A STUDY OF COPING BEHAVIOURS, stress and work life balance

among NURSES

“Synopsis”
INTRODUCTION

Coping behaviour

Coping behaviour is defined as “constantly changing cognitive and behavioural efforts to

manage specific external and/or internal demands that are appraised as taxing or exceeding

the resources of the person” (Lazarus and Folkman, 1984).

Folkman and Moscowitz (2004) defined coping as “continually changing cognitive and

behavioural practices that are developed to handle specific external and/or internal demands

that are valued as beyond the individual’s resources”.

Hamaideh (2011) stated that “individuals cope with different traumatic and taxing

circumstances in a manner that surpasses the effect of the situational and chronological

context, a phenomenon often referred to as coping behaviour”.

Freire et al. (2020) stated “coping would come to be defined by cognitive and behavioural

efforts employed in response to external or internal demands that the individual deems to be

threats to their well-being”.

A phenomenon that is commonly referred to as coping styles describes the method in which

individuals deal with varying stressful and demanding situations in a way that is more

significant than the impact of the contextual and chronological context.

Work life Balance

Hudson Resourcing (2005) defined work/life balance as a satisfactory level of involvement or

'fit' between the multiple roles in a person's life. U.K. organization. Employers for Work-Life

Balance (2005) defined work-life balance as "people having a measure of control over when,

where and how they work, leading them to be able to enjoy an optimal quality of life". Work-

life Balance is achieved when an individual's right to fiilfiUed life inside and outside paid
work is accepted and respected as a norm, to the mutual benefit of individual, business and

society.

Work-life balance is the phenomenon of striking an ideal balance between the professional

life of an individual and their personal life with all of their respective associations (Clark,

2000). The level of importance being given to this phenomenon these days is because of the

harmful results brought about because of the severe lack of this phenomenon. According to

the research paper, Is Happiness Relative? an effective work-life balance makes a person

happier and more content(Veenhoven, 1991). This contentment leads people to maintain the

level of hard work they put in their respective careers and remain satisfied

Stress

The term „stress‟ is used in many ways in our daily life so as to represent our internal state of

psychological upset or disequilibrium, caused by one or any other factors. Stress can be

characterized as 'an inner state which can be brought about by actual requests on body or by

natural and social circumstances which are assessed as possibly unsafe, wild, or surpassing

our assets for adapting'. These physical, natural and social causes or factors affecting levels of

stress are named as stressors. When inner state is initiated by stressors, then, at that point,

stress can prompt different reactions by body. These reactions are essentially physical or

mental in nature. These physical and mental reactions incorporate side effects like

nervousness, misery, melancholy, peevishness and general inclination powerlessness to adapt

to requirements of evolving scene.

According to the American Institute of Stress (AIS), common causes of workplace stress

include long working hours, feelings of being treated unfairly, insufficient acknowledgement

or reward for a job well done, lack of job security, office politics, and most importantly,

increased demands to accomplish assignments without sufficient authority and/or resources.

or externally that makes it difficult to adapt and that induces increased effort on the part of

the person to maintain a state of equilibrium both internally and with the external

environment.

Beehr and Newman (1978) defined occupational stress as A situation wherein jobrelated

factors interact with a worker to change (i.e., disrupt or enhance) his or her psychological or

physiological condition such that the person (i.e., mind-body) is forced to deviate from

normal functioning.

LITERATURE REVIEW

Rosnawati muhamad robat et al. (2021) studied the differences regarding occupational

stress among hospital and non-hospital nurses, and found out that there are not much

differences in both regarding household stressors but vary hugely regarding work place

stressors as hospital nurses are under greater stress mainly due to shift work in hospital

settings.Gribben and Semple (2021) conducted a review study on the factors that contribute

towards work life balance and burnout among nurses working in adult oncology department.

