Integrated Intelligent Research (IIR)
Vol 02, Issue 01, June 2013, Page No.28-32
A Study of Work Related Stress Factors
Affecting Work Life Balance using Combined
Overlap Block Fuzzy Cognitive Mapping
(COBFCM)
A.VictorDevadoss, J. Befija Minnie
Department of Mathematics, Loyola College, Chennai, India
Email: befija@yahoo.co.in
Abstract - Work related stress factors play a major role in the
work life balance irrespective of the personal stress factors,
organizational setups and other factors. The work life stressors
of every individual affect the Work-life harmony and work
efficiency. In this study an attempt is made to study about the
work related stressors which affect more on the work life
harmony and ultimately results in work life imbalance. The
experts linguistic opinions are analyzed using Combined
Overlap Block Fuzzy Cognitive Mapping (COBFCM) model
to find out the work related stressor which is the major reason
for work life imbalance and affects the work life harmony.
Keywords: Stress, Work related Stressors, Work Life balance,
Combined Overlap Block Fuzzy Cognitive maps
I. INTRODUCTION
I.1 Stress
Stress is a natural factor that acts from inside or outside of the
world and influencing the individual. Every response to stress
will affect the particular individual as well as the environment.
As we experience the high stress in day today life, we often
perceive it as a negative experience; however, the stress can
also be experienced as positive to some extent. In general,
stress is related to both external and internal factors. External
factors include the physical environment, including job,
relationships with others, challenges, difficulties and
expectations deal with on a daily basis. Internal factors decide
the way to respond and deal with the external stressors.
Internal factors which influence the ability to handle stress
include nutritional status, overall health and fitness levels,
emotional well-being and the amount of sleep and rest one
gets.
I.2 Stresses at Work
The demands of modern lifestyle and modern organizational
setups are inducing stress and acting as a stress factors. Stress
at work is not affecting the individual but also affects t 1 he
organization. Work related stress starts when one cannot cope
up with the modern day’s deadlines and long working hours.
Stress is a well-known and very common trouble in today's
workplace. As per Princeton Survey Research Associates
Labor Day survey states, about one-third of workers report
high levels of stress. One-quarter of employees sight their jobs
as the number one stressor in their lives. Three-quarters of
employees suppose the worker has more on-the-job stress than
a generation ago [10]. As per Michael Kahn, Work-related
stress study finds evidence suggests that stress is the major
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International Journal of Computing Algorithm
ISSN: 2278-2397
cause of revenue in organizations. With chronic stress at the
workplace, workers will build up psychological and
physiological dysfunctions and decreased motivation in
excelling in their position [4]. The Kenexa Research Institute
released a global survey of almost 30,000 workers which
showed that females suffered more workplace stress than their
male counterparts [17].
According to the survey, women's stress level were 10% higher
for those in supervisory positions, 8% higher stress in service
and production jobs than men, and 6% higher in middle and
upper management than men in the same position. Professional
stress or job stresses always have a threat to physical health.
Work related stress in the life of organized workers,
consequently, affects the health of organizations. Work-related
stress can be caused by various factors. For example, a person
might feel under pressure if the demands of their job (such as
hours or responsibilities) are greater than they can comfortably
manage. Other sources of work-related stress include conflict
with co-workers or bosses, work harassment and threats to job
security. What one person may perceive as stressful, however,
another may view as challenging.
I.3 Stressor
A stressor is anything that causes the release of stress
hormones. There are two broad categories of stressors:
Physiological (or physical) stressors and Psychological
Stressors.
Physiological (or physical) stressors
These are stressors that put strain on our body (i.e., very
cold/hot temperatures, injury, chronic illness or pain).
Psychological Stressors
These are events, situations, individuals, comments or anything
we interpret as negative or threatening (i.e., love failure, death,
fired from job, etc).
I.4 Work Life Balance
Work life balance is about people having measure of their
control over when, where and how they work. Most of the
people view thework life balance is what the organization
allows for an individual to experience. However, work-life
balance is a bi-dimensional approach. The other dimension of
work-life balance, which many individuals overlook, relates to
Integrated Intelligent Research (IIR)
what individuals do for themselves. The success of work life
balance is always sustained with achievement along with
enjoyment. Achievement and enjoyment at work is a critical
part of work-life balance.
Moreover, achievement and enjoyment in the other three
quadrants of one's life (e.g. family, friends and self) is critical
as well. Stress occurs in many different circumstances, but is
particularly strong when a person’s ability to control the
demands of work is threatened. The importance of the balance
between personal life and work life is ignored today. . The
imbalance also has a negative impact in the personal life of
working people, some of which have even become social
hazards- increasing number of divorces, infertility due to high
stress levels, nuclear families etc.  When Ciis switched on and if the causality flows through the
