Coping with work stress: a review and critique

Coping with Work Stress: A Review and Critique highlights current research relating to the coping strategies of individuals and organizations, and provides best practice techniques for dealing with the growing epidemic of stress and lack of overall well-being at work

Workplace bullying in New Zealand: a survey of employee perceptions and attitudes

Bullying at work, a severe form of anti-social behaviour, has become an issue of major concern to workers, organisations, unions and governments. It has also received considerable attention in organisational behaviour and human resource management research over the past 20 years. Research has been conducted on the prevalence of bullying at work and factors which contribute to bullying, but less attention has been accorded to personal coping with bullying and organisational-level responses to counteract bullying. The present paper reports findings from a survey of over 1700 employees of 36 organisations in New Zealand. We describe the reported incidence of bullying at work, along with relevant work attitudes and experiences, including psychological strain, ratings of subjective well-being, and levels of commitment to the organisation. Personal experience of bullying was reported by 17.8% of respondents, and was significantly correlated with higher levels of strain, reduced well-being, reduced commitment to their organisation, and lower self-rated performance. Personal coping strategies were generally unrelated to these outcomes. On the other hand, the perceived effectiveness of organisational efforts to deal with bullying was considered an important contributor to both the occurrence of bullying and reduced negative effects of bullying. Overall, our findings illustrate the importance of developing organisational-level strategies to reduce the incidence of bullying and to counteract its negative impact, rather than expecting individuals to develop personal strategies to cope with this problem

Ethnicity, workplace bullying, social support and psychological strain in Aotearoa/New Zealand

This research explored whether respondents who self-identified as New Zealand Europeans experienced less bullying and less severe outcomes than those who self-identified as Māori, Pacific Island or other ethnic groups. Social support was also examined as a potential buffer against the negative effects of bullying. One thousand, seven hundred and thirty-three respondents from four sectors (health, education, hospitality and travel) responded to a selfreport questionnaire. Despite reporting higher levels of bullying than New Zealand Europeans, Pacific Island and Asian/Indian respondents reported lower levels of psychological strain. A possible explanation for this may lie in the somewhat higher levels of supervisor support reported by Pacific Island, Asian/Indian and Māori respondents, compared to those who self-identified as New Zealand European. Respondents with more supportive supervisors and colleagues reported experiencing less bullying and less strain. Bullying was related to negative outcomes for all groups. The implications of these findings for management of workplace bullying are discussed.fals

Perceptions of workplace bullying in the New Zealand travel industry: prevalence and management strategies

Workplace bullying is a major cause of stress and psychological harm for employees and a costly problem for organisations. Within the travel industry, little is known about the extent and nature of the workplace bullying problem. This paper reports on findings from a survey of 332 New Zealand travel industry staff and managers. The finding that more than one-in-ten respondents experienced bullying in the workplace indicates a significant problem for the sector. In comparison to those who had not experienced bullying, targets of bullying reported lower levels of constructive leadership, colleague support, and supervisor support, and lower self-rated performance. Targets also reported higher levels of stress, lower levels of emotional wellbeing, higher absenteeism, and a higher intention to leave the organisation. Organisational responses to bullying reported to be most effective were those that focused on improvements in communication and relationships. The paper discusses the importance of leadership in developing a bully-free culture within organisations

Measurement invariance of the Satisfaction With Life Scale across 26 countries

The Satisfaction With Life Scale (SWLS) is a commonly used life satisfaction scale. Cross-cultural researchers use SWLS to compare mean scores of life satisfaction across countries. Despite the wide use of SWLS in cross-cultural studies, measurement invariance of SWLS has rarely been investigated, and previous studies showed inconsistent findings. Therefore, we examined the measurement invariance of SWLS with samples collected from 26 countries. To test measurement invariance, we utilized three measurement invariance techniques: (a) multigroup confirmatory factor analysis (MG-CFA), (b) multilevel confirmatory factor analysis (ML-CFA), and (c) alignment optimization methods. The three methods demonstrated that configural and metric invariances of life satisfaction held across 26 countries, whereas scalar invariance did not. With partial invariance testing, we identified that the intercepts of Items 2, 4, and 5 were noninvariant. Based on two invariant intercepts, factor means of countries were compared. Chile showed the highest factor mean; Spain and Bulgaria showed the lowest. The findings enhance our understanding of life satisfaction across countries, and they provide researchers and practitioners with practical guidance on how to conduct measurement invariance testing across countries