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Faculty perception of stress in a non-profit business and technology college

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Faculty perception of stress in a non-profit business and technology college

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Content FACULTY PERCEPTION OF STRESS IN A NON-PROFIT
BUSINESS AND TECHNOLOGY COLLEGE
by
Lilia Hernandez Claude
A Dissertation Presented to the
FACULTY OF THE ROSSIER SCHOOL OF EDUCATION
UNIVERSITY OF SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA
In Partial Fulfillment of the
Requirements for the Degree
DOCTOR OF EDUCATION
December 2002
Copyright 2002 Lilia Hernandez Claude
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UMI Number: 3093748
Copyright 2002 by
Claude, Lilia Hernandez
All rights reserved.
®
UMI
UMI Microform 3093748
Copyright 2003 by ProQuest Information and Learning Company.
All rights reserved. This microform edition is protected against
unauthorized copying under Title 17, United States Code.
ProQuest Information and Learning Company
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U n iv e rs ity o f S o u th e rn C a lifo rn ia
R ossier S ch o o l o f E d u c a tio n
Los A ngeles, C a lifo rn ia 90089-0031
T h is d is s e rta tio n w ritte n b y
LILIA HERNANDEZ CLAUDE
u nd er the discretion o f h e r D issertation C om m ittee,
and approved by all members o f the C om m ittee, has
been presented to and accepted by the Faculty o f the
Rossier School o f E ducation in p a rtia l fu lfillm e n t o f the
requirem ents fo r the degree o f
Doctor of Education
December 18, 2002
lean
D issertation C om m ittee
Chairperson
"7
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DEDICATION
Dedicated to
Henry Louis Claude Cohn
Rafaela Felisa Hernandez Claude
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ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
No labor is ever a solo endeavor. I owe so much
to the following people:
Dr. Dennis Hocevar for his unwavering belief in my
ability since I started this dissertation in 1996.
Dr. Roger Anderson for approving and supporting my
survey.
Dr. William Michael for asking challenging
questions.
Dr. Barry Bachelor for his gentle comments.
Dr. Martin E. Jenness for suggesting the topic of
teacher stress.
Dr. James Siebert for his encouraging words.
Ralph McFadden for the website idea.
Scott Yost for envisioning the survey.
Zachary Oliver for the never-ending proofreading.
My family, friends, and associates who unknowingly
gave me the spirit of hope to finish this academic
endeavor.
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iv
TABLE OF CONTENTS
Page
DEDICATION................. ........................ ii
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS ................. ii
LIST OF TABLES...................................... vi
LIST OF FIGURES..................................... vii
ABSTRACT...........................................viii
CHAPTER
1. INTRODUCTION.................. 1
Background of the Problem ..................... 1
Statement of the Problem ...................... 2
Purpose of the Study.......................... 3
Significance of the Study ..................... 4
Research Questions ............................ 5
Assumptions and Limitations ................... 6
Delimitations .................................. 6
Definitions of Terms .......................... 7
2. REVIEW OF LITERATURE ......................... 10
Definitions of Stress ........................ 12
Measurements and Models ...................... 16
Teacher Stress ................................ 22
Rebuttals..................................... 3 0
The Personality Factor........ 32
Personality and Teacher Stress ......... 35
Personality Adaptation ................. 38
The Culture Factor.............................42
Emotional Impact/Internal Culture ..... 47
Challenge in U.S. Classrooms................ 57
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V
3 . METHODOLOGY................................. 69
Participants.................. 60
Measures and Instrumentation ................ 62
Procedure...................., 67
4. PRESENTATION OF FINDINGS ................ 69
5. SUMMARY AND CONCLUSIONS........ 90
Summary....................................... 90
Conclusions................................... 93
SELECTED REFERENCES ............. 98
APPENDIX: EDUCATOR STRESS INVENTORY AND
COMPONENT MATRIX................... 106
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vi
LIST OF TABLES
1. Frequency Distribution of Section I . . 70
2. General Stress and Satisfaction ............ 73