I.5 Work related stressors which affect the work life balance
Stress can strike anyone at any level of the business and recent
research (4) shows that work related stress is prevalent and is
not restricted to particular sectors, jobs or industries. Job stress
is a persistent illness caused by conditions in the workplace
that negatively affect an individual`s performance and/or
overall well-being of his body and mind. One or morephysical
and mental illnesses manifests job stress. In some cases, job
stress can be disabling. In chronic cases a psychiatric
consultation is usually required to validate the reason and
degree of work related stress. In the early stages job stress can
boost the body and enhance performance in the workplace,
thus the term `I perform better under pressure`. However, if
this condition is allowed to go continuously and the body is
depleted further, the performance ultimately declines and the
person`s health degenerates. Due to these health issues and the
anxiety caused by the stress at work effectively influence the
work life balance. The subject individual is unable to manage
work and life and thus fail in either of these or both of these.
In this study, the expert’s opinion used to determine which
work related stressor have more influence in destroying the
work life harmony and lead to work life imbalance.
II. DEFINITION AND ILLUSTRATION OF
COMBINED OVERLAP BLOCK FUZZY
COGNITIVE MAPS (COBFCMS)
The FCMs work on the opinion of experts. FCMs model the
world as a collection of classes and causal relations between
classes. FCMs are fuzzy signed directed graphs with feedback.
The directed edge eijfrom causal concept Cito concept
Cjmeasures how much Cjcauses Ci. The edges eijtake values in
the fuzzy causal interval [–1, 1]. e ij= 0 indicates no causality,
eij> 0 indicates causal increase, Cjincreases as Ciincreases (or
Cidecreases as Cjdecreases). eij< 0 indicates causal decrease or
negative causality. Cj decreases as Ciincreases (or Cjincreases
as Ci decreases). Simple FCMs have edge values in {–1, 0, 1}.
2.1 Definitions
Definition 2.1.1: An FCM is a directed graph with concepts
like policies, events etc. as nodes and causalities as edges. It
represents causal relationship between concepts.
Definition 2.1.2: FCMs with edge weights or causalities from
the set {–1, 0, 1}, are called simple FCMs.
Definition 2.1.3: Consider the nodes or concepts C1,….Cnof the
FCM. Suppose the directed graph is drawn using edge weight
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International Journal of Computing Algorithm
Vol 02, Issue 01, June 2013, Page No.28-32
ISSN: 2278-2397
eij∈{0, 1, –1}. The matrix E be defined by E = (eij)whereeijis
the weight of the directed edge CiCj.E is called the adjacency
matrix of the FCM, also known as the connection matrix of the
FCM.
Definition 2.1.4: Let C1,….Cn be the nodes of an FCM. A = (a1,
a2,….,an) where ai∈{0, 1}. A is called the instantaneous state
vector and it denotes the on-off position of the node at an
instant.
ai= 0 if aiis off and
ai= 1 if aiis on for i = 1, 2, …, n.
CC CC C C
Definition2.1.5:Let 1 2 , 1 2 ….., n-1 n be a cycle.
edges of a cycle and if it again causes C i, we say that the
dynamical system goes round and round. This is true for any
node Ci, for i = 1, 2,…, n. The equilibrium state for this
dynamical system is called the hidden pattern.
Definition 2.1.6: Finite number of FCMs can be combined
together to produce the joint effect of all the FCMs. Let E 1, E2,
….Ep be the adjacency matrices of the FCMs with nodes C1, C2,
….Cn then the combined FCM is got by adding all the
adjacency matrices E1, E2, ….Ep.
We denote the combined FCM adjacency matrix by E = E1 + E2
+ … + Ep. Suppose A = (a1, a2,….,an) is a vector which is
passed into a dynamical system E. Then AE = (a’1, a’2,….,a’n)
after thresholding and updating the vector suppose we get (b1,
b2,….,bn) we denote that by (a1, a2,….,an) ↪ (b1, b2,….,bn).
Thus the symbol ‘↪’ means the resultant vector has been
thresholded and updated.
2.2 Method of finding the hidden patterns
Let C1, C2,., Cn be the nodes of an FCM, with feedback. Let E
be the associated adjacency matrix. Let us find the hidden
pattern when C1 is switched on. When an input is given as the
vector A1 = (1, 0, 0,., 0), the data should pass through the
relation matrix E. This is done by multiplying A1 by the matrix
E. Let A1E = (a1, a2,., an) with the threshold operation that is by
replacing ai by 1 if ai> k and ai by 0 if ai< k (k is a suitable
positive integer).We update the resulting concept, the concept
C1 is included in the updated vector by making the first
coordinate as 1 in the resulting vector. Suppose A 1E → A2 then
consider A2E and repeat the same procedure. This procedure is
repeated till we get a limit cycle or a fixed point.
III. ADAPTATION OF THE PROBLEM
There are many factors contributing to work related stress and
all the stress inducing factors (stressors) will lead to work life
imbalance. It is known that all the stressors affect the work life
balance in some degree. Twelve stress inducing factors are
derived from expert’s opinion and to find out which stressor
has more influence in provoking the other stress inducing
factors and result in work life imbalance. With the help of
expert’s opinion the data has been arrived. Since the data is
linguistic by nature it makes it very difficult to analyze it with
other mathematical tools. Combined Overlap Block FCM is
useful in such a way to analyze these linguistic data and make
easier to drive the result. With COBFCM, the analysis of work
related stressor affects the work life balance directly has been
studied in this paper. The following attributes are taken as the
Integrated Intelligent Research (IIR) International Journal of Computing Algorithm
Vol 02, Issue 01, June 2013, Page No.28-32
ISSN: 2278-2397

