. The coping direction that requires the most personal psychological work is acceptance. Psychological capital deals with who you are now and who you will become in the future ( Luthans et al., 2015 ). Hence, psychological capital identifies a transformation from one's actual self to one's possible self. Thus, acceptance may enable greater psychological growth than change, and much more than withdrawal when coping involves finding meaning that through an examination of values and goals. It is therefore possible that the relationship of psychological capital resources with acceptance is more powerful its relationship with other coping directions for various types of stress. This should be examined in future research.

4.0.1 Limitations and suggestions for future research

The present study has a number of limitations. The first is a methodological limitation: the data were gathered by means of self-report questionnaires; therefore, a report bias is possible. "Hard" measures of coping could improve the research (for example, examining avoidance coping by counting absences, etc.). Another problem concerns the correlations between the research variables, which were filled out by the same subjects.

The second limitation is that the coping questionnaire contained few items, which could compromise its reliability. In addition, it was developed by the researchers, and the tool should be tested and validated in other studies.

The third limitation is that all the research variables were examined simultaneously. Information about changes to the variables over time (longitudinal research) was not collected. This information is important when addressing dynamic variables.

Psychological capital resources significantly affected the coping directions studied here. Future work should investigate how it affects the stages before coping; namely, the initial appraisal stage (whether a certain situation is challenging or threatening) and the secondary appraisal (what the individual's resources are). The relationship between coping at the time of the stress event (as in this study), proactive coping (involving the accumulation of resources that might be useful if a threat occurs), and Psychological resources should be examined. In addition, self-efficacy was the most highly correlated with coping by change. Future work should consider the relationship between coping with stress and self-efficacy. As far as we know this concept has yet to be investigated.

5. Conclusion

The relationship between various forms of coping (by change, acceptance, and withdrawal) and positive psychological resources (self-efficacy, hope, optimism, and resilience) was examined and found to be significant. The present study contributes to explorations of new relationships between coping and psychological capital, and shows that increased conceptual accuracy can distinguish between psychological capital capacities (especially hope and resilience) and measurements of coping.

6. Acknowledgment

The authors acknowledge the valuable contribution of the late Prof. Dov Elizur to this research. Elizur, who passed away in September 2015, was part of the supervising team of the first author's PhD dissertation. He was a very special person and very dear to both of us. He will be in our hearts forever.

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Coping with stress at work

Working hard should not be confused with overworking at the expense of relationships and physical health.

• Healthy Workplaces

Everyone who has ever held a job has, at some point, felt the pressure of work-related stress. Any job can have stressful elements, even if you love what you do. In the short-term, you may experience pressure to meet a deadline or to fulfill a challenging obligation. But when work stress becomes chronic, it can be overwhelming—and harmful to both physical and emotional health.

Unfortunately, such long-term stress is all too common. In fact, APA’s annual Stress in America survey has consistently found that work is cited as a significant source of stress by a majority of Americans. You can’t always avoid the tensions that occur on the job. Yet you can take steps to manage work-related stress.

Common sources of work stress

Certain factors tend to go hand-in-hand with work-related stress. Some common workplace stressors are:

• Low salaries
• Excessive workloads
• Few opportunities for growth or advancement
• Work that isn’t engaging or challenging
• Lack of social support
• Not having enough control over job-related decisions
• Conflicting demands or unclear performance expectations

Effects of uncontrolled stress

Work-related stress doesn’t just disappear when you head home for the day. When stress persists, it can take a toll on your health and well-being.

A stressful work environment can contribute to problems such as headache, stomachache, sleep disturbances, short temper, and difficulty concentrating. Chronic stress can result in anxiety, insomnia, high blood pressure, and a weakened immune system. It can also contribute to health conditions such as depression, obesity, and heart disease. Compounding the problem, people who experience excessive stress often deal with it in unhealthy ways, such as overeating, eating unhealthy foods, smoking cigarettes, or abusing drugs and alcohol.

Taking steps to manage stress

• Track your stressors. Keep a journal for a week or two to identify which situations create the most stress and how you respond to them. Record your thoughts, feelings, and information about the environment, including the people and circumstances involved, the physical setting, and how you reacted. Did you raise your voice? Get a snack from the vending machine? Go for a walk? Taking notes can help you find patterns among your stressors and your reactions to them.
• Develop healthy responses. Instead of attempting to fight stress with fast food or alcohol, do your best to make healthy choices when you feel the tension rise. Exercise is a great stress-buster. Yoga can be an excellent choice, but any form of physical activity is beneficial. Also make time for hobbies and favorite activities. Whether it’s reading a novel, going to concerts, or playing games with your family, make sure to set aside time for the things that bring you pleasure. Getting enough good-quality sleep is also important for effective stress management. Build healthy sleep habits by limiting your caffeine intake late in the day and minimizing stimulating activities, such as computer and television use, at night.
• Establish boundaries. In today’s digital world, it’s easy to feel pressure to be available 24 hours a day. Establish some work-life boundaries for yourself. That might mean making a rule not to check email from home in the evening, or not answering the phone during dinner. Although people have different preferences when it comes to how much they blend their work and home life, creating some clear boundaries between these realms can reduce the potential for work-life conflict and the stress that goes with it.
• Take time to recharge. To avoid the negative effects of chronic stress and burnout, we need time to replenish and return to our pre-stress level of functioning. This recovery process requires “switching off” from work by having periods of time when you are neither engaging in work-related activities, nor thinking about work. That’s why it’s critical that you disconnect from time to time, in a way that fits your needs and preferences. Don’t let your vacation days go to waste. When possible, take time off to relax and unwind, so you come back to work feeling reinvigorated and ready to perform at your best. When you’re not able to take time off, get a quick boost by turning off your smartphone and focusing your attention on nonwork activities for a while.
• Learn how to relax. Techniques such as meditation, deep breathing exercises, and mindfulness (a state in which you actively observe present experiences and thoughts without judging them) can help melt away stress. Start by taking a few minutes each day to focus on a simple activity like breathing, walking, or enjoying a meal. The skill of being able to focus purposefully on a single activity without distraction will get stronger with practice and you’ll find that you can apply it to many different aspects of your life.
• Talk to your supervisor. Employee health has been linked to productivity at work, so your boss has an incentive to create a work environment that promotes employee well-being. Start by having an open conversation with your supervisor. The purpose of this isn’t to lay out a list of complaints, but rather to come up with an effective plan for managing the stressors you’ve identified, so you can perform at your best on the job. While some parts of the plan may be designed to help you improve your skills in areas such as time management, other elements might include identifying employer-sponsored wellness resources you can tap into, clarifying what’s expected of you, getting necessary resources or support from colleagues, enriching your job to include more challenging or meaningful tasks, or making changes to your physical workspace to make it more comfortable and reduce strain.
• Get some support. Accepting help from trusted friends and family members can improve your ability to manage stress. Your employer may also have stress management resources available through an employee assistance program, including online information, available counseling, and referral to mental health professionals, if needed. If you continue to feel overwhelmed by work stress, you may want to talk to a psychologist, who can help you better manage stress and change unhealthy behavior.

Recommended Reading

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• Coping after suicide loss: Tips for grieving adults and children
• Grief: Coping with the loss of your loved one
• Dealing with financial stress

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A Qualitative Study of Workplace Factors Causing Stress Among University Teachers and Coping Strategies A Qualitative Study of Workplace Factors

• Human Arenas
• Published: 10 August 2022

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• Iqbal Ahmad 1 ,
• Rani Gul   ORCID: orcid.org/0000-0003-1951-3351 1 &
• Muhammad Kashif 1  

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Workplace stress is a common phenomenon worldwide. University teachers perform many types of duties apart from teaching load and are always under stress. The purpose of the study was to explore workplace factors causing stress among university teachers. A qualitative case study design was adopted to investigate the problem. Data were collected through semi-structured interviews with 20 university teachers based on purposive sampling. The collected data was analyzed using thematic analysis technique. The main finding of this study is that extra workload, working space, job security, delay in promotions, and work atmosphere were important workplace factors causing stress among university teachers. It is concluded that workplace stress among university teachers can be reduced by providing a conducive working environment and giving opportunities for continuous professional development.