A total of 20 studies formed the part of this study. Only one of the studies focused on work

life balance among nurses while all the studies included burnout. According to the study, the

burnout among oncology nurses was based on either the ability of nurses to thrive, i.e., their

ability to struggle against workplace burnout or their personal perspectives that influence

burnout among them. Burnout among oncology nurses was specifically influenced by

excessive work load and severity of patients‘ disease and health. The development of burnout

among oncology nurses was found to be influenced by work culture, shift work and overtime
and nurses‘ personal characteristics. The researchers suggested that both the nurses and the

organizations need to work together on their levels to build resilience against burnout and

promote wellness among employees to build and sustain workforce capacity.

Yuko Ono et al. (2020) studied the factors and association between work-life conflict and

gender based discrimination among health professionals in Japan and found out that gender

did not affect perceived work life conflict among nurses, teaching faculty and employees

aged between 30 to 39 years. According to the findings, men perceived higher gender based

discrimination regarding work content and incidental tasks, while women perceived higher

gender discrimination regarding promotions and performance appraisals. Both men and

women perceiving gender based discrimination were exposed to higher risk of work-life

conflict. They suggested promoting gender equality in the organisations to attain healthy

work life balance.

Man-Li Du et al. (2020) conducted a study to assess the mental health of nurses working on

different posts. The study found positive relationships between post of the nurses and their

interpersonal relationships, depression and hostile behaviours. While it had negative

relationships with somatisation, scope of job involvement and communication. They

concluded that the post of the nurse and post related knowledge, skills and risks have

significant association with nurses‘ mental health.

Elizabeth Fiske (2018) studied the stress causing factors and satisfiers for the nurses

working in the neonatal intensive care unit (NICU) and found out that inadequate staffing

was the major reason behind stress among NICU nurses. Most of the NICU nurses found

their jobs stressful but were not stressed by their working environment. The nurses were

satisfied with their perceived stress coping abilities and confident regarding their knowledge

and their care providing abilities. The nurses desired better team work in NICUs and

enhanced support and respect from their supervisors and physicians. Most of the stress coping
strategies were found to be focussed on task completion.

Adib-Hajbaghery, Khamechian and Alavi (2017) conducted a study on factors influencing

nurses‘ perception of job stress and found out three factors namely, nurses perception of job

stress, professional interest and choosing career over family that affect their perception

regarding job stress. Acc to the study, the nurses defined stress as a situation where their

work (quality of care) and life (personal and family) are negatively impacted due to

occupational pressures. They concluded that continuous work pressure, low social status and

relationship with managers were the major sources of stress among nurses and suggested

better logistics, improved system coordination and cordial nurse-manager relationships as

measures to reduce stress among them.

Meenakshi and Subrahmanyam (2013) stated that the number of men facing worklife

balance problems is increasing and the generalisation that work-life balance is woman‘s only

issue is losing its grounding, although women still are more impacted by work-life imbalance

compared to men. According to them imbalance in work and life leads to dissatisfying life,

unhappiness, physical and mental illness, etc. They suggested that organisations can train,

coach and educate their employees regarding work-life balance, provide managerial support,

design and implement WLB programs, provide work location and time flexibility, etc. while

the employees can use time management, good organisation, friendly attitudes, stress coping

skills, hobbies, etc. to maintain a healthy balance in work and life. They stated that work-life

balance impacts employee‘s recruitment, retention/turnover, absenteeism, productivity,

accident rates, commitment and satisfaction, etc.

METHODOLOGY OF THE STUDY

worklifebalance among nurses

Variables

 Coping behaviours In this study, coping behaviours are the adaptive response elicited

from the students’ behaviour that maintains a healthy response in the areas of academics,

time balance, intrapersonal, interpersonal, family and environmental factors, as measured

by a 5 point Likert scale.

 Stress: Stress can be defined as any type of change that causes physical, emotional, or

psychological strain. Stress is your body's response to anything that requires attention or

action. Everyone experiences stress to some degree. The way you respond to stress,

however, makes a big difference to your overall well-being.