3. Frequency Distribution of Section II ....... 74
4. Means and Standard Deviations of Five
Components of Stressors ...................... 75
5 . Means and Standard Deviations of Each of
the 21 Stressors........................... 77
6. Correlations Between Demographics and
Stressors.................. 80
7. Correlations Between General Stress
Satisfaction and Stressors ................81
8. Correlations Between Demographics and
Teaching Ratings................ . 83
9. Correlations on Teacher Ratings ............ 84
10. Correlations on Teacher Ratings and
Stress Factors ................................ 84
11. Component Matrix ............................ 108
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vii
LIST OF FIGURES
1. A Paradigm for Analysis of the Stress
Cycle..................... 18
2. A Reformulation of the Stress Model.......... 20
3 . A Model of Teacher Stress .......;...... 23
4. A Framework for Interactions Between the
Individual and the Environment................ 27
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ABSTRACT
In teaching, constant interaction with students
provides a stressful environment-. Most studies of
stress in education focus on public , schools. This
study focused on faculty in a nonprofit business and
technology college that grants diplomas and associate
degrees. A survey, "Educator Stress Inventory"
(ESI), patterned after Cichon and Koff's (1978)
"Teaching Events Stress Inventory,and Kyriacou and
Sutcliffe's (1978b) questionnaire survey, was created
for Heald College. Responses were drawn from the
faculty of 12 Heald College campuses in California
(10), Hawaii (1), and Oregon (1) .
The questionnaire-survey had three sections.
Section I covered demographics. Section II (a self-
rating scale) included three modified questions from
Kyriacou and Sutcliffe (1978b) on general stress,
overall satisfaction, and career satisfaction. Two
questions on student ratings of instructional
effectiveness were added. Section III listed 21
stressors perceived stressful by educators. Number
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ix
22 was blank so respondents could write a stressful
event not covered. A factor analysis indicated five
factors in the questionnaire and composite scores
were created for each factor. -
Two hundred thirteen instructors provided valid
responses to the survey. The ESI revealed that the
average Heald instructor was somewhat stressed and
fairly satisfied teaching at Heald. Most reported
they would choose teaching as a career again.
Generally stressed instructors had higher levels of
stress in each of five stress categories:
professional, resource, student, teaching, and
administration. The sample averages in order of most
to least stressful were: professional(2.44),
resource(2.28), student (2.11), teaching(1.90), and
administration(1.61). Faculty at Heald found
professional issues the most stressful (average
between "somewhat stressed" and "stressful") and
administrative issues the least stressful (average
between "not stressful" and "somewhat stressed").
Other findings were: (a) instructors with 11 or
more years' experience reported less stress on the
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teaching dimension, (b) full-time instructors
reported more stress than part-time instructors on
the administrative stress dimension, (c) instructors
with a graduate degree reported^more stress on the
professional stressors dimension, (d) White (non-
Hispanic) faculty reported more stress on the student
stressors dimension, and (e) faculty stress and end-
of-class teacher ratings were uncorrelated.
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1
CHAPTER 1
INTRODUCTION
Background of the Problem
Stress is a mind/body phenomenon. Charcot
(1887-1888) introduced the connection between the
mind and the body. When he was addressing his
audience in one of his Tuesday lessons at the St.
Salpetriere Hospital, he stated, "I have heard that
this patient's disease began after an emotional
upset" (p. 166). He was referring to the condition
of glossolabial laryngeal paralysis. It matters not
the disease, what is significant here is the
connection of the disease to an emotionally
disturbing situation that affected the body.
As widespread as the interest on stress is, it
seems to elude a conclusive definition (Kyriacou &
Sutcliffe, 1978b, Lazarus, 1966; Mason, 1975;
McGrath, 1976) . Particularly in a caring profession
such as teaching, stress acquires many different
shades of meaning (Cichon & Koff, 1978; Dewe, 1986;
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2
He, Li, Shi, Mao, Mu, & Zhou, 2000; Milstein &
Farkas, 1988; Trendall, 1989)..