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Ahmad, I., Gul, R. & Kashif, M. A Qualitative Study of Workplace Factors Causing Stress Among University Teachers and Coping Strategies A Qualitative Study of Workplace Factors. Hu Arenas (2022). https://doi.org/10.1007/s42087-022-00302-w

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Workplace Stress Management: 11 Best Strategies & Worksheets

An American Psychological Association survey found that 31% of staff felt stressed out during their workday (cited in Tetrick & Winslow, 2015).

Help is available. Workplace stress management and wellness programs can help reduce the degree and impact of stress and restore an employee’s depleted psychological resources (Tetrick & Winslow, 2015).

This article explores what we mean by workplace stress management and introduces mechanisms and activities that can provide relief and help staff cope.

Before you continue, we thought you might like to download our three Stress & Burnout Prevention Exercises (PDF) for free . These science-based exercises will equip you and those you work with with tools to manage stress better and find a healthier balance in your life.

This Article Contains:

What is workplace stress management, how to prevent stress at work: 3 strategies, 2 helpful coping mechanisms for employees, stress relief at work: 3 worksheets to reduce stress, 3 activities & worksheets to cope with stress, how to craft prevention programs & workshops, assessing stress: 4 questionnaires & scales, best stress-relief tools from positivepsychology.com, a take-home message.

The relationship between the workplace and our psychological, cognitive, and physiological responses to stress is complex, impacted by “a broad set of occupational and work demands as well as environmental stressors” (Quick & Henderson, 2016, p. 2).

And yet, our stress response at work can typically be attributed to one of the following four workplace demands (Quick & Henderson, 2016):

• Task demands Job insecurity, workload, occupation, etc.
• Role demands Role conflict and ambiguity
• Physical demands Workplace, lighting, and temperature
• Interpersonal demands Staff density, leadership style, and personality conflicts

Workplace stress management (WSM) has been significantly influenced by the theory of preventive stress management, introduced in 1979, which proposes that it is not the stimuli that decide the degree of stress experienced by the individual, but the individual’s response to those stressors (Hargrove, Quick, Nelson, & Quick, 2011).

Over the years, many theoretical frameworks and organizational wellness programs that fall under the umbrella term of WSM have been proposed to understand occupational stress and employee wellbeing. WSM aims to understand specific stressors and take positive steps to reduce their effects (Tetrick & Winslow, 2015).

WSM interventions are typically divided into three types:

• Primary Proactive and involved in preventing stress and promoting employee wellbeing (including wellness programs, conflict management, etc.)
• Secondary Proactive and reactive, to help remove risk factors (including coping skills, employee fitness programs, job redesign)
• Tertiary Reactive, for employees who need help (including counseling, employee assistance programs, and Cognitive-Behavioral Therapy)

Stress interventions include (modified from Tetrick & Winslow, 2015):

• Cognitive-behavioral interventions Primary and secondary interventions. Changing cognitions and reinforcing active coping skills .
• Relaxation techniques Secondary and tertiary interventions. Physical and mental relaxation techniques to help cope with the consequences of stress.
• Multimodal programs Secondary interventions. Acquiring passive and active coping skills. They consist of a combination of approaches, including relaxation and cognitive-behavioral skills.
• Organization-focused interventions Mostly primary interventions, but some considered secondary. Organizational development and job redesign.
• Individual-level interventions Secondary or tertiary interventions, including relaxation, meditation, and cognitive-behavioral skills training.
• Organizational-level interventions Primary and secondary interventions, including changing working conditions and employee participation.
• Systems approach Primary and secondary, combining individual and organizational interventions.

Such interventions are often used in combination to prevent, reduce, and cope with stress.

While many of the following strategies appear simple, they require focus and commitment. Others foster a new mindset and change how we relate to work and occupational stress.

1. Controlling your stress

Our brains are constantly flooded with increasing demands and information, causing us stress and reducing our ability to focus and solve problems.

There are many steps we can take to avoid or reduce stress, including promoting positive emotions, taking physical care of our brain, and becoming more organized (modified from Hallowell, 2014).

• Ensure you get adequate sleep (don’t eat late at night and reduce caffeine and alcohol intake).
• Enjoy a balanced diet and stay hydrated.
• Exercise throughout the week and get time away from your desk, preferably in nature.
• Schedule regular catch-ups with people you value.
• Break large tasks into smaller ones.
• Maintain a tidy work environment.
• Schedule some ‘think time’ in your busy schedule.
• Allocate time for lunch and take it away from your desk.
• Recognize when you do your best work. Plan your most demanding tasks for those times.
• Walk around more, stand, or listen to music, depending on what works best for you.
• Set reminders for a ‘hard stop’ at the end of the workday.

2. When you feel overwhelmed

• Slow yourself down. When stressed, we often move into panic mode.
• Take time to perform a calming exercise.
• Move around. Walk outside or head to the break room/kitchen.
• Ask for help. Seek out people you trust.

3. Managing your energy

Demanding jobs, long hours, and increasing workloads can leave us feeling emotional, disengaged, stressed, and exhausted (Schwartz & McCarthy, 2014).

Creating a series of habits , practices, and rituals can promote your physical, emotional, mental, and spiritual energy (modified from Schwartz & McCarthy, 2014).

Physical energy

• Recognize times in the day when you feel tired or unable to concentrate. Step away from the desk, meet colleagues, or perform something interesting.
• Aim to focus for 90 to 120 minutes at a time, taking regular breaks.
• Eat smaller, lighter meals during the day to maintain energy.

Emotional energy

• Practice abdominal breathing to manage negative emotions , such as irritability, anxiety, and impatience.
• Express gratitude and appreciation for others while adopting self-compassion for yourself.
• Use a reverse lens to see a situation from the other person’s point of view. Use a long lens to consider how we might look at the issue in six months. Use a wide lens to consider the bigger picture.

Mental energy

• Switch off email and move phones away to perform high-concentration tasks.
• Schedule specific times in the day to answer and respond to emails.
• At the end of each day, make a list of key actions for tomorrow.

Spiritual energy

• Identify when you perform at your best. What strengths do you enjoy using, and how can you use them more often?
• On your commute home, or the last 20 minutes of your day when working remotely, relax. This may mean sitting mindfully or listening to music before returning to home life.
• Recognize your core values. Reflect on whether you are using and showing them to others around you. Find opportunities to be your authentic self.

We all have finite limits before reducing energy levels and increasing stress interrupt what we can achieve. Investing in healthy work habits can maintain productivity and performance throughout the day.

Download 3 Free Stress & Burnout Prevention Exercises (PDF)

These detailed, science-based exercises will equip you or your clients with tools to manage stress better and find a healthier balance in their life.

Download 3 Stress & Burnout Prevention Exercises Pack (PDF)

By filling out your name and email address below.

• Email Address *
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How we experience and handle stress changes its cognitive, emotional, and behavioral impact (Crum & Crum, 2018). The following two coping mechanisms offer practical approaches for managing stress in the workplace and can be implemented with little training.

Mindfulness

Research has confirmed the success of mindfulness at reducing perceived stress and emotional exhaustion, and improving sleep quality and job satisfaction (Tetrick & Winslow, 2015).

While we may sometimes think of mindfulness as passive and accepting, it is often the first step toward growth and change. While incredibly valuable for handling life stresses, it is also powerful enough to enrich positive and happy times in our lives (Shapiro, 2020).

Mindfulness expert Shauna Shapiro (2020) considers three points essential to mindfulness:

• Intention – why we pay attention
• Attention – attending to the present
• Attitude – how we pay attention (compassion, kindness, etc.)