 Work-Life Balance: Work-life balance refers to maintaining a balance between

employee‘s personal and professional life, so the employee enjoys both his work and his

personal family time.

 Nursing proffesion : Nursing includes the promotion of health, prevention of illness, and

the care of ill, disabled and dying people. Advocacy, promotion of a safe environment,

research, participation in shaping health policy and in patient and health systems

management, and education are also key nursing roles.

 Gender : gender is the distinction between male, female, and genders which are a

combination of male and female, or neither male nor female, as reported by a respondent.

For this study only females will be considered.

Sample

In research terms a sample is a group of people, objects, or items that are taken from a larger
population for measurement. Sample is a representation of the population. Purposive

Sampling from non-probability sampling method will be used for collecting data through

questionnaire. The researcher will contact nurses in delhi ncr either directly or through virtual

platform. A group of 100 people will be selected as sample size. They were classified in two

age groups, first 25 to 35 years (lower age group) and second 36 to 45 years (upper age

group). Only females will be studied during this research.

Objectives

The following are the objectives

1. To study the coping behaviours in nursing profession based on years & age of experience.

2. To study the stress in nursing profession based on years & age of experience.

3. To study the work life balance in nursing profession based on years & age of experience.

4. To study the relationship between coping behaviours , stress and work-life balance.

Hypothesis

The following are the hypothesis

1. There will be significant difference based on years & age of experience in coping

behaviours among nurses..

2. There will be significant difference based on years & age of experience in stress among

nurses.

3. There will be significant difference based on years & age of experience in worklife

balance among nurses.

4. There will be significant relationship between coping behaviours ,stress and work life

balance.

Inclusion crieteria
 Nurses serving in delhi ncr

 Nurses between age range 25 to 45 years

 Nurses having 4 years of experience in nursing

 Nurses who are married

Exclusion crieteria

 Unmarried Nurses

 Nurses with no child

 Nurses serving in other then delhi ncr

 Nurses having below 4 years of experience in nursing

Tools

The following tools will be used to assess Occupational Stress and Work-Life balance of

Female nurses in delhi ncr.

Stress Inventory (Dr. B Dharmangadhan and Radhika R Thampuran, University of

Kerala, 1994-95)

Occupational Stress Inventory was developed for measuring perceived Stress of employees.

The test in total contains 35 statements. The statements cover 9 dimensions of job life. The

dimensions are overload, lack of participation, lack of challenge, transfer, schedules of

working time, home/work interface, discrimination, stereo type and social isolation The split

half reliability (N=100) after correlation for attenuation is 0.53. The content related and

construct related validities cannot be measured in this test. Users of this test (Joseph, 1988)

report satisfactory validity for research purpose.

Work-Family Conflict Scale (Netemeyer, Boles & McMurrian, 1996 : Translated and

standardized by Mahesh Bhanu & Bindu P Nair, 2015)

Work-family conflict scale is a 10 item scale contained five items measuring work to family
conflict and five items measuring family to work conflict. Using 7 point Likert scale,

participants were asked to indicate as to what extend they agree in each item. Responses

ranged from 1 (Strongly Agree) to 7 (Strongly disagree). The sample item from work to

Family scale was “The demands of my work interfere with my home and family life.” A

sample item from family to work scale was “The demands of family interfere with work

related activities”. For each subscale, items are summed to provide the total work-to-family

conflict score (range 7- 35) and family-to-work conflict score (range 7-35) with higher scores

indicating higher levels of conflict.

Internal consistencies of both scales are adequate, with alpha estimates ranging from .83 to

.89 and an average alpha of .88 for WFC and .86 for FWC across samples. Both the subscales

were administered among three samples and the correlation values between three samples

were calculated to be .48, .33 and .42 respectively. This shows discriminant validity hence

the entire

test is valid.

