Avoidance Increases Target’s Stress

January 16, 2012 by Leave a Comment

Most targets try to avoid contact with an abusive supervisor but this tactic may backfire because it increases the target’s stress, according to research published in the American Psychological Association’s  International Journal of Stress Management.

A study conducted by a team of researchers at the University of Haifa in Israel found that direct communication with a bully boss results in more positive emotions for the target than avoidance. An example of direct communication is: “I tell the supervisor directly that he/she must not treat me like that.”

“It is understandable that employees wish to reduce their contact to a minimum.  However, this strategy further increases the employee’s stress because it is associated with a sense of weakness and perpetuates their fear of the supervisor,” said Prof. Dana Yagil, a member of the university’s Faculty of Social Welfare and Health Sciences who headed the study.

According to the study, abusive supervision is a major organizational stressor yet little is known about how employees cope with such stress. The study examined five types of strategies for coping with the stress factor of abusive treatment:

  • Directly communicating with the abusive boss to discuss the problems.
  • Using forms of ingratiation such as doing favors, using flattery and compliance.
  • Seeking support from others.
  • Avoiding contact with the supervisor.
  • Reframing or mentally restructuring the abuse in a way that decreases its threat.

The most widely-used strategy reported by the 300 employees who participated in the study was avoiding contact with the abusive supervisor, disengaging from the supervisor as much as possible, and also to seeking support from others.  The least used strategy was direct communication with the abusive supervisor — the strategy that was most strongly related to employees’ positive emotions.

The study shows that managers should be alert to signs of employee detachment – as it might indicate that their own behavior is being considered offensive by those employees.

Filed Under: Being Bullied?, DISPATCHES Tagged With: , abusive boss, abusive supervisor, American Psychological Association, , Dr. Dana Yagil, International Journal of Stress Management, job stress, University of Haifa

Workplace Bullying Affects Family Relationships

September 6, 2011 by Leave a Comment

There’s an old saying: When mom is unhappy; everyone is unhappy!  (Presumably the same goes  for Dad.)

A study by a Baylor University researcher has found that workplace incivility can be so intense that, at the end of the day, the target brings it home, where it impacts the well-being of the worker’s family and partner.

The study’s author, Merideth J. Ferguson, Ph.D., an assistant professor of management and entrepreneurship at the Baylor University Hankamer School of Business, says:   “Employees who experience such incivility at work bring home the stress, negative emotion and perceived ostracism that results from those experiences, which then affects more than their family life – it also creates problems for the partner’s life at work.”

Since the employee is stressed and distracted, the partner is likely to pick up more of the family responsibilities, and those demands may interfere with the partner’s work life. The study also found that such stress also significantly affected the worker’s and the partner’s marital satisfaction.

“This research underlines the importance of stopping incivility before it starts so that the ripple effect of incivility does not impact the employee’s family and potentially inflict further damage beyond the workplace where the incivility took place and cross over into the workplace of the partner,” said Ferguson.

The study included 190 full-time workers, who all had co-workers and had an employed partner, who agreed to complete an online survey.  After completing the survey, workers were asked to have their partners complete a separate survey.  Approximately 57 percent of the employee sample was male with an average age of 36, while 43 percent of the partner sample was male with an average age of 35. Of these couples, 75 percent had children living with them.

“Unlike the study of incivility’s effects at work, the study of its impact on the family is in its infancy. However, these findings emphasize the notion that organizations must realize the far-reaching effects of co-worker incivility and its impact on employees and their families,” Ferguson said.

“One approach to prevent this stress might be to encourage workers to seek support through their organization’s employee assistance program or other resources such as counseling or stress management so that tactics or mechanisms for buffering the effect of incivility’s stress on the family can be identified,” she said.

Ferguson advises workers who are experiencing “chronic rudeness” to get help with stress management techniques. “Rudeness and instability can result in things like anxiety and depression, so we suggest people get in touch with a counselor,” she said. “If it starts impacting their physical and mental health, they should seek a job elsewhere.”

The study results were announced in an August 16, 2011 press release by Baylor, which is based in Waco, TX.

Filed Under: Being Bullied?, DISPATCHES Tagged With: , , Baylor University, Family Relationships, , Merideth J. Ferguson, Ph.D., , workplace civility

Impact of Job Stress on Health

December 4, 2010 by Leave a Comment
 There is  OVERWHELMING research that workplace bullying can be devastating to one’s health, both emotional and physical. PGB

Job Stress and Health

Excerpt from a publication of the Center for the Promotion of Health in the New England Workplace:

Stress sets off an alarm in the brain, which responds by preparing the body for defensive action. The nervous system is aroused and hormones are released to sharpen the senses, quicken the pulse, deepen respiration, and tense the muscles. This response (sometimes called the fight or flight response) is important because it helps us defend against threatening situations. The response is preprogrammed biologically. Everyone responds in much the same way, regardless of whether the stressful situation is at work or home.