A review of the literature confirms that mindfulness is a powerful and cost-free approach to coping with stress (Shapiro, 2020).

Reframing stress

While we are familiar with the negative impacts of stress, we sometimes forget that achieving a stress-free life is unlikely and, perhaps, impossible (Crum & Crum, 2018).

We must recognize that some degree of stress is crucial to our personal and professional growth. Stress reminds us that something is important to us, that we care.

People who adopt a “stress is enhancing” mindset rather than a “stress is debilitating” mindset perform better and experience fewer negative health consequences (Crum & Crum, 2018).

But how do we see stress differently?

We can rethink stress using the following three steps (Crum & Crum, 2018; Crum, Salovey, & Achor, 2013):

• See it Rather than deny stress, you must recognize and name the stress you are facing.

“I am stressed about my job interview.” “I am stressed about finals.”

Acknowledging stress can help you move brain activity from being automatic and reactive to conscious and deliberate.

• Own it Recognize that what you are stressing about must be important to you. “Owning this realization unleashes positive motivation” (Crum & Crum, 2018, p. 73).
• Use it Stress is not designed to kill us, but to boost our mind and body, and prepare for the challenge ahead. By reframing your stress response as something positive, such as eustress , you can use your heightened energy and awareness to improve your performance.

Even with long-term, chronic stress at work, you can recognize opportunities for learning, growth, or the motivation to change yourself or your situation. While it may not always be possible, if you can find a way to embrace stress, it can become a “powerful tool for helping you overcome the inevitable challenges that can – and will – arise” (Crum & Crum, 2018, p. 75).

World’s Largest Positive Psychology Resource

The Positive Psychology Toolkit© is a groundbreaking practitioner resource containing over 500 science-based exercises , activities, interventions, questionnaires, and assessments created by experts using the latest positive psychology research.

Updated monthly. 100% Science-based.

“The best positive psychology resource out there!” — Emiliya Zhivotovskaya , Flourishing Center CEO

The following worksheets share the same goal: to reduce stress.

Identifying Your Stress Resources

Your resources (internal and external) provide a potentially limitless amount of support that will sustain you during challenging times and stressful situations (Niemiec, 2019).

The Identifying Your Stress Resources worksheet helps you recognize your resources and identify how they can support your strengths.

Stress Decision Framework

The Stress Decision Framework worksheet helps you put decision-making in context, aiming for a good enough , not perfect , decision (Armstrong, 2019).

Vicious Versus Virtuous Stress Thinking

Stress is a choice, yet it is often perpetuated by negative (vicious) cycles of thinking (Armstrong, 2019).

It doesn’t have to be this way.

Using a cognitive-behavioral approach, it is possible to reframe unhelpful beliefs and thinking, and adopt a virtuous cycle of thinking.

The Vicious Versus Virtuous Stress Thinking worksheet helps you compare unhelpful and helpful thinking regarding an event (Armstrong, 2019).

The cost of workplace stress – and how to reduce it – Rob Cooke

Coping with stress can often be about gaining control of what is – or, more importantly, what we perceive to be – within our control. The following activities and exercises can help.

One-Hour Stress Plan

When we feel overwhelmed, we get stressed, which can damage our focus and cloud our thinking. “Working within a limited time frame is important because the race against time keeps you focused” (Bregman, 2014, p. 157).

Use the One-Hour Stress Plan worksheet when stressed to plan and work through what you can in 60 minutes. At the end of the hour, you will have progressed and can repeat the exercise as many times as you like (modified from Bregman, 2014).

Stress as a Stimulus for Change

Sometimes stress is a good indication that something in your life needs to change.

The Stress as a Stimulus for Change worksheet can capture what you wish to change in your life and begin the transformation process.

Workplace Mindfulness

Mindfulness can be a powerful way to adopt a state of loving-kindness about yourself and others, and has significant benefits to how you handle stress (Shapiro, 2020; Tetrick & Winslow, 2015).

The Workplace Mindfulness worksheet can help decrease stress and improve workplace satisfaction through a series of simple questions asked when relaxed and present.

Instead, a multimodal approach should be considered when crafting prevention programs and workshops (Tetrick & Winslow, 2015).

Most likely, it will be necessary to put in place learning and education that are both proactive and reactive.

Proactive interventions

Focus on preventing stress (removing risk factors) and promoting positive actions for all employees.

Interventions are likely to include:

• Conflict management
• Employee wellness
• Job redesign and the organization of work
• Coping skills
• Employee fitness programs (for employees with known risk factors)

Reactive interventions

Focus on helping employees who need assistance.

• Cognitive-Behavioral Therapy
• Rehabilitation after illness or returning to work
• Employee assistance programs

A multimodal approach combines multiple intervention styles and techniques, and can be rolled out across the organization while focusing on the individual (Tetrick & Winslow, 2015).

The following questionnaires measure a respondent’s current degree of stress and assess their risk of experiencing future stress.

Perceived Stress Scale

The Perceived Stress Scale is one of the most widely used measures of the perception of stress (Cohen, 1994; Cohen & Williamson, 1988).

The 10 questions are answered with a rating between 0 (never) and 4 (very often).

For example:

In the last month, how often have you been upset because of something that happened unexpectedly?

In the last month, how often have you felt nervous and “stressed”?

Life Events and Difficulties Schedule (LEDS) and Stress and Adversity Inventory (STRAIN)

LEDS is a structured interview used to assess stressor exposure over a lifetime. It has since been turned into an online version known as STRAIN (Crosswell & Lockwood, 2020).

“Both measures provide a comprehensive assessment of stressor exposures across the lifespan” (Crosswell & Lockwood, 2020, p. 2) and can be valuable for research and therapy.

Stress Mastery Questionnaire (SMQ)

The American Institute of Stress offers the SMQ as an online self-assessment of stress risk.

The results, plus a 66-page Stress Mastery Guide and Workbook , provide a personalized stress risk profile that can help you lead a less stressed, more enjoyable life.

You’ll find a range of powerful stress-related interventions and assessment tools available throughout our site. Check out the following for some of our favorites:

• Radical Acceptance of a Distressing Situation This worksheet presents a sequence of eleven questions to help clients reflect on a current or past distressing situation and work toward radically accepting the reality of that event.
• Changing Physical Habits This worksheet helps clients reflect on their vulnerabilities and routines surrounding aspects of their physical health and consider steps to develop healthier habits.
• Coping With Stress This two-part exercise invites clients to list experienced physiological and emotional symptoms of stress and brainstorm strategies to reduce, cope with, or eliminate these sources of stress.
• Coping: Stressors and Resources This worksheet helps clients identify past, present, and future stressors and link them with coping resources they can use to overcome them.
• Squeeze and Release This group activity helps participants discover the energizing potential of positive stress, known as eustress , which can help improve motivation, performance, and emotional wellbeing.
• 13 Stress-Relief Books About the Science of Managing Anxiety This article provides an excellent selection of stress-relief books .
• 17 Stress & Burnout Prevention Exercises If you’re looking for more science-based ways to help others manage stress without spending hours on research and session prep, check out this collection of 17 validated stress-management tools for practitioners . Use them to help others identify signs of burnout and create more balance in their lives.

Our physical and mental wellbeing, work environment, and the demands of our job all impact our degree of stress. They also influence our performance and productivity in the workplace.

Reducing stressors and managing their impact by adopting effective coping mechanisms help us regain a sense of control (Quick & Henderson, 2016).

According to Angela Armstrong (2019), stress is a choice. Appropriate workplace stress management (personal and organizational) helps us identify ways to control what we can and learn how to see things differently when we cannot.

With the right mindset, seeing stress as enhancing, we can increase our motivation and see challenges as opportunities for growth rather than debilitating obstacles (Crum et al., 2013).

There are powerful tools to help. In recent years, mindfulness in particular has become increasingly popular for stress reduction, helping individuals to confront situations “in an accepting, nonjudgmental manner” (Tetrick & Winslow, 2015, p. 8).