Coping behavior scale – by Roman (2001) to collect data on the coping behaviours of nursing

before and after the intervention. It is a self administered questionnaire of 5- point Likert scale. The

instrument consisted of 50 statements equally distributed positively (25) and negatively (25) worded

statements distributed under five areas with five different response options scaled as Seldom-1, rare-2,

sometimes-3, Often-4, Always-5.In this scale 1, 3,5,7,9 in time management, relaxation, 2,4,7,8,10 in

positive thinking ,1,2,7,9.10 in problem solving and decision making and 1,3,5,7,9 in ventilation were

negatively worded statements and 2,4,6,8,10 both in time management and relaxation,1,3,5,6,9 in

positive thinking, 3,4,5,6,8 in problem solving and decision making and 2,4,6,8,10 in ventilation were

positively worded statements. Validity is 0.82 and reliability is 0.77.

Demographic Information Sheet

Demographic information sheet will used to collect various demographic information about

the sampling including name, sex, type of family etc.

Descriptive, mean, standard deviation, t-test and correlation methods will be used in this

study.

RATIONAL/SCOPE OF STUDY

Stress is manifested in physiological, psychological, behavioral and organizational forms. All

these finally impact workplace performance, leading to organizational effects such as

absenteeism, job turnover, poor organizational climate and reduced productivity. To meet the

physical and emotional demands of their profession, nurses need to be free of occupational

stress and maintain good health. There is a need for research to develop some norms of

desirable or acceptable levels of role stress scores for its different dimensions.

Work-life conflict can be the major reason of stress. Work-life conflict occurs when the

cumulative demands of work and role at home are incompatible in some respect so that

participation in one role is made more difficult by participation in the other. Sometimes

described as having too much to do and too little time to do it, role overload is a term that is

sometimes used as a means of examining the conditions that give rise to work-life conflict.

The role of working women has changed throughout the world due to economic and social

conditions. The increasing work pressure and responsibilities on the personal on the working

women leaving them with less time for themselves. Work life integrated with personal life

also creates stress on individual, family and work related areas. This affects the person’s

physical, emotional and social well-being. Thus, achieving work life balance is a necessity

for working women to have a good quality of life. Working women are flooded with work

and family commitments. Majority of working women are bogged down while trying to

balance their work and family life. Health Care Sector is an area of interest because shift
work, especially night work, overtime places lot of stress on the nurses both at professional

and personal front.

The nursing profession in India, which is dominated by women, faces difficult working

conditions, including abuse from employers, coworkers, and patients' families; poor salaries,

workplace restrictions, poor work environments, and a lack of social acceptance. It is now

essential to identify the obstacles faced by nurses in their workplace in order to address these

issues. Assessing the work-life of nurses enables organisations to comprehend how work

environments, work design, societal influences, and work-life balance issues affect the work-

life of nurses and, ultimately, organisational productivity. A healthy work-life balance is

essential for attracting and retaining employees. Therefore, health organisations are searching

for ways to address recruitment and retention issues by achieving a high quality of work-life.

Concentrating on enhancing this quality and boosting the happiness and satisfaction of

employees can result in numerous benefits for the employee, the organisation, and the

patients. These include s trengthening organisational commitment, enhancing the quality of

care, and increasing the individual and organisational productivity.

BIBLIOGRAPHIES

Andoniou, A. S. (2007). Occupational stress sources. EΛ.IN.Y.A.E.

Du M. (2020) mental health of nurses working on different posts

Eden, D. (1990). Acute and Chronic Job Stress, Strain, and Vacation Relief. Organizational Behavior

and Human Decision Processes, Volume 45, Issue 2. Pp. 175-193.

Fiske E (2018) studied the stress causing factors and satisfiers for the nurses working in the

neonatal intensive care unit

Glazer, S. and Gyurak, A. (2008) Sources of Occupational Stress among Nurses in Five Countries.

International Journal of Intercultural Relations, Volume 32, Issue1. Pp. 49–66.

Muhamad R (2021) studied the differences regarding occupational stress among hospital and

non-hospital nurses

Ono Y (2020) association between work-life conflict and gender based discrimination

among health professionals in Japan