Psychological Reports: Employment Psychology & Marketing 2015, 116, 2, 377-380. © Psychological Reports 2015
STRESS, COPING, AND WORK ENGAGEMENT WITHIN THE SPECIFIC JOB CONTEXT: COMMENT ON KAISELER, ET AL. (2014)1 ESTHER GRACIA IDOCAL, Facultad de Psicología, University of Valencia Summary.—This work discusses the use of tools that make use of context information. Comments are based on a previous study that looked into the relationship between stressors, coping, and work engagement (Kaiseler, Queirós, Passos & Sousa, 2014). A set of propositions are provided for research that will allow the design of contextualized stress interventions in specific job settings.
The 2014 paper by Kaiseler, Queirós, Passos, and Sousa studied the relationship between stress appraisal, coping, and work engagement among police recruits. Specifically, they observed that engaged police recruits used more active coping but fewer behavioral disengagement strategies. In addition, they found that as the levels of stressor control perceived by the police recruits rose, they felt more engaged in their work. This supports the idea that a sense of control over a specific event plays an important role in the stress process (Lazarus & Folkman, 1984). Along these lines, they suggest that “future applied interventions fostering work engagement among police recruits should reinforce perceptions of control over a stressor as well as active coping strategies” (Kaiseler, et al., 2014, p. 635). Taking the study by Kaiseler, et al. (2014) as a starting point, how could future studies provide additional information to help police recruits and officers to reinforce their perceptions of control over a stressor and to follow the “most efficient” active coping strategies that will allow them to reduce the negative effects of a specific stressor and enhance work engagement? The importance of considering context in the study of stress and coping, as highlighted earlier by Lazarus and Folkman (1984), comes to mind. This brief article focuses on highlighting the need to take into account certain specific factors when analyzing stress and coping if practical insights are to be gained. Hence, it examines the extent to which contextual information was measured, coded, and analyzed by Kaiseler, et al. (2014) to provide alternative proposals for future studies. To be more precise, three propositions relevant to future studies on stress and coping are put forward: (1) to make use of the contextualized data that have already been collected; (2) to implement methods that collect information with high Address correspondence to Esther Gracia, IDOCAL, Facultad de Psicología, Universidad de Valencia, Avda. Blasco Ibáñez, 21, 46010 Valencia, Spain or e-mail ([email protected]) 1
DOI 10.2466/01.20.PR0.116k22w1
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ecological validity; and (3) to analyze the complexity of the coping process by examining the specific stressor-coping-outcome relationship. The first proposal arises from the fact that the participants in the study by Kaiseler, et al. (2014) assessed a specific stressor (i.e., the most intense one that they had experienced in relation to the academy course), which provides rich contextual information. A total of 387 stressors were collected. The stressors were, however, finally divided into just two main types: outcome, if the stressor referred to results such as tests or examinations; and course, if the stressor instead referred to structures and performance such as time management. These broad categories might reduce the richness of the information. A more specific categorization of the types of stressors such as overload, social undervaluation, constantly changing environment, culture shock, role conflict, conflict with colleagues, technological problems, etc. (e.g., O'Driscoll & Cooper, 1996; Länsisalmi, Peiró, & Kivimäki, 2000) may help future studies to identify the most frequent stressors and the most salient characteristics of the stressors, including those that have a more considerable effect on work engagement, in a particular setting. The second proposal results from the fact that the coping strategies, in contrast to the sources of stress, were chosen by participants from a closed list of 14 general options using the COPE scale (Carver, 1997). Although the COPE scale is a well-known and validated scale, it may not be accurate for collecting contextual information regarding location and time. That is, it does not allow differentiation of the full range of potential effective coping responses that were taken. This premise is in line with previous studies that have already strongly recommended using a measure that makes no assumptions and avoids setting any restrictions instead of assessing coping strategies by means of a predetermined list (O’Driscoll & Cooper, 1994). One alternative is to follow the Critical Incident Technique (Flanagan, 1954) to collect specific coping strategies. This 60-yearold method consists in a “flexible set of principles that must be modified and adapted to meet the specific situation at hand” (Flanagan, 1954, p. 335). The method takes place in a natural setting and data are collected as words through interviewing, participant observation, and/or qualitative open-ended questions (Butterfield, Borgen, Amundson, & Maglio, 2005). This technique has frequently been used in an assortment of disciplines such as job analysis, psychology, and counseling, etc., and has proven to be both valid and reliable (see Butterfield, et al., 2005, for a revision). Furthermore, this technique would be a good tool for use in future studies to assess coping strategies (O'Driscoll & Cooper, 1996) even in police settings, because it “offers a high level of safety for participants” (Burns, Morley, Bradshaw, & Domene, 2008; p. 22).