Why not review some strategies, techniques, and tools in this article and identify what can help you, your employees, or your clients manage the impact of stress or turn it into something positive and life enhancing?

We hope you enjoyed reading this article. Don’t forget to download our three Stress & Burnout Prevention Exercises (PDF) for free .

• Armstrong, A. (2019). Resilience club: Daily success habits of long-term high performers . Rethink Press.
• Bregman, P. (2014). A practical plan when you feel overwhelmed. In HBR guide to managing stress at work (pp. 27–50). Harvard Business Review Press.
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I’m looking for an active stress avoidance / proactive approach to a stress-free work experience. This article appears to focus on alleviating the effects of stress rather than designing a work experience that removes it, and/or deals with those in positions of power in the workplace who rely on others for results and enforce this through control techniques, resulting in high employee stress, since the techniques are seldom nice, polite, sustainable or implemented with the employee’s long term well being in mind. I need workplace strategies that negate those manipulations and exploitations put in place by the hierarchy to simply get more work from employees, no matter what. Engagement surveys, annual reviews, and many workplace methodologies are in fact trojan horses. Please advise, many thanks Alvin Zest

Thanks for your comment; I completely understand where you’re coming from. Many of the dominant approaches to addressing strain, stress, and high work demands in organizations are largely reactive and center on ‘undoing’ the harm (i.e., stress) done to employees after it’s already done, rather than being proactive and creating conditions that prevent the harm in the first place. However, more research is coming out that’s looking at these proactive strategies.

Research is a long way from identifying a complete solution, but I would encourage you to look into the research and efforts by a researcher named Sharon Parker and her colleagues at the Center for Transformative Work Design. Some of the videos on this page might begin pointing you in the right direction and highlight the path research has taken so far.

I hope this helps.

– Nicole | Community Manager

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How to Manage Stress at Work Essay

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Introduction

Stress is among the major costly and significant cause of health troubles and mental agony. Stress at work place is considered the major primary stressor. Work stress is thought to affect individuals psychological and physical health as well as the organizations effectiveness in adverse manner. Work stress is one of the ailments that are acknowledged worldwide to be affecting the healthiness of the organization and the health or workers.

Workers who are stressed out will probable have a low motivation towards their work. In addition, stress can be detrimental to such member of staff as it possesses potential danger to their safety at work and in generally their efficiency is extremely low.

Pressures at workplace and at home can cause stress. Sometimes it may be beyond employees mandate to protect the staff against the stress caused by external factors for instance domestic strife but they can protect them from the stress that arises from work (Mandler, 2008).

Stress has proved to be a major challenge in the realization of the organization objectives. It may have adverse effects on the organization and the workers. Effective and good management and an aspect of good organizational structure and culture play a vital role in stress prevention.

In case the staffs are already stressed, the management should be aware of the situation and possibly devise a mechanism of addressing the challenge. There is generally low or minimal stress when one is adorned with resources, time, and experience to manage the challenges in any given situation.

Stress can be viewed as a negative experience that deprives the organization of the productivity potential and it is an inevitable consequence of an occurrence. Stress depends on the peoples perceptions and attitudes towards a given situation and this determines how they will cope with the situation.

To be able to develop stress management strategy for any organization, it will be essential to understand the causes of the stress in any given organization (Davis, Eshelman, McKay & Fanning, 2006).

Causes of Stress and Solutions

There are many possible causes of stress in any work set-up. It is vital to recognize and identify the main causes of stress in any organization and be able to develop mechanism of coping up with the challenges that stress at work is likely to present.

Among the typical stress, inducers include the cases of excess workload which most of them do not have realistic deadlines to deliver, this is likely to make people rush, and this puts the employees under pressure. Most of the people are overwhelmed in these situations. On the contrary having insufficient workloads may also result in stress as the individuals feel underemployment and their skills are not being maximized.

In such scenarios, one feels the organizations may not appreciate the potential at their disposal. It would be important to define clearly the tasks to be done in any given timeframe and both the interested parties to be involved in the generation of the work plan that will guide the operations or the activities to be done at any given time.

Another possible cause of stress is when one lacks control of the work he or she is in charge. The lack of control of the activities at work may result in one being stressed since the individuals cannot plan or organize the work according to his or her wish. Poor working relationship and lack of interpersonal support is likely to affect ones performance in any organization.

Such scenarios make staff feel isolated and their general lack of coordination of the activities in the organization. In such cases, it is very important to define the line of command and the individual’s area of jurisdiction to minimize conflicts (Davis, Eshelman, McKay & Fanning, 2006).

The demands on individuals to do the job that they do not have experience on may also expose one to stress conditions. Having insufficient training in most of the tasks one is involved in is likely to frustrate one in carrying out their responsibilities at the organization. Here most individuals are not able to deliver and are at risk as a result of fear of not being able to deliver the expected outputs in a given task assigned to them.

It is important that the right people are employed for the right job. During hiring, it would be important for the supervisor of any individuals to go through the job descriptions and evaluation to be done to identify the training needs that the staff may need to be able to perform the given task effectively.

There are also challenges associated with promotion into a new position. Most people find it difficult to settle when given a new position especially when it comes to promotions.

The requirements for adapting to a new office contribute to such pressure. Such challenges come with the more demands that the position presents and the changes in the possible relationship and associations with colleagues. The organization should have clearly defined rules governing promotions and pay increment procedures that are transparent where every due recognition must be given t9o the deserving individual

There are concerns related to job security, most people feel under pressure to deliver in order to be guaranteed their job. Such scenarios lead to people working extra hours and sometimes out themselves under unnecessary pressure with an aim to impress. This can be said to be caused by lack of other career opportunities, which leads individuals to stick to the job they may not be comfortable with.

People also get stress as they strive to get pay rise or attain a certain level of pay level. Most of the jobs pay individuals based on the output and most of the jobs are such that the more you work the more the possible returns. It will be essential to cultivate the culture where individuals explore mechanisms of working smart rather than working hard. Working harder has shown to detrimental to people physical and health situation.

There are also cases of harassment and bullying that is reported in most organization. This usually happens in all levels of work. The causes for the bullying and harassment are believed to be varied from the racial factors, gender, age, and affiliation in the organization. Cases of sexual harassment have gone unattended because the victims fear the stigmatization that may result.

Such cases have been reported in most organization where men and women have been sexually exploited at the expense of their ethical believes and subscriptions and this has led to many suffering in silence (Muchinsky, 2009). It will be essential for the system to have in place an amicable mechanism that is able to address such cases without making the fuss on the victims.

Most of the racial cases will require the cultivation of the spirit of team work where all the players in organization feel being part of the organization. Such situations will require the top management team lead by example and have an open system where the members work together as a team and not like a gang where consultation is not allowed.

The system must also be open in such a way that appropriate consultation is carried out when any major decision is made that is likely to impact on the life of any staff in the organization to reduce the cases of uncertainty and rise of informal organization.

There are incidences of blame culture where no one wants to be accountable for the action or mistake. The existence of blame culture within any business set up arise when people in the organization are not willing to take responsibility for any action or mistake that has occurred in the organization.

This has resulted in rise in temperature especially when the mistake is likely to have serious effects on the organizations performance or image. It is essential that everybody be trained to take responsibility for his or her actions.

The organizations must clearly define the job profiles for all staff members. Furthermore, the chain of command must be developed and who is in charge of which department be clearly stipulated to reduce uncertainty when it comes to who takes responsibility or credit for any happenings in the department.

Existence of weak and ineffective management in any organization is likely to stress most of the good staff. Such scenarios mostly leave the staff with a sense of absence or lack of direction and this mostly frustrates their effort in pursuing their individuals and organizations goals.

The lack of direction has such far-reaching effect to the organizations performance. On the reverse, there are cases where there is over-management and here we see the employees feeling undervalued in the organization and this may affect their self-esteem. It is very essential for the management to be able to clearly define the lines of command and have an all-inclusive decision making structure in all levels of management.