Short-lived or infrequent episodes of stress pose little risk. But when stressful situations go unresolved, the body is kept in a constant state of activation, which increases the rate of wear and tear to biological systems. Ultimately, fatigue or damage results, and the ability of the body to repair and defend itself can become seriously compromised. As a result, the risk of injury or disease escalates.

In the past 20 years, many studies have looked at the relationship between job stress and a variety of ailments. Mood and sleep disturbances, upset stomach and headache, and disturbed relationships with family and friends are examples of stress-related problems that are quick to develop and are commonly seen in these studies. These early signs of job stress are usually easy to recognize. But the effects of job stress on chronic diseases are more difficult to see because chronic diseases take a long time to develop and can be influenced by many factors other than stress. Nonetheless, evidence is rapidly accumulating to suggest that stress plays an important role in several types of chronic health problems-especially cardiovascular disease, musculoskeletal disorders, and psychological disorders.

Health care expenditures are nearly 50% greater for workers who report high levels of stress.

-Journal of Occupational and Environmental Medicine

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How does job stress contribute to cardiovascular disease, and what can be done to intervene?

 

Cardiovascular diseases (CVD) are the leading cause of death in the United States.

Considerable evidence has demonstrated that occupational stress contributes to CVD morbidity and mortality. It is estimated that up to 23 percent of heart disease related deaths per year could be prevented if the levels of job strain in the most stressful occupations were reduced to average levels seen in other occupations …

Job stress results from the interaction of the worker and the working conditions. Specific workplace features of concern include highly repetitive, monotonous tasks, excessive job demands and time pressure, racial or sexual discrimination; management style, interpersonal relationships, work roles, job insecurity, and environmental exposures such as constant background noise, or heat. One very widely used definition of stressful work is the combination of high demands with little or no leeway for decision-making about the job (also referred to as “high demand/low control” or “job strain”). A high demand with insufficient rewards (known as
“effort/reward imbalance”) has also been highlighted as problematic.

Evidence supporting the multiple mechanisms by which job stress contributes to cardiovascular diseases (and other chronic health conditions) comes from a vast body of international scientific literature that includes epidemiologic studies, patho-physiological studies of animals and humans, and behavioral studies. Stressful conditions on the job can result in at least three main mechanisms or pathways:

1. Changes in physiological processes that increase the risk for CVD—high cholesterol, high blood pressure, high blood sugar, weakened immune response, high cortisol, and changes in appetite and digestive patterns.

2. Changes in behavior that increase the risk for CVD—low physical activity levels, excessive coffee consumption, smoking, poor dietary habits.

3. Development of mental health conditions (anxiety and depression) that independently increases the risk for a range of chronic health conditions, including CVD (obesity, stroke, atherosclerosis, arrhythmias, myocardial infarction, etc.).

… evidence from intervention research shows clear benefits for a “systems” approach that emphasizes primary prevention, and that combines approaches for improving working conditions with approaches for managing occupational stress-related illnesses.  Examples of primary prevention approaches include clarifying worker roles, increasing worker decision making opportunities, improving worker management communication, ensuring a respectful work environment, and increasing social interaction between workers. Examples of managing occupational stress-related illness include training on stress management techniques, providing space for exercise and medication, and providing access to employee assistance programs …

Authors: Suzanne Nobrega, M.S., and Manuel Cifuentes, M.D, Sc.D., University of MA Lowell

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STUDY: BAD MANAGERS POTENTIALLY LETHAL

In a groundbreaking 2008 study, Swedish researchers, led by Anna Nyberg at the Stress Institute in Stockholm, studied more than 3,100 men over a 10 year period in typical work settings. The researchers reported in the Journal of Occupational and Environmental Medicine that employees who had managers who were incompetent, inconsiderate, secretive and uncommunicative were 60 percent more likely to suffered a heart attack or other life-threatening cardiac condition. Employees who worked with “good” leaders were 40 percent less likely to suffer heart problems.

Filed Under: Being Bullied?, DISPATCHES, Health Risks Tagged With: , , , , abuse at work, Anna Nyberg, , health risks at work, sick at work, stress, Stress Institute
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