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The third proposal stems from the fact that the relationship between coping strategies and work engagement in the study by Kaiseler, et al. (2014) was analyzed independently from the specific stressor to which the participants referred. Yet the definition of coping put forward by Lazarus and Folkman (1984, p. 141), also taken up by Kaiseler, et al. (2014, p. 636), refers to efforts made to manage specific stressors. That is, “a strategy that is effective in one situation can be ineffective in another and vice versa” (Lazarus & Folkman, 1984; p. 185). Therefore, different stressors elicit different forms of coping, and the coping strategies that are chosen might not be effective (O'Driscoll & Cooper, 1996). For example, a stress study in police teams oriented toward assessing Internet child exploitation (ICE) reported that viewing strategies such as a gradual introduction to images or determining when, where, and how to view the images helped them to mitigate the negative effects of viewing as a source of stress (Burns, et al., 2008). However, these strategies are unlikely to help police officers who are mainly stressed because of workload or technology problems. In this sense, it is essential to analyze specific stressors and actual responses to those stressors simultaneously in order to gain a complete understanding of the outcomes of the coping process (O'Driscoll & Cooper, 1994). For this reason, future analyses could test the interactions between the most effective coping strategies for each of the types of stressors in order to see whether the effects on work engagement are higher than when taken separately. This information would help to focus interventions on the most efficient stressor-coping-engagement relationship. In conclusion, Kaiseler, et al. (2014) have made a considerable effort to apply new measures and to obtain information from a specific difficult-to-access population. Furthermore, their work provides a useful step for highlighting stress and coping processes among police officers. Applying the three methods proposed here may allow future research to refine the tools for understanding and improving coping interventions in highstress occupations like policing. REFERENCES
BURNS, C. M., MORLEY, J., BRADSHAW, R., & DOMENE, J. (2008) The emotional impact on and coping strategies employed by police teams investigating Internet child exploitation. Traumatology, 14, 20-31. BUTTERFIELD, L. D., BORGEN, W. A., AMUNDSON, N. E., & MAGLIO, A. S. T. (2005) Fifty years of the critical incident technique: 1954–2004 and beyond. Qualitative Research, 5, 475-497. CARVER, C. S. (1997) You want to measure coping but your protocol’s too long: consider the Brief COPE. International Journal of Behavioral Medicine, 4, 92-100. FLANAGAN, J. C. (1954) The critical incident technique. Psychological Bulletin, 51, 327-355. KAISELER, M., QUEIRÓS, C., PASSOS, F., & SOUSA, P. (2014) Stress appraisal, coping, and work engagement among police recruits: an exploratory study. Psychological Reports: Employment Psychology & Marketing, 114, 635-646.
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LÄNSISALMI, H., PEIRÓ, J. M., & KIVIMÄKI, M. (2000) Collective stress and coping in the context of organizational culture. European Journal of Work and Organizational Psychology, 9, 527-559. LAZARUS, R. S., & FOLKMAN, S. (1984) Stress, appraisal, and coping. New York: Springer. O'DRISCOLL, M. P., & COOPER, C. L. (1994) Coping with work-related stress: a critique of existing measures and proposal for an alternative methodology. Journal of Occupational and Organizational Psychology, 67, 343-354. O'DRISCOLL, M. P., & COOPER, C. L. (1996) A critical incident analysis of stress-coping behaviours at work. Stress Medicine, 12, 123-128. Accepted February 16, 2015.
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Copyright of Psychological Reports is the property of Ammons Scientific, Ltd. and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use.