The organization must have clear organs at the various levels of management. The set up should be in such that the decisions made at operational level are binding. The same should be the case with decisions made at the tactical management level and the strategic management level. The organizations should have an effective decision support system at all levels that are informed of the decisions being made.

All the staff would like to play their role in various levels, the ability of the organizations to delegate the decisions to various levels of management would cultivate the culture of collectiveness, and this would promote the inclusiveness of all the stakeholders in the running of the organization (Hackman, 2007).

In such cases the staff will be motivated and their contribution in various consultative meetings is likely top boost their value to the organizations and their self-esteem.

Another evident cause of stress is the existence of different levels of reporting and mostly with different goals and objectives. This can result in conflict, as each manager would like his or her work to be treated as urgent and important. This is likely to put a lot of pressure on the individuals and forced to treat every work on table as very urgent and important.

Operating in such a quadrant may result to individual breakdown and there are tendencies of poor performance. It will be essential for all the managers to be consulted when drafting the work plan of the staff to minimize the conflict of interest when carrying out the work when one is reporting to multiple managers. This is likely to be achieved when the time allocated for serving each manager is well documented as specified.

There must be a working mechanism put in place to addressing the possible conflicts that may arise in such circumstances. The staff must be advised on how to plan the work and be able to given promises on what he or she can realistically deliver.

Planning your work is likely to reduce the last minute rush to meet every deadline. Having ones, priority right is likely to productively, guide individual’s performance in such cases (Muchinsky, 2009).

The failure by the management to inform the employees of any impending changes is likely to result in stress. Decisions that are likely to have a long term effect on the future of the employees must be communicated clearly to the staff and there should be a reliable conflict address system in place to act as mediators in case such decisions are likely to affect the operations in the organizations (Hackman, 2007).

Determination of the stress causes and addressing the challenges is very important in the survival of any organization. The procedure will always take into account the job analysis of the staff, the psychological assessment of the employees and the management, the legal issues related with the personnel selection and hiring procedures.

All these must be factored when determining the effective program to address the already stressed staff or reduce the likelihood of the situation from deteriorating.

Davis M., Eshelman E., McKay M. & Fanning P. (2006). The Relaxation and stress reduction workbook. California, CA: New Harbinger Publication.

Hackman, R.J. (2007). Leading teams setting the stage for great performances. Massachusetts, MA: Harvard University Press.

Mandler, G. (2008). Thought, memory and learning: Effects of emotional stress . New York, NY: Free Press.

Muchinsky, P.M. (2009). Psychology applied to work. 9th Ed. Summerfield, NC: Hypergraphic Press.

• Techniques Employed by Managers in Ensuring Success of Plans in their Firms
• Motivation Role in Organizational Management
• Physiological Mechanism of Stress
• Stand and Deliver
• Stress and Burnout in Organizations
• “Constructing Factors Related to Worker Retention”
• Individual Leadership Plan
• The Concept of Organization Structure and Teamwork
• Sony's Evolving Human Resource Challenges
• Employee Selection Strategies
• Chicago (A-D)
• Chicago (N-B)

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• Open access
• Published: 26 August 2024

The chain mediating role of negative emotions at work and meaning in life between interpersonal conflict at work and depressive symptoms among nurses: a multicenter cross-sectional study

• Ting Zhao 1 , 2   na1 ,
• Huang Yan 1   na1 ,
• Honghong Wang 2 &
• Meiying Guo 1 , 3  

BMC Nursing volume  23 , Article number:  598 ( 2024 ) Cite this article

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Depressive symptoms among nurses have been a significant public health concern. Although many studies have demonstrated the potential relationship between interpersonal conflict at work and depressive symptoms, the mechanisms underlying this relationship among nurses remain unclear. Based on the theoretical and empirical research, this study aimed to investigate the multiple mediating effects of negative emotion at work and meaning in life on the relationship between interpersonal conflict at work and depressive symptoms among nurses.

An online multicenter cross-sectional study was conducted in 15 hospitals from different geographical areas of Hunan Province, China, from December 2021 to February 2022. A total of 1754 nurses completed validated self-reported questionnaires, including their sociodemographic information, interpersonal conflict at work, negative emotions at work, meaning in life, and depressive symptoms. Descriptive statistics analysis, Spearman’s correlation analysis, multiple linear regression analysis, and chain mediation analysis were performed using IBM SPSS software (version 29) and Mplus software (version 8).

There were significant correlations between interpersonal conflict at work, negative emotions at work, meaning in life, and depressive symptoms ( r = -0.206 ~ 0.518, all p  < 0.01). Interpersonal conflict at work had a statistically significantly direct effect on depressive symptoms ( β  = 0.061; 95% confidence interval, CI: 0.011 ~ 0.126, p =  0.039). Analysis of mediating effects revealed that interpersonal conflict at work also influenced depressive symptoms through two statistically significantly indirect pathways: (a) the mediating effect of negative emotions at work ( β  = 0.167; 95% CI: 0.138 ~ 0.195, p  < 0.001) and (b) the chain mediating effect between negative emotions at work and meaning in life ( β  = 0.008; 95% CI: 0.003 ~ 0.013, p =  0.005).

Interpersonal conflict at work has a direct positive effect on depressive symptoms among nurses. Meanwhile, interpersonal conflict at work can influence depressive symptoms among nurses through the mediating effect of negative emotions at work and the chain mediating effect between negative emotions at work and meaning in life.

Peer Review reports

As the largest occupational group in the healthcare professions [ 1 ], nurses disproportionately suffer from depressive symptoms due to special working conditions, such as unhealthy working environments, over-loaded clinical work, shiftwork disorder, occupational stress, and workplace violence and discrimination [ 2 , 3 , 4 , 5 , 6 ]. Evidence suggested that depressive symptoms have been a significant public health concern for nurses, with prevalence rates ranging from 18.8–64.8% [ 7 , 8 , 9 , 10 ], which generally predicts increased burnout [ 11 , 12 ], decreased quality of patient care [ 13 , 14 , 15 ], higher turnover intention [ 16 , 17 ], and increased risk of suicide [ 5 , 18 ].

Interpersonal conflict at work has been recognized as one of the stressors within the global healthcare settings, i.e., ‘a dynamic process that occurs between interdependent parties as they experience negative emotional reactions to perceived disagreements and interference with the attainment of their goals’ [ 19 ]. In today’s complex healthcare environments, nurses are often required to achieve gold standard with limited resources and to coordinate–to a greater extent–with coworkers (e.g., other nurses and physicians) and supervisors, which process may lead to inevitable interpersonal conflicts due to the poor work environment, role ambiguity, lack of support, and poor communication [ 20 , 21 ]. Unfortunately, interpersonal conflict at work may have a negative impact on mental health conditions among nurses. A wealth of empirical research has shown a positive correlation between interpersonal conflict at work and depressive symptoms; in other words, individuals who perceived higher levels of interpersonal conflict at work may have more depressive symptoms [ 22 , 23 , 24 ]. Therefore, we hypothesized that interpersonal conflict at work positively predicts depressive symptoms among nurses.

Negative emotions at work refer to an unpleasant engagement and a subjective feeling of distress, including anger, contempt, disgust, guilt, fear, and nervousness [ 25 ]. According to the ‘need to belong’ theory [ 26 ], ‘human beings have a pervasive drive to form and maintain at least a minimum quantity of lasting, positive, and significant interpersonal relationships,’ whereas interpersonal conflict at work, as a threat to this drive, may sharp a variety of negative emotions at work among nurses and even subsequent mental health problem, such as depressive symptoms. Previous research has also shown that interpersonal conflicts at work were associated with higher levels of negative emotions at work [ 27 ], which, in turn, were associated with depressive symptoms [ 28 , 29 ]. Therefore, we hypothesized that negative emotions at work mediate the relationship between interpersonal conflict at work and depressive symptoms among nurses.

