PowerPoint

Presentation for
Management of
Occupational Health
and Safety

Prepared by
Bernadette Gatien

Copyright © 2021 by Nelson Education Ltd.

Chapter 7
Psychosocial
Hazards

Copyright © 2021 by Nelson Education Ltd. 7-2

 Learning Objectives
• After reading this chapter, you should be able to:
– Describe and distinguish among the concepts of
stressor, stress, and strain
– Explain the transactional model of stress and its
implications
– Identify major sources of stress in the workplace
– Discuss the psychological, physical, behavioural, and
organizational consequences of stress

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 Learning Objectives
• After reading this chapter, you should be able
to:
– Discuss ways to recognize, assess, and manage
psychosocial hazards at work
– Describe and distinguish among primary,
secondary, and tertiary stress interventions
– Describe injustice, technology, and work–life
conflict as prevalent workplace stressors
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Copyright © 2021 by Nelson Education Ltd.

PTSD results from exposure to traumatic

events
Opening
Vignette: Characterized by 3 symptoms:
Post-Traumatic • Re-experiencing the initial event
Stress Disorder • Avoidance of specific situations
• Arousal
(PTSD)
Research suggests 9% of Canadians will
experience PTSD in their lifetime

Many jurisdictions introduced presumptive

WCB coverage for first-responder PTSD

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Workplace stress costs

Canadian economy $12
to $33 billion annually.

Introduction Absenteeism and

presenteeism costs
stemming from work–life
conflict are about
$6 billion annually.
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Psychologically healthy and

safe workplace
Workplace • A workplace that promotes
workers’ psychological well-being
Stress and and actively works to prevent
Mental harm to workers’ psychological
health including in negligent,
Health reckless, or intentional ways

Mental Health Commission

of Canada
• Published CSA-Z1003-13 as a
voluntary workplace standard
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Copyright © 2021 by Nelson Education Ltd.

Psychosocial Model of Health

• Approach to the study of health
that highlights the importance of
Workplace both the social environment and
Stress and psychological factors

Mental Social factors:

Health • Family circumstances, exposure to
violence, and workplace policies

Psychological factors:
• Levels of self-esteem and anxiety, as
well as the ability to cope with
pressure

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Stressors
• Stressor
– Objectively
verifiable
event that
occurs outside
the individual
that has the
potential to
cause stress

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 Stressors
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Acute

Chronic

Categories:

Daily
Vary according to
frequency, duration,
intensity, and
specificity of onset
Catastrophic

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 Stressors

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 Stressors
• Acute
– Specific time onset (i.e., you
know exactly when it began)
– Short duration and high
intensity
– Low frequency
– Traffic accident is an acute
stressor
– Example:
• Performance review
meeting or a conflict
with a supervisor may
be an acute stressor

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 Stressors
• Chronic
– No specific time
onset
– Short or long
duration
– Repeats frequently
– Low or high intensity
– Example:
• Job insecurity:
Nagging
worry that job
is
at risk

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Copyright © 2021 by Nelson Education Ltd.

• Daily
– Specific onset
– Short duration
– Low in
intensity
– Infrequent
– Example:
• Dealing
Stressors with a
broken
piece of
office
equipmen
t

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Stressors
• Catastrophic
– Specific onset
– Occur infrequently
– High intensity
– Long or short duration
– Distinction between acute and
catastrophic relates to intensity of the
stressor

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 • NIOSH model identifies major categories:
Stressors – Workload and work pace
– Role stressors
in the – Career concerns
– Work scheduling
Workplace – Interpersonal relations
– Job content and control

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 Stressors in the Workplace
• 13 Organizational
Factors (CSA Z1003-13)
– Organizational culture – Involvement and
– Psychological and social influence
support – Workload management
– Clear leadership and – Engagement
expectations – Work–life balance
– Civility and respect – Psychological protection
– Psychological demands – Protection of physical
– Growth and development safety
– Recognition and reward
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 • Stress
– Individual’s internal response to, or
evaluation of, stressors; often
characterized by negative feelings of

Stress
arousal
• General Adaptation Syndrome
– The body’s way of gearing up for fight
or flight
(i.e., to confront or run away from a
predator)

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 OH&S Notebook 7.1
Occupational Health Psychology

OHP applies the field of

Four-component strategy
psychology to occupational
focuses on:
stress, illness and injury.
• Aims to improve quality • Organizational change
of work life, and to • Information
protect and promote • Psychological health
safety, health, and well- services
being • Surveillance

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 Stress
Moderators

Moderator
• Variable that changes the
relationship between other
variables
• Some aggravate or increase
the effects of stressors
• Others can protect individual
from adverse effects of
stressors
Moderators (factors)
affect people’s
evaluations of stressors
and how they react to
them (i.e., degree of
stress experienced)

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 Stress Risk Factor
Moderators
• Variable that
increases the
negative effects of
stress
Buffer

• Variable that protects

people from the
negative effects of
stress

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 • The Individual—Personality:
– Relatively stable set of characteristics,
responses, thoughts, and behaviours
of a given individual
– Type A Behaviour
• Action–emotion complex that can
Stress be observed in any person who is
aggressively involved in a chronic,
Moderators incessant struggle to achieve
increasingly more in increasingly
less time
– Negative Affectivity
• A dispositional dimension
reflecting persistent individual
differences in negative emotion

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 Stress • The Social Context—Social Support
– This can reduce a person’s
Moderators vulnerability to stressors

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 Psychological

Physical

Strain
Behavioural

Organizational

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Psychological Psychological strain reactions include a disturbance in affect
Strain (e.g., mood) or a disturbance in cognition (e.g.,
concentration).

Feeling irritable, anxious, overwhelmed, moody, depressed,

“Feeling stressed
and angry are common affective strain reactions

out”

Disturbances in mood range from short-lived periods of

feeling blue, down, or irritable to longer-term and more
serious diagnoses of psychological disorders such as
depression and anxiety.

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 Physical Strain
• Physical symptoms of strain (e.g., stomach upsets, headaches)
– May seem trivial, but evidence suggests that stress is implicated in
more serious physical conditions
• Coronary heart disease (CHD)
• High blood pressure (hypertension)
• Strokes
• Ulcers
• Asthma
• Some forms of cancer

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 • Behavioural strain reactions take a variety
of forms
– Individuals may develop nervous
Behavioural habits (e.g., nail biting or nervous tics)
– Other reactions include avoidance of
Strain certain situations, or a reduction in
individual involvement, either
because of a lack of interest or as a
means of reducing time demands

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Organizational
Strain
• Common organizational
outcomes of stress:
– Increased absenteeism
– Decreased
performance
– Disturbances of
interpersonal
relationships at work
– Increased likelihood of
looking for alternative
employment

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 Recognizing, Assessing,
and Managing Psychosocial Hazards

Work-related stressors, stress, and strain have

substantial negative consequences for both
employees and organizations

Learn to identify stressors

Identifying psychosocial Survey the employees

hazards: Look for telltale signs of stress

Be attuned to individual employees

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 Recognizing, Assessing, and
Managing Psychosocial Hazards

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 Recognizing, Assessing, and
Managing Psychosocial Hazards

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 Recognizing, Assessing,
and Managing Psychosocial Hazards
• Preventive Stress Management
– An approach to managing stress in the workplace
– Emphasizes that the health of an organization and its employees are
interdependent
– Encourages the reduction of stressors in the workplace as well as the
recognition and management of occupational stress and strain

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 Recognizing, Primary Interventions
Assessing, • Reduction or removal of actual
and Managing stressors
Psychosocial
Hazards Secondary Interventions

• Minimizing negative
consequences once a person is
feeling stress

Tertiary Interventions

• Help those individuals who have

not been able to manage
workplace stress effectively and
are experiencing symptoms of
strain

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Spotlight on In organizational justice research,
“fairness” is not treated as a one-
a Stressor: dimensional construct
Injustice at
Work

Three categories of fairness

judgments: Fairness of
Fairness of outcomes, Fairness of processes, interpersonal
or distributive justice or procedural justice treatment, or
interactional justice

All types of injustice are associated

with increased work stress and strain

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Spotlight on Increasing role of technology
affects the psychological as
a Stressor: well as the physical well-being
Technology of workers

Technology-related factors are

psychosocial stressors:

• Malfunctions
• Isolation
• Privacy
• Increased job demands
• Increased expectations for
continuous learning

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 Spotlight on a
Stressor:
Work–Family
Conflict

• Work–Family Conflict
– Inter-role conflict in
which the role
pressures experienced
in the work and family
domains are
incompatible

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 Spotlight on a
Stressor:
Work–Family
Conflict

• Work-to-Family Conflict
– Work–family conflict in
which work demands
interfere with the
fulfillment of family
responsibilities

• Family-to-Work Conflict
– Work–family conflict in
which family demands
interfere with the
fulfillment of work
responsibilities

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 Spotlight on a Stressor:
Work–Family Conflict
• Causes of Work–Family Conflict
– Behavioural involvement
• The amount of time a person spends in a particular role

– Psychological involvement
• The degree to which a person identifies with a particular role and
sees the role as a central component of his or her self-concept

Copyright © 2021 by Nelson Education Ltd. 7-38

 Video Link
• “Working with Stress,” National Institute for
Occupational Health and Safety (NIOHS)
– Describes workplace factors that can create or exa
cerbate worker stress, and suggests practical meas
ures for reducing job-related stress through chang
es in work organization
(2 parts, 17min)

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 End-of-Chapter Activities
• Consider your most recent or current job. Can
you think of examples of stress, stressor, and
strain?
• Consider how stress affects individuals when
responding to Well-Mart cumulative case.

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