STRESS, COPING, AND WORK ENGAGEMENT WITHIN THE SPECIFIC JOB CONTEXT: COMMENT ON KAISELER, ET AL. (2014)1 ESTHER GRACIA IDOCAL, Facultad de Psicología, University of Valencia Summary.—This work discusses the use of tools that make use of context information. Comments are based on a previous study that looked into the relationship between stressors, coping, and work engagement (Kaiseler, Queirós, Passos & Sousa, 2014). A set of propositions are provided for research that will allow the design of contextualized stress interventions in specific job settings.
The 2014 paper by Kaiseler, Queirós, Passos, and Sousa studied the relationship between stress appraisal, coping, and work engagement among police recruits. Specifically, they observed that engaged police recruits used more active coping but fewer behavioral disengagement strategies. In addition, they found that as the levels of stressor control perceived by the police recruits rose, they felt more engaged in their work. This supports the idea that a sense of control over a specific event plays an important role in the stress process (Lazarus & Folkman, 1984). Along these lines, they suggest that “future applied interventions fostering work engagement among police recruits should reinforce perceptions of control over a stressor as well as active coping strategies” (Kaiseler, et al., 2014, p. 635). Taking the study by Kaiseler, et al. (2014) as a starting point, how could future studies provide additional information to help police recruits and officers to reinforce their perceptions of control over a stressor and to follow the “most efficient” active coping strategies that will allow them to reduce the negative effects of a specific stressor and enhance work engagement? The importance of considering context in the study of stress and coping, as highlighted earlier by Lazarus and Folkman (1984), comes to mind. This brief article focuses on highlighting the need to take into account certain specific factors when analyzing stress and coping if practical insights are to be gained. Hence, it examines the extent to which contextual information was measured, coded, and analyzed by Kaiseler, et al. (2014) to provide alternative proposals for future studies. To be more precise, three propositions relevant to future studies on stress and coping are put forward: (1) to make use of the contextualized data that have already been collected; (2) to implement methods that collect information with high Address correspondence to Esther Gracia, IDOCAL, Facultad de Psicología, Universidad de Valencia, Avda. Blasco Ibáñez, 21, 46010 Valencia, Spain or e-mail ([email protected]) 1
DOI 10.2466/01.20.PR0.116k22w1
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ISSN 0033-2941
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ecological validity; and (3) to analyze the complexity of the coping process by examining the specific stressor-coping-outcome relationship. The first proposal arises from the fact that the participants in the study by Kaiseler, et al. (2014) assessed a specific stressor (i.e., the most intense one that they had experienced in relation to the academy course), which provides rich contextual information. A total of 387 stressors were collected. The stressors were, however, finally divided into just two main types: outcome, if the stressor referred to results such as tests or examinations; and course, if the stressor instead referred to structures and performance such as time management. These broad categories might reduce the richness of the information. A more specific categorization of the types of stressors such as overload, social undervaluation, constantly changing environment, culture shock, role conflict, conflict with colleagues, technological problems, etc. (e.g., O'Driscoll & Cooper, 1996; Länsisalmi, Peiró, & Kivimäki, 2000) may help future studies to identify the most frequent stressors and the most salient characteristics of the stressors, including those that have a more considerable effect on work engagement, in a particular setting. The second proposal results from the fact that the coping strategies, in contrast to the sources of stress, were chosen by participants from a closed list of 14 general options using the COPE scale (Carver, 1997). Although the COPE scale is a well-known and validated scale, it may not be accurate for collecting contextual information regarding location and time. That is, it does not allow differentiation of the full range of potential effective coping responses that were taken. This premise is in line with previous studies that have already strongly recommended using a measure that makes no assumptions and avoids setting any restrictions instead of assessing coping strategies by means of a predetermined list (O’Driscoll & Cooper, 1994). One alternative is to follow the Critical Incident Technique (Flanagan, 1954) to collect specific coping strategies. This 60-yearold method consists in a “flexible set of principles that must be modified and adapted to meet the specific situation at hand” (Flanagan, 1954, p. 335). The method takes place in a natural setting and data are collected as words through interviewing, participant observation, and/or qualitative open-ended questions (Butterfield, Borgen, Amundson, & Maglio, 2005). This technique has frequently been used in an assortment of disciplines such as job analysis, psychology, and counseling, etc., and has proven to be both valid and reliable (see Butterfield, et al., 2005, for a revision). Furthermore, this technique would be a good tool for use in future studies to assess coping strategies (O'Driscoll & Cooper, 1996) even in police settings, because it “offers a high level of safety for participants” (Burns, Morley, Bradshaw, & Domene, 2008; p. 22).