Meaning in life has become an increasingly popular concept. Meaning in life refers to ‘the sense made of, and significance felt regarding, the nature of one’s being and existence’ [ 30 ]. According to the conceptual model of meaning in life [ 31 ], people find their meaning in life when they connect to others and receive help, support, strength, encouragement, love, and caring from others; therefore, interpersonal conflict at work, as an interpersonal stressful event, may have a negative impact on meaning in life among nurses. In addition, Viktor Frankl, a Viennese psychiatrist, recognized that the will to find meaning in life is a fundamental motivation for human beings, and failure to find meaning in life can lead to depression and even suicide [ 32 ]. Numerous studies have also demonstrated that meaning in life was associated with psychopathology, depressive symptoms, and suicidal ideation [ 33 , 34 , 35 , 36 ]. Therefore, we hypothesized that meaning in life mediates the relationship between interpersonal conflict at work and depressive symptoms among nurses.

As we hypothesized above, negative emotions at work and meaning in life may play a single mediating role between interpersonal conflict at work and depressive symptoms among nurses, respectively. However, when both negative emotions at work and meaning in life are considered mediators, the relationship between them remains to be clarified. Previous research has demonstrated that negative emotions were significant predictors of meaning in life [ 37 , 38 ], and this means the relationship between interpersonal conflict at work and depressive symptoms may be influenced first by negative emotions at work and second by meaning in life. Therefore, we hypothesized that negative emotions at work and meaning in life play a chain mediation role between interpersonal conflict at work and depressive symptoms among nurses.

After an extensive literature review, there is a lack of research on the relationship between interpersonal conflict at work, negative emotions at work, meaning in life, and depressive symptoms among nurses. However, it is essential to understand the mechanisms underlying the impact of interpersonal conflict at work on depressive symptoms among nurses, which can inform future research and interventions for depressive symptoms among nurses. Therefore, to fill these knowledge gaps, this study aimed to investigate the multiple mediating effects of negative emotion at work and meaning in life on the relationship between interpersonal conflict at work and depressive symptoms among nurses, in order to provide a theoretical basis for the prevention and intervention of depressive symptoms among nurses. Four hypotheses were proposed to construct the hypothetical conceptual model for this study (Fig.  1 ):

Hypothesis 1

Interpersonal conflict at work positively predicts depressive symptoms among nurses.

Hypothesis 2

Negative emotions at work mediate the relationship between interpersonal conflict at work and depressive symptoms among nurses.

Hypothesis 3

Meaning in life mediates the relationship between interpersonal conflict at work and depressive symptoms among nurses.

Hypothesis 4

Negative emotions at work and meaning in life play a chain mediation role between interpersonal conflict at work and depressive symptoms among nurses.

Hypothesized conceptual model of the chain mediation

Study design, setting and participants

A multicenter cross-sectional study was conducted in the Hunan Province, China, from December 2021 to February 2022. We used a convenience sampling method to recruit participants online from 15 public hospitals in different geographical areas of Hunan Province, including Northern Hunan, Western Hunan, Southern Hunan, Central Hunan, and Eastern Hunan. The 15 public hospitals comprise 12 well-known tertiary hospitals (with over 1000 fixed beds) and three secondary hospitals (with over 450 fixed beds). All 15 public hospitals are comprehensive or general hospitals except one children’s hospital. Each hospital has more than 200 registered nurses to provide a high level of specialized care, with a cumulative total of more than 10,000 registered nurses in the 15 hospitals. The inclusion criteria were: (1) registered nurses at the hospital; (2) willing to participate in the survey after informed consent. The exclusion criteria were registered nurses with major physical illnesses (e.g., malignant tumors) or acute disease conditions.

The present research was reported in line with the Strengthening the Reporting of Observational Studies in Epidemiology (STROBE) checklist for cross-sectional studies (see Supplementary Material).

Sample size

The sample size was calculated using the procedure of the confidence intervals (CIs) for one mean in the Power Analysis & Sample Size (PASS) software (version 2021, https://www.ncss.com/software/pass/ ). Based on a previous study in China [ 39 ], the standard deviation (SD) of depressive symptoms among nurses was estimated to be 7.41. Assuming a 95% confidence level ( \(\:\alpha\:\:\) = 0.05, two-sided), a 5.0% marginal error, and a rate of 15.0% for incomplete or invalid cases, the minimal sample size required was 1,808 participants.

Data was collected using the questionnaire that included sociodemographic variables, interpersonal conflict at work, negative emotions at work, meaning in life, and depressive symptoms. Sociodemographic variables included age (years), gender (male = 0, female = 1), educational level (junior college or less = 0, bachelor’s degree or higher = 1), single status (no = 0, yes = 1), clinical working experience (< 5 years = 0, ≥ 5 years = 1), position (clinical nurse = 0, nurse manager = 1), and technical title (primary = 0, intermediate or senior = 1).

Interpersonal conflict at work was assessed by the adapted version of the Interpersonal Conflict at Work Scale [ 40 ]. The scale consisted of eight items: four items on interpersonal conflict with the supervisor (e.g., “How often do you get into arguments with your supervisor?”) and four items on interpersonal conflict with coworkers (e.g., “How often do you get into arguments with your coworkers?”). All items were scored on a 5-point Likert scale from 1 (never) to 5 (very often), with a total score ranging from 8 to 40. A higher score reflected a higher level of interpersonal conflict at work. The Cronbach’s \(\:\:\alpha\:\:\) was 0.925 in this study.

Negative emotions at work were assessed with a five-item subscale from the Job-Related Affective Well-Being Scale [ 41 ]. Each item was scored on a 5-point Likert scale ranging from 1 (never) to 5 (extremely often or always), with a range of total scores from 5 to 25. Higher scores indicated a higher level of negative emotions at work. A sample item of the scale is “My job made me feel angry.” The Cronbach’s \(\:\:\alpha\:\:\) was 0.945 in this study.

Meaning in life was assessed by the modified version of the Meaning in Life Questionnaire (MLQ) [ 42 ]. The nine-item scale had two dimensions: the presence of meaning (e.g., “I have a good sense of what makes my life meaningful”) and the search for meaning (e.g., “I am looking for something that makes my life feel meaningful”). Each item was scored on a 7-point Likert scale ranging from 1 (absolutely untrue) to 7 (absolutely true). The total score ranged from 9 to 63. A higher score reflected a higher level of meaning in life. The Cronbach’s \(\:\:\alpha\:\:\) was 0.847 in this study.

Depressive symptoms were assessed by the Patient Health Questionnaire-2 (PHQ-2) [ 43 ], which consisted of two items: “little interest or pleasure in doing things” and “feeling down, depressed, or hopeless.” On a 4-point scale, response options were 0 (not at all), 1 (several days), 2 (more than half the days), and 3 (nearly every day), with a total score ranging from 0 to 6. Higher scores indicated more severe depressive symptoms. A cut-off value (≥ 3 points) indicated signs of depression. The Cronbach’s \(\:\:\alpha\:\:\) was 0.847 in this study.

Data collection

The online survey was distributed via the Wenjuanxing platform (a free and open online survey website, https://www.wjx.cn/ ) as an electronic questionnaire with a unique Quick Response Code (QR code), including 32 items distributed over four pages. Before the formal survey, we piloted the electronic questionnaire with a convenience sample of registered nurses from various healthcare settings, and we adjusted its wording based on their feedback to ensure comprehensibility and readability. We sent the QR code to the head nurse in each department via e-mail, WeChat, or in-person, and then they sent the QR code to eligible nurses in their department via the WeChat group platform. Interested nurses scanned the QR code to complete the survey. The survey was anonymous and voluntary, with no personally identifiable information involved. We provided an introduction to this survey and informed consent on the first page of the survey. If participants were willing to participate in the survey, they would click the “I agree to participate in this research of my own volition” button on the first page. We limited the survey to be completed only once for each IP address and set all items as mandatory to avoid omission. Respondents were allowed to review and change their responses by scrolling up and down the screen or clicking the “Back” button at the bottom of each page. Respondents could end the survey at any time by closing the link or not submitting the survey, and their data would not be retained. It took approximately 15 to 20 min to complete the survey. If the time to complete the survey was too short (< 150 s), we considered the data invalid. All available data were downloaded from the Wenjuanxing platform and stored on the corresponding author’s computer; only authorized researchers were entitled to access them.

