Chapter 6: Conclusions, Limitations and Recommendations
2.5 Occupational Stress
After an extensive review of existing literature, there is a seemingly emergent theme of uncertainty when defining stress; therein, there is no single agreed definition, however, numerous theorists have advanced their own conceptualisations of stress (Cooper & Williams, 1991; Hart & Cooper, 2001; Viljoen & Rothmann, 2009). If one bases their understanding on the seminal work of Hans Selye, who is often considered the ‘father’ of stress research, one can start identifying the subjective nature of stress in terms of it being, "an adaptive syndrome or non-specific response to demands placed upon the human body, which either stimulate or threaten the individual" (Selye, 1956, p.38). Within this line of thinking, stress is understood as being part of a complex psychological state that originates from an individual’s cognitive appraisal of the adaption to the demands of their surroundings (Cox, 1987). To elaborate on this further, Andersson (2002), conceptualises stress as essentially being a response to the self-
perceived imbalance between an individual’s resources to successfully address the demands of the situation presented.
Whilst reviewing occupational stress, it is imperative to understand it as being subjective in nature and implicitly, the appraisal of stress is primarily therefore based on perceptions pertaining to whether or not an individual can cope and manage with the various demands that are placed on them as a whole, as well as the constraints placed on the individual, their characteristics and support afforded to them (Herbert, 2011; Cox, 1987). In this vein, it is elementary to deduce that the degree of hindrance that emerges due to the imbalance between the job demands and the individuals’ resources places significant strain in both their personal and work capacities (Lazarus & Folkman, 1984). Owing to the perceptual differences in an individual’s evaluation of stress, the assessment of such, cannot be viewed as objective (Herbert, 2011; Roberts et al., 2011).
Understandably, stress does not only occur within personal domains but transcends into the world of work. Even though there are shared characteristics between stress and occupational stress (Cooper, Dewe & O’Driscoll, 2001), Spector (1997, p.108) advances that occupational stress “is the sum total of factors experienced in relation to work which affects the psychosocial and physiological homeostasis of the worker, the individual factor is termed a stressor and stress is the individual worker’s reaction to stressors”. Unlike stress itself, occupational stress is confined within the ambit of the work environment and typically refers to the inherent characteristics of the occupation that causes social, physiological and psychological imbalances within the individual based on their own subjective appraisal of a stressor (Kesari, 2012). The impression given by literature is that stress or occupational stress in this regard is an inherently
considered negative (Herbert, 2011). It is common knowledge that copious amounts of stress or ‘distress' (Lazarus & Folkman, 1984) can result in acute physiological, psychological and emotional repercussions for individuals (Setar, Buitendach & Kanengoni, 2015); conversely, good experiences of stress or ‘eustress' (Herbert, 2011) serves as a resource to aid individuals whilst performing challenging tasks. What eustress advances then, is that the kind of stress experienced during energising or challenging activities will succour an individual's performance under pressure and better able them to cope with unforeseen changes within the working environment (Coon & Mitterer, 2007; Herbert, 2011). It is imperative that such a distinction is made within the ambit of this study insofar as to ensure that there is no misinterpretation of findings; thus, for the purposes of this study, the term ‘occupational stress’
will be synonymous with distress.
In South Africa, demands within and outside of the work environment that contribute to high levels of stress, inevitably lead to increased displays of competition among employees (Van Zyl, 2002). As a result, Van Zyl (2002) claims that occurrences of conflict, aggressive behaviour, poor communication amongst employees and low morale become the norm. It is elementary then, to understand that due high levels of occupational stress and the associated occurrences of incivility and inter-employee conflict, grows a need for the effective monitoring of stress as a way to ensure optimal organisational functioning (Herbert, 2011). Previous studies (Roberts et al., 2011; Van Jaarsveld, Walker & Skarlicki, 2010) have found that there was a significant positive relationship between occupational stress and displays of uncivil workplace behaviour; more pertinent to this study is the moderating role of psychological capital in this relationship. It is imperative to note that a previous study (Penney & Spector, 2005) has illustrated the link between uncivil workplace behaviour as a stressor within the workplace and its role in provoking individuals to engage with counter-productive work behaviour. The above
contextualises the need for occupational stress to be a crucial area of investigation as the benefit of its understanding provides the impetus to further examine its negative outcomes, such as uncivil workplace behaviour, but also build on the existing knowledge of PsyCap’s role as a moderating factor within the relationship.
As far as could be ascertained, prominent literature detailing the relationship between occupational stress and uncivil workplace behaviour (Van Jaarsveld, Walker & Skarlicki, 2010) as well as that of job involvement (Setar, Buitendach & Kanengoni, 2015) in conjunction with the role of psychological capital as a moderating factor in this relationship (Herbert, 2011; Setar, Buitendach & Kanengoni, 2015) were identified. However, no studies recognised the relationship between occupational stress, uncivil workplace behaviour, job satisfaction and the moderating role of psychological capital amongst call centre employees within the South African context, let alone that of the Emergency Control Unit employees.