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The third proposal stems from the fact that the relationship between coping strategies and work engagement in the study by Kaiseler, et al. (2014) was analyzed independently from the specific stressor to which the participants referred. Yet the definition of coping put forward by Lazarus and Folkman (1984, p. 141), also taken up by Kaiseler, et al. (2014, p. 636), refers to efforts made to manage specific stressors. That is, “a strategy that is effective in one situation can be ineffective in another and vice versa” (Lazarus & Folkman, 1984; p. 185). Therefore, different stressors elicit different forms of coping, and the coping strategies that are chosen might not be effective (O'Driscoll & Cooper, 1996). For example, a stress study in police teams oriented toward assessing Internet child exploitation (ICE) reported that viewing strategies such as a gradual introduction to images or determining when, where, and how to view the images helped them to mitigate the negative effects of viewing as a source of stress (Burns, et al., 2008). However, these strategies are unlikely to help police officers who are mainly stressed because of workload or technology problems. In this sense, it is essential to analyze specific stressors and actual responses to those stressors simultaneously in order to gain a complete understanding of the outcomes of the coping process (O'Driscoll & Cooper, 1994). For this reason, future analyses could test the interactions between the most effective coping strategies for each of the types of stressors in order to see whether the effects on work engagement are higher than when taken separately. This information would help to focus interventions on the most efficient stressor-coping-engagement relationship. In conclusion, Kaiseler, et al. (2014) have made a considerable effort to apply new measures and to obtain information from a specific difficult-to-access population. Furthermore, their work provides a useful step for highlighting stress and coping processes among police officers. Applying the three methods proposed here may allow future research to refine the tools for understanding and improving coping interventions in highstress occupations like policing. REFERENCES
BURNS, C. M., MORLEY, J., BRADSHAW, R., & DOMENE, J. (2008) The emotional impact on and coping strategies employed by police teams investigating Internet child exploitation. Traumatology, 14, 20-31. BUTTERFIELD, L. D., BORGEN, W. A., AMUNDSON, N. E., & MAGLIO, A. S. T. (2005) Fifty years of the critical incident technique: 1954–2004 and beyond. Qualitative Research, 5, 475-497. CARVER, C. S. (1997) You want to measure coping but your protocol’s too long: consider the Brief COPE. International Journal of Behavioral Medicine, 4, 92-100. FLANAGAN, J. C. (1954) The critical incident technique. Psychological Bulletin, 51, 327-355. KAISELER, M., QUEIRÓS, C., PASSOS, F., & SOUSA, P. (2014) Stress appraisal, coping, and work engagement among police recruits: an exploratory study. Psychological Reports: Employment Psychology & Marketing, 114, 635-646.
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LÄNSISALMI, H., PEIRÓ, J. M., & KIVIMÄKI, M. (2000) Collective stress and coping in the context of organizational culture. European Journal of Work and Organizational Psychology, 9, 527-559. LAZARUS, R. S., & FOLKMAN, S. (1984) Stress, appraisal, and coping. New York: Springer. O'DRISCOLL, M. P., & COOPER, C. L. (1994) Coping with work-related stress: a critique of existing measures and proposal for an alternative methodology. Journal of Occupational and Organizational Psychology, 67, 343-354. O'DRISCOLL, M. P., & COOPER, C. L. (1996) A critical incident analysis of stress-coping behaviours at work. Stress Medicine, 12, 123-128. Accepted February 16, 2015.
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02/04/15 3:24 PM
Copyright of Psychological Reports is the property of Ammons Scientific, Ltd. and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use.