A total of 1827 questionnaires were submitted by nurses, 73 of which were deemed poor quality due to inadequate completion time. After double-checking and verifying, 1754 valid questionnaires were included in the final analysis, with a valid response rate of 96.0%.

Statistical analysis

Statistical analysis consisted of four parts. Firstly, we used descriptive statistics to describe the participants’ sociodemographic variables and the main study variables (interpersonal conflict at work, negative emotions at work, meaning in life, and depressive symptoms). Specifically, we used frequency and percentage to describe categorical variables and used mean (standard deviation, SD) or median (interquartile range) to describe continuous variables according to the normality. Values of skewness and kurtosis < |2| were typically deemed acceptable indicators of a normal distribution [ 44 ]. The missing data analysis uncovered less than 1% of missing data, so missing data were treated by a complete case deletion. Secondly, the main study variables were regressed on the sociodemographic variables in multiple linear regressions. Statistically significant sociodemographic variables were defined as covariates. Thirdly, we used Spearman’s correlation analysis to examine the bivariate correlation between interpersonal conflict at work, negative emotions at work, meaning in life, and depressive symptoms.

Finally, adjusting for covariates, we examined the hypothesized chain mediation model, following the Mplus code based on the original PROCESS diagrams by Andrew Hayes [ 45 ]. We selected the Mplus code for model number 6, which showed an example of 2 mediators, in series, with the maximum likelihood estimation method. Following Hayes’ recommendation [ 46 ], we calculated the 95% confidence intervals (CIs) for mediation analyses using the bootstrapping procedure with 10,000 repeated sampling, and the mediation effect was statistically significant if the 95% CIs did not contain zero. An acceptable model fit was indicated by a combination of indexes, including a non-significant Chi-Square value, root mean square error of approximation (RMSEA) smaller than 0.07, standardized root mean square residual (SRMR) smaller than 0.05, comparative fit index (CFI), and Tucker-Lewis index (TLI) greater than 0.95 [ 47 ]. All statistical analyses were performed using IBM SPSS software (version 29) and Mplus software (version 8), and p  < 0.05 was considered statistically significant.

Ethics considerations

The study followed the Declaration of Helsinki and obtained ethical approval from the Institutional Review Board of the Third Xiangya Hospital of Central South University (Number: 22297).

Preliminary analysis

Since the study data were collected through self-report measures, we conducted Harman’s single-factor test in IBM SPSS software (version 29) to detect common method bias using exploratory factor analysis [ 48 ]. The results showed that five factors had eigenvalues greater than 1, explaining 75.13% of the total variance. Among them, the first factor explained 32.10% of the total variance, lower than the critical value of 40.00%, indicating that no significant common method bias was found in this study.

Descriptive statistics

Table  1 shows the sociodemographic characteristics of the participants. In this study, the mean age of participants was 31.03 years (SD = 6.44). Most participants were female (94.47%), not single (76.57%), and clinical nurses (92.70%), and had a bachelor’s degree or higher (74.52%), ≥ five years of clinical experience (74.17%), and a primary technical title (56.61%). The prevalence of depression among nurses was 27.54%.

Correlation between interpersonal conflict at work, negative emotions at work, meaning in life and depressive symptoms

Table  2 shows the descriptive statistics of the main study variables. The median and interquartile range of interpersonal conflict at work was 8.00 and 3.00. The mean and standard deviation of negative emotions at work, meaning in life, and depressive symptoms were 12.44 ± 4.23, 43.26 ± 8.50, and 1.97 ± 1.60, respectively.

Table  2 also shows the correlation matrix for the main study variables. The results of the correlation analysis were consistent with our expected hypotheses, and all the analysis results were statistically significant at the level of p  < 0.01 (two-tailed). Firstly, interpersonal conflict at work was positively correlated with negative emotions at work ( r  = 0.400, p  < 0.001) and depressive symptoms ( r  = 0.306, p  < 0.001) and negatively correlated with meaning in life ( r = -0.068, p  < 0.01). Secondly, negative emotions at work were negatively correlated with meaning in life ( r = -0.206, p  < 0.001) and positively correlated with depressive symptoms ( r  = 0.518, p  < 0.001). Thirdly, meaning in life was negatively correlated with depressive symptoms ( r = -0.184, p  < 0.001).

All sociodemographic variables were significantly associated with these four main study variables ( p  < 0.05), except the technical title (see Table  3 ). Specifically, gender (B = − 1.70, p  < 0.001) was negatively associated with interpersonal conflict at work; age (B = − 0.11, p  < 0.001) and position (B = − 0.95, p  = 0.020) were negatively associated with negative emotions at work; educational level (B = 0.63, p  = 0.009), single status (B = 0.84, p  = 0.002), and clinical working experience (B = 0.95, p  = 0.002) were positively associated with negative emotions at work; clinical working experience (B = -1.86, p  = 0.003) was negatively associated with meaning in life; age (B = − 0.02, p  = 0.012) and position (B = − 0.36, p  = 0.020) were negatively associated with depressive symptoms; single status (B = 0.25, p  = 0.014) and clinical working experience (B = 0.44, p  < 0.001) were positively associated with depressive symptoms.

Mediation analysis

The mediation analysis evaluated a hypothesized chain mediation model where interpersonal conflict at work was chosen as the independent variable, negative emotions at work and meaning in life as mediators, and depressive symptoms as the dependent variable (Fig.  1 ; Table  4 ). The chain mediation model showed sufficient goodness of fit value: \(\:\chi\:\) 2 = 12.77 ( p  = 0.466), RMSEA = 0.000, SRMR = 0.015, CFI = 1.000, and TLI = 1.000. The mediation analysis results showed that after being adjusted for covariates, the total effect of interpersonal conflict at work on depressive symptoms was statistically significant ( β  = 0.229, 95% CI: 0.185 to 0.285, p  < 0.001), with a statistically significant direct effect (Hypothesis 1 , β  = 0.061, 95% CI: 0.011 to 0.126, p  = 0.039). Besides, the total indirect effect through both mediators was also statistically significant ( β  = 0.168, 95% CI: 0.139 to 0.197, p  < 0.001), suggesting a significant overall mediation effect. Specifically, interpersonal conflict at work could influence depressive symptoms through two pathways: (a) Interpersonal conflict at work → Negative emotions at work → Depressive symptoms (Hypothesis 2 ), and (b) Interpersonal conflict at work → Negative emotions at work → Meaning in life → Depressive symptoms (Hypothesis 4 ). The mediating effects of the above two are 0.167 (0.331 \(\:\:\times\:\:\) 0.505) and 0.008 (0.331 \(\:\:\times\:\:\) -0.218 \(\:\:\times\:\:\) -0.107), respectively. Both of the two indirect effects reached the level of statistical significance because the 95% CI for the above indirect effects did not contain a zero value. However, the indirect effects of Interpersonal conflict at work → Meaning in life → Depressive symptoms did not reach a significant level (Hypothesis 3 ). In summary, all hypotheses were confirmed except hypothesis 3 .

This study aimed to investigate the multiple mediating effects of negative emotion at work and meaning in life on the relationship between interpersonal conflict at work and depressive symptoms among nurses. The results of this study confirmed a direct relationship between interpersonal conflict at work and depressive symptoms among nurses. Meanwhile, this study confirmed that interpersonal conflict at work influences depressive symptoms among nurses through two pathways: (a) Interpersonal conflict at work → Negative emotions at work → Depressive symptoms, and (b) Interpersonal conflict at work → Negative emotions at work → Meaning in life → Depressive symptoms.