nodes of the COBFCM. A = {A 1, A2, A3, A4, A5,A6, A7, A8, A9, The related graph and the relation matrix for the class S 3 = {A5,
A10, A11, A12} where A1, A2, A3, A4, A5,A6, A7, A8, A9, A10, A11, A3, A7, A10} is
A12 are described as

A1 – Excessive work load

A2 – Unimportant and meaningless tasks
A3 – Conflicting job demands
A4 – Distant or unreachable supervisors
A5 – Multiple supervisors A3 A5 A 7 A10
A6 – Lack of individual autonomy and A3  0 0 1 1 
co-operation in decision making A5  1 0 1 0 
 
A7 – Poor performance from co-workers A7  0 0 0 1 
A8 – Conflicts and competition among staff  
A10  0 0 0 0 
A9 – Workplace bullying or harassment
A10 – Long working time
A11 – Low payment
A12 – Unreasonable demands from managers or
supervisors The related graph and the relation matrix for the class S 4 = {A8,
A9, A11, A4} is
The 12 attributes A1, A2, …, A12 are divided into seven
overlapping blocks as

S1 = {A1, A10, A2, A4}

S2 = {A3, A6, A4, A7}
S3 = {A5, A3, A7, A10} A4 A 8 A 9 A11
S4 = {A8, A9, A11, A4} A4  0 1 1 0 
S5 = {A12, A10, A1, A7} A8  0 0 1 0 
S6 = {A2, A4, A3, A10} 
A9  0 0 0 0 
S7 = {A4, A12, A11, A8}  
A11  0 0 1 0 
The related graph for each class is given by the expert’s
opinion.The related graph and the relation matrix for the class
S1 = {A5, A3, A7, A10} is

The related graph and the relation matrix for the class S 5 =
{A12, A10, A1, A7} is