McCormick (1997) believes study on teacher
occupational stress to be a 'Valuable, if not
practical, area to investigate especially for
educational administrators. For this author, this
research is vital because it may provide a way to
understand stress in the classroom setting of a
college that grants Associate in Applied Science
degrees.
Statement of the Problem
Lortie's book, Schoolteacher (1975), appears to
reflect teachers' views on what is externally
stressful to the profession. When pondered, these
views affect teachers' feelings if focused on
constantly. One of his conclusions is: Teachers are
similar to factory hands. Although teaching is
accorded high respectability, teachers do not receive
the level or type of deference given to those in high
government office or to those successful in business.
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3
The above statements may just be meanings
teachers attach to events surrounding their work.
These thoughts translate to emotional arousal. As
pointed out in Charcot's (1887-1888) statement above,
an emotional upset can affect the .body and ensuing
behavior of the organism. For want of a better
term, stress is borrowed from the engineering field.
Stress, in Latin, means, "to stretch." In its
engineering context, stress is a force applied to a
physical object resulting in temporary or permanent
change on the object. Teaching itself can be viewed
as stressful when the demands exceed an instructor's
capabilities and resources for meeting the load.
Purpose of the Study
The purpose of this study was to investigate
faculty perception of stressful teaching events. The
primary objective was to determine the correlation
between teacher-perceived stress and student
evaluation of teachers at a nonprofit business and
technology college that grants associate degrees,
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specifically Heald College with campuses in
California, Hawaii, and Oregon.,
The following demographics were considered:
gender, years teaching, degree, ethnicity, status
(full time or part time), and whether the instructor
taught in the business or technology department. It
was hypothesized in this study that the lower the
teacher-perceived stress level, the higher the
student evaluation; and the higher the stress level,
the lower the evaluation of the instructor.
Due to constant interpersonal interaction,
teaching requires the body to adjust and regulate
itself to pressures brought on by stress. For this
study, stress was used to define a situation
perceived as "a demand which threatens to exceed the
person's capabilities and resources for meeting it"
(McGrath, 1976, p. 1352) .
Sicrnificance of the Study
1. As an educational institution, Heald College
would benefit from the knowledge of the impact
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5
of teacher stress on its social and
organizational structure
2. This study may provide a list of classroom
teacher stressors that Heald College needs to
address '
3 . This study will provide insights that will be
useful in developing strategies to lessen
stressful events or situations among teachers at
Heald College, perhaps to other two-year
colleges as well.
Research Questions
1. How do teachers at Heald College describe their
job stress?
2. What is the relationship between teaching
experience and Educator Stress Inventory (ESI)
scores?
3. Is there a difference in ESI scores between
full-time instructors and part-time instructors?
4. Is there a difference in ESI scores between
instructors teaching technology (skills) courses
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6
and those instructors teaching business
(content) courses?,
5. Is there is difference in ESI scores between
male and female instructors?
6. Is there a difference in ESI scores among ethnic
groups?
7. Are ESI scores correlated with student ratings
of instructors?
Assumptions and Limitations
1. Because the survey was available for 20 days on
a specially designed website, a representative
percentage of the faculty will participate.
2. Completely objective responses on the survey
instrument are not possible.
3 . The responses may not be a general
representation of perceived stress in the Heald
College system.
Delimitations
1. As a self-report survey, choices of perceived
stressful events were limited by the list.
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2. Since participation is by invitation via the
college e-mail and open to all campuses,
volunteer teacher participation was limited by
personal choice.
3 . There was no control' group because the
independent variable (stress) was not subject to
manipulation.
4. This study was not concerned with stress as a
dependent variable (result).
5. This study cannot prove causality.
6. No physical data was collected to match a
physiological measure of stress to respondents'
perception of stress.
7. Teacher ratings were retrospective self-reports.
Actual end-of-course evaluations were not
compiled.
Definitions of Terms
Allostasis. Different circumstances demand different
homeostatic set points