For hypothesis 1 , this study confirmed that interpersonal conflict at work has a direct positive effect on depressive symptoms among nurses, and the higher the level of interpersonal conflict at work, the more depressive symptoms among nurses, which is similar to the previous research on general workers [ 40 , 49 ]. As the largest occupational group in any healthcare setting, nurses are members of the organization and part of this social network by nature. In the collectivist cultural context of Chinese society, people are highly group-oriented and particularly value relationships with their in-group [ 50 ]. Therefore, it is not surprising that interpersonal conflict at work has a profound impact on the mental health conditions among nurses, as they tend to pursue relationship harmony and balance within their in-groups [ 51 ]. Meanwhile, these cultural values also make Chinese nurses more likely to use compromise/coordination and avoidance styles to deal with interpersonal conflict at work [ 51 , 52 , 53 ], thus making them more vulnerable to depressive symptoms [ 54 , 55 ]. Given the prevalence of interpersonal conflict at work in healthcare settings, this finding highlights the need to focus on interpersonal relationships with coworkers and supervisors at work to improve depressive symptoms among nurses.

For hypothesis 2 , this study confirmed that negative emotions at work mediate the relationship between interpersonal conflict at work and depressive symptoms among nurses. In other words, when nurses experience higher levels of interpersonal conflict at work, they may have more negative emotions at work and thus suffer more depressive symptoms. This finding is consistent with the ‘need to belong’ theory [ 26 ]. In complex healthcare environments, nurses experience interpersonal conflict at work from multiple sources, such as other nurses coworkers, nurse managers, and physicians [ 56 ], and these interpersonal conflict processes may threaten their relationships with their in-groups and, as a result, fail to satisfy their need to belong to their in-groups [ 26 ]. Therefore, when these interpersonal relationships are broken, threatened, or refused, negative emotions at work may ensue [ 26 ], while nurses with high levels of negative emotions at work tend to put themselves in circumstances with more stressors, leading to more depressive symptoms [ 57 ].

For hypothesis 3 , we found that meaning in life did not mediate the relationship between interpersonal conflict at work and depressive symptoms among nurses. This finding is unexpected, but some clues can be found in previous research. As a stressful event, interpersonal conflict at work may prompt nurses to make compensatory meaning-making efforts to restore their meaning in life, and such a rebound effect has been found in previous research on meaning making in the context of stressful life experiences [ 58 ]. Specifically, nurses may reappraise the meaning of interpersonal conflict at work to make it more consistent with their preexisting beliefs and desires. For example, nurses may consider interpersonal conflict at work as benign compared to what others experience or as relatively fortunate because the event did not worsen. Van and Green also found a similar rebound effect in their experiments on the automatic defense of meaning [ 59 ]. However, our single-point assessment may not capture this dynamic process [ 60 ], and thus, we may underestimate the actual effect of interpersonal conflict at work on meaning in life. Future research could use the Ecological Momentary Assessment (EMA) method, a repeated collection of real-time data on subjects’ experience in their natural environments [ 61 ], to capture this dynamic process and further examine the effect of interpersonal conflict at work on meaning in life among nurses.

For hypothesis 4 , this study confirmed the sequential mediating effect of negative emotions at work and meaning in life on the relationship between interpersonal conflict at work and depressive symptoms among nurses. The sequential mediating effect indicates that nurses with higher levels of interpersonal conflict at work may have more negative emotions at work, which may subsequently decrease their meaning in life and finally increase their depressive symptoms. This finding is similar to previous research. Previous research has shown that negative emotions may mediate the effect of negative events on meaning in life [ 60 ] while meaning in life plays a fundamental protective role against a range of mental health problems [ 33 ]. The potential explanation for this finding may be that negative emotions at work lead to narrowed attention and analytical focus and amplified negative evaluations among nurses [ 62 , 63 , 64 ], which in turn influences their meaning in life and finally triggers their mental health problems [ 34 , 38 , 65 ]. As such, there is a need to focus on the interpersonal conflict at work and its series of knock-on effects, i.e., negative emotions at work and decreased meaning in life, in order to prevent and intervene in depressive symptoms among nurses promptly.

Implications for future practice

Attention to the mental health of nurses is imperative for an efficient, effective, resilient, and sustainable healthcare system, especially under unprecedented strain from the pandemic. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) has also served as a wake-up call to the pressing need to support their mental health [ 66 ]. Our findings provide practical implications for the prevention and intervention of mental health problems among nurses. Firstly, managers can create a positive, supportive environment for nurses to avoid interpersonal conflict at work as much as possible. For example, managers can hold regular group activities to help nurses develop trusting, reciprocal relationships with coworkers (e.g., other nurses and physicians) and their managers, making nurses feel a more positive and harmonious organizational atmosphere and a sense of belonging. Secondly, managers can build an effective communication platform to encourage nurses to express their voices actively when they experience interpersonal conflicts at work, negative emotions at work, decreased meaning in life, or depressive symptoms. Finally, managers can regularly assess interpersonal conflict at work, negative emotions at work, meaning in life, and depressive symptoms among nurses and develop targeted preventions and interventions for depressive symptoms among nurses.

Limitations and future research directions

This study has several limitations. First, our study used a cross-sectional design, which did not allow for the inference of causal relationships between the variables. Future longitudinal studies are needed to clarify the potential causal relationships between these variables in this model. Second, due to limited funding and time, all participants in this study were recruited from a specific province in China through convenience sampling, which may not represent all nurses in the survey area, thereby limiting the generalizability of the findings. However, we recruited nurses from various departments in different geographical areas of Hunan Province, China, which is, to some extent, a representation of a diverse group of nurses within the survey area. Therefore, it can still be assumed that our findings reflect a social trend. Further studies should consider a more expansive sampling method to improve the generalizability and representativeness of the findings. Third, although we used a range of strategies for quality control before distributing the electronic questionnaires, some invalid questionnaires were collected due to the limitations of the online survey platform, which may affect the authenticity of the findings. Finally, due to the sensitivity of interpersonal conflict at work, participants may not fully answer their actual answers to gain social approval. Future studies could use more objective measurements, such as behavioral observation, to collect data.

This study showed that interpersonal conflict at work has a direct positive effect on depressive symptoms among nurses. Meanwhile, interpersonal conflict at work can influence depressive symptoms among nurses through the mediating effect of negative emotions at work and the chain mediating effect between negative emotions at work and meaning in life. These findings may help managers better understand the underlying mechanisms between interpersonal conflict at work and depressive symptoms among nurses and develop targeted preventions and interventions for depressive symptoms among nurses in the future.

Data availability

The data can be obtained by contacting the correspondence author.

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Acknowledgements

We would like to express our sincere gratitude to Prof. Qirong Chen and all reviewers and participants for their assistance and support.

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Nursing Department, The Third Xiangya Hospital, Central South University, Changsha, Hunan, China

Ting Zhao, Huang Yan & Meiying Guo

Xiangya School of Nursing, Central South University, Changsha, Hunan, China

Ting Zhao & Honghong Wang

Department of Emergency, The Third Xiangya Hospital, Central South University, Changsha, Hunan, China

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TZ: Conceptualization, Methodology, Investigation, Formal analysis, Writing - Original Draft. HY: Conceptualization, Methodology, Investigation, Formal analysis, Writing - Original Draft. HW: Conceptualization, Supervision, Writing - Review & Editing. MG: Conceptualization, Project administration, Writing - Review & Editing. All authors read and approved the final manuscript.

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Zhao, T., Yan, H., Wang, H. et al. The chain mediating role of negative emotions at work and meaning in life between interpersonal conflict at work and depressive symptoms among nurses: a multicenter cross-sectional study. BMC Nurs 23 , 598 (2024). https://doi.org/10.1186/s12912-024-02276-2

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