Farmers, farm workers and work-related stress

This research explores the ways in which stress affects farming communities, how this has changed in recent years, and the degree to which work-related aspects of stress may be assuaged by support interventions. A qualitative case study research approach was employed to address these issues, involving 60 interviews in five locations across England and Wales.In examining farming stress, a distinction is made between its intrinsic, extrinsic and workrelated dimensions. Whileinterviewees tended to associate day-to-day worries and acute stress with farming’s intrinsic demands (such as disease and adverse weather conditions), external causes of tension (such as competition and regulation), together with worries about finances and family, were associated with more sustained anxieties. By contrast, work-related aspects of farming stress, such as workload issues and farming practices, involved a combination of physical and mental health effects.Notably, work-related and extrinsic dimensions of stress have increased in recent years in relation to organisational and policy shifts, price fluctuations, mounting paperwork demands, workload intensification, and changes in agricultural regulation. These have prompted an escalation in the aspects of their work that farming communities feel powerless to control, and represent a major area for policy intervention. Principal farmers displayed the most visible manifestations of stress, linked at once to the intrinsic, extrinsic and workrelated dimensions of their work. By contrast, family farm workers and labourers often lacked autonomy over the way they worked, and work-related aspects of stress concerning workload and organisation made up a greater part of their experience. Increased paperwork demands emerged as a major cause of stress among interviewees, particularly forfarmers and their wives, who struggled to balance these with traditional farming priorities. Differences between farmswere also influential in explaining stress. Livestock farming embodied intrinsic pressures relating to stock crises and the unpredictability of animals, but more recently has come under intense economic pressure, prompting a rationalisation of working practices. Arable farmers found the organisation of activities, such as harvesting and planting, in a context of reduced and increasingly contractual workforces particularly challenging. Mixed farmers faced the dual stresses of balancing work activities with conflicting timetables, and the paperwork demands of a complex portfolio of farming. Smaller farms were struggled with intensified workloads, while larger enterprises had to comply with the demands of more inspection regimes.Support agencies need to overcome the stigma attached to asking for help among farming communities and offer a rangeof responsive and proactive services. Locally based support was more likely to be used and trusted, although concernsabout client confidentiality might deter those most in need from seeking help. Where existing local networks wereestablished, there was a strong argument for providers to plug into these and work towards publicising their efforts to ensure that support is provided most effectively. Critically, support must be multidimensional, reflecting the wide range of stressors and their impacts among farming communities

Does Work Stress Predict the Occurrence of Cold, Flu and Minor Illness Symptoms in Clinical Psychology Trainees?

Objectives: The present study examined the three/four-day lagged relationship between daily work stress and upper respiratory tract infection (URTI) and other minor illness symptoms. Methods: Twenty-four postgraduate clinical psychology trainees completed work stress, cold/flu symptoms and somatic symptoms checklists daily for four weeks. Results: Increases in work stress were observed two days prior to a cold/flu episode but not three or four days preceding a cold/flu episode. Work stress was unrelated to peaks in somatic symptom reporting. Conclusions: There was some evidence of a lagged relationship between work stress and symptoms, but not of the expected duration, suggesting that the relationship between work stress and URTI symptoms was not mediated by the immune system

Work Stress and Psychological Consequences in the Workplace: Study on Elementary School Teachers

There are very limited studies examining the relationships between work stress and psychological consequences of the teachers, especially elementary school teachers. Therefore, the primary purpose of conducting this research is to understand the correlation between teachers work stress, and burnout and job satisfaction. It also aims to understand sources and levels of teachers work stress. The findings of the study showed that there was no correlation between teachers work stress and burnout, and between teachers work stress and job satisfactio

PENGARUH WORK LIFE BALANCE TERHADAP KEPUASAN KERJA DENGAN STRES KERJA SEBAGAI VARIABEL INTERVENING (Studi Pada PT. BPD Kalimantan Tengah Cabang Buntok)

This research aims to determine how the work life balance, job satisfaction, and work Stress, the effect of the work life balance on job satisfaction, the effect of work life balance on work Stress, and the effect of work Stress on job satisfaction, and to determine whether work Stres mediates the work life balance on job satisfaction. This research was conducted on PT. BPD Central Borneo Buntok Branch employees with 35 respondents. The sampling technique of this research issue Total Sampling where all members of the population are used as samples. Data collection method in this study using a questionnaire. Data analysis method using Path Analysis assisted by Smart PLS 4.0 software. The result of this research indicate that the variable Work Life Balance is in the balanced category, Job Satisfaction is in the adequate category, and Work Stress is in the high category. The research result found that Work Life Balance had no direct effect on Job Satisfaction, Work Life Balance had a positive and significant effect on Work Stress, Work Stress had a negative and significant effect on Job Satisfaction, Work Stress mediated Work Life Balance on Job Satisfaction

Stress level and its influencing factors among employees in a plastic manufacturing and the implication towards work performance

Stress has been viewed as an inevitable consequence of work life. A worker will fell stress when his or her does not match their job requirements. Work stress come from a variety of sources and it can affect people in different ways. In the report The Scale of Occupational Stress (Smith et al., 2000 in Jeremy, 2005) it was estimated that there were 5 million workers suffering the high level of stress at work. The study shows the important outcomes that approximately one in five workers reported stress arising from work. There were cause by excessive workloads or lack of managerial support, ill health and back pain, together with certain health related activities such as smoking and alcohol intake

Work-family conflict and stress

Over the past twenty years, increasing attention has been paid by researchers and organizations to the interface between people’s work and their family lives. In 1977, Rosabeth Kanter argued that the notion that work and life off the job are separate worlds is a ‘myth’. Since then there has been a growing volume to research on the interaction between job or work demands are experiences and family life. The burgeoning literature on this topic can be attributed to a variety of reasons, including changing family structures, with a significant increase in the number of dual-earner families and single-parent families; changing family orientations, with many couples now delaying the onset of children and also reducing the overall number of children; increasing participation of women in the workforce to the point where in many Western countries, in particular, employed women now out-number their male colleagues; and finally, a greater desire to achieve some kind of ‘balance’ between work and family responsibilities, to enhance both individual and family well-being

Comparison of personality traits among patients with psoriasis, atopic dermatitis, and stress: a pilot study

Background: Psoriasis and atopic dermatitis are chronic skin diseases that greatly affect the quality of life. Both diseases can be triggered or exacerbated by stress. Objective: We aimed to differentiate personality traits between patients with chronic skin conditions and people treated for stress in a pilot study. Methods: Patients participating voluntarily in educational programs in Belgium and Switzerland were recruited to complete personality trait questionnaires, including the Temperament and Character Inventory (TCI) and the Tridimensional Personality Questionnaire (TPQ). A comparison was made with patients treated for work-related stress. Results: A total of 48 and 91 patients suffering from skin diseases and work-related stress, respectively, were included in the study. Based on the questionnaires, we found that dermatology patients were less persistent and impulsive than those with work-related stress. Dermatology patients also exhibited more rigidness and less focus on performance. Finally, patients with work-related stress seem more likely to change in response to health-promoting programs than patients with chronic dermatoses. Conclusion: Patients with chronic skin diseases may perceive and cope with stress differently in comparison to patients with work-related stress due to inherent personality traits. Therefore, stress coping mechanisms may differ among different diseases. More research is needed into the design of educational interventions and the impact of personality traits in disease-specific groups