A1 A 2 A 4 A10
A1  0 0 0 1 
A2  0 0 0 1  A1 A 7 A10 A12

A4  1 1 0 0  A1  0 1 1 0 

A10  1 0 0 0 
 A7  1 0 1 0 

A10  1 0 0 0 
 
A12  0 1 1 0 
The related graph and the relation matrix for the class S 2 = {A3,
A6, A4, A7} is

The related graph and the relation matrix for the class S 6 = {A2,
A4, A3, A10} is

A3 A4 A6 A7
A3  0 0 1 1 
A 4  1 0 1 1 

A6  1 0 0 0 
 
A7  0 0 0 0 

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Integrated Intelligent Research (IIR) International Journal of Computing Algorithm
Vol 02, Issue 01, June 2013, Page No.28-32
ISSN: 2278-2397
A2 A 3 A 4 A10
A2  0 1 0 1  ↪ (1 1 1 0 0 1 1 1 1 0 01) = X1
A3  0 0 0 1  X1E = (1 0 2 0 0 1 4 0 1 9 0 0)

A4  1 1 0 0  ↪ (1 0 1 0 0 1 1 0 1 1 0 0) = X2
  X2E = (3 0 1 0 0 1 3 0 0 5 0 0)
A10  0 0 0 0 
↪ (1 0 1 0 0 1 1 0 0 1 0 0) = X3
X3E = (3 0 1 0 0 1 3 0 0 5 0 0)
↪ (1 0 1 0 0 1 1 0 0 1 0 0) = X4 = X3
The related graph and the relation matrix for the class S 7 = {A4, Here X3 is the hidden pattern and which is the fixed point.
A12, A11, A8} is
IV. RESULTS AND DISCUSSIONS

The result of the study indicates that the on state of the

A4 A8 A11 A12 attribute distant and unreachable supervisors (A4)leads to the
on state of the attributes excessive work load (A1), conflicting
A4  0 1 0 1  job demands (A3), lack of individual autonomy and co-
A8  0 0 0 0  operation in decision making (A6), poor performance from co-

A11  0 0 0 0  workers (A7) and long working time (A10).
 
A1 A 2 A3 A 4 AA
5 12A6 0 A 7 0A8 0A9 0A10 A11 A12 V. CONCLUSION
A1  0 0 0 0 0 0 1 0 0 2 0 0 
It is evident that when the supervisor is in distant or
A2  0 0 1 0 0 0 0 0 0 2 0 0 
unreachable there would be no control over the employees and
The related
 matrix E of the combined graph is 
A3  0 0 0 0 0 1 2 0 0 2 0 0  employees have no place to show their dissatisfaction or
negative stress about the job. Since the supervisor is
A 4  1 2 2 0 0 1 1 2 1 0 0 1

unreachable the excessive work load stressor cannot be

A5  0 0 1 0 0 0 1 0 0 0 0 0  reported to the supervisor and hence the employee would feel
  helpless which itself is a stressor. Conflicting job demands
A6  0 0 1 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0  cannot be clarified with the supervisor as the supervisor is in
A7  1 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 2 0 0  distant or unreachable. Again, since the supervisor is
  unreachable, individual autonomy in decision making is
A8  0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 1 0 0 0  affected due to the fact that the supervisor is not there to back
A9  0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0  the employee, this results in poor performance. Long working
  hours also left unreported to their supervisor for any resolution.
A10  2 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0  Thus distant or unreachable supervisor is major stressor which
  ultimately resulted in many other work related stressors and
A11  0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 1 0 0 0  thus the work life harmony gets affected.
A12  0 0 0 0 0 0 1 0 0 1 0 0 
VI. FUTURE DIRECTION

This paper dealt with the work related stressors which comes
under the broad area of psychological stressors, however the
study can be further extended into personal stressors such as
family issue, health issue, financial problems, etc. Also, the
The combined directed graph is study can be industry specific that is, the study can be done in
a particular industries like medical, pharma, BPO, IT,
Govt.Sector, Banks, etc and find the stress inducing factors
which affects the work life harmony. Moreover, the study can
be extended to find which gender is more vulnerable to stress
and thus get affected by the work life imbalance.

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 Integrated Intelligent Research (IIR) International Journal of Computing Algorithm
Vol 02, Issue 01, June 2013, Page No.28-32
ISSN: 2278-2397

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