Work-stress, perhaps, is the most common word that we frequently use in our daily life! It is a process by which work environmental events and/or situations initiate a series of cognitive and physiological reactions that ultimately affect employees’ psychological and physiological well-being negatively. In general, the possible factors that relate to work-stress that we can think of and talk about are work environment, workload, coworkers, managers, clients, customers, and office politics. However, have you ever thought that your personality could influence your experience of work-stress? Though it sounds surprising, researchers have found interesting relationships between personalities and work-stress.
“There are interesting relationships between our personalities and work-stress.” said Dr. Md Rashedul Islam. Dr. Islam continued that research found many different types of personalities that play key roles in experiencing more work stress. Some of the notable ones are negative affectivity (generally experiencing negative emotions, like anxiety, sadness, anger, and fear in any situation), low activity, hopelessness, high ambition, competitiveness, incessantly trying to be perfect, hostility, orderliness, workaholism, overachievement, a strong desire to accomplish more in less time, conscientiousness, extraversion, agreeableness, emotional stability, resilience, and hardiness.
Besides their main influence, two or more personalities interactively influence the amount of work-stress that employees experience. In a recent study, Dr. Islam and his colleague found that employees who have higher levels of curmudgeon personality (a personality that views both positive and negative stimuli as negative, and thus, dislike them) and higher levels of extraversion or emotional expressiveness experience more work stress, which leads to experiencing more workplace incivility from their coworkers and supervisors.
There are also research on how personalities and work-stress relate to job performance of employees. Dr. Islam said, “The relationships depend on how employees view work-stress. For example, employees who have low ambition or high hopelessness may find work-stress too much for them. This kind of employees usually displays lower levels of job performance. He added, “employees who have high activity or high emotional stability may find work-stress as an opportunity. To this kind of employees, more work-stress means more opportunities to display higher levels of job performance, which later paves the path to increase remuneration, receive promotion, and enjoy other fringe benefits.”
“Our personality is the only factor that we can fully control, which determines whether we lose opportunities or create new opportunities in the workplace.” underscored Dr. Islam.
Of late, Pew Research reported that the number of older employees are increasing all over the world. In a recent study, the US Bureau of Labor Statistics found that 34.4% of employees in the US workforce are at least 55 years old. This trend is also noticed among the employees in the Bangladesh workforce as the average life expectancy of Bangladeshi people has increased. In addition, employers are increasingly using the products and services brought by the advancement of science and technology that help both the young and older employees to perform their job task more successfully and effectively.
Since, in general, employees of all ages experience work stress in the workplace, a question is whether the younger employees experience more work stress than older employees, or it is the other way around. Dr. Islam replied, “Well, what we have found is it depends on different work situations. For example, when it comes to job insecurity, older employees experience more work stress than younger employees. When it comes to problem-solving and completing tasks in time, younger employees experience more work stress than older employees. He added, “Also, specific work experience for a long time might make the ‘age’ factor of no importance. For example, an employee who is 35 years old and has been working in the healthcare industry for about 7-8 years is not expected to experience more work stress than an employee who is 52 years old and has just started working in the same industry. Here, the considerations are a specific work experience and how long the employee is having that experience, not the age!”
Dr. Islam stated, “Because the relationships between age and work stress depend on work situations and specific work experience for a long time, we should be respectful and careful with our words and behaviors so both the young and older employees feel encouraged to communicate with us for any job-related matters. Not only this, but also words chosen carefully and behaviors performed respectfully help to develop and maintain a friendly and positive social relationship at work.” He emphasized that employees’ job performance can be increased to higher levels when they perform their job tasks in a friendly and positive work environment.
Profile: Dr. Md Rashedul Islam completed his Bachelor of Arts in Psychology (major) and Mathematics (minor) from Ashford University (Clinton, IA, USA) in 2016 and MS and PhD in Industrial and Organizational Psychology (major) and Human Factors Psychology (minor) from Wright State University (Dayton, OH, USA) in 2020 and 2022, respectively. Dr. Islam serves as a professor, researcher, and consultant. Currently, he is an assistant professor of Industrial and Organizational Psychology at Valdosta State University in Valdosta, GA, USA. In the past, he served as an Assistant Professor at the University of Minnesota in Duluth, MN, USA and Salem State University in Salem, MA, USA.
Dr. Md Rashedul Islam presented his research projects at the conferences of Society for Industrial and Organizational Psychology (SIOP; USA), Association for Psychological Science (APS; USA), American Psychological Association (APA; USA), National Occupational Injury Research Symposium (NOIRS; USA), International Congress of Stress, Performance, and Wellness (ICSPW; India), Canadian Psychological Association (CPA; Canada), European Congress of Work and Organizational Psychology (ECWOP; Czech Republic), and International Conference on Management and Business (ICMBCONF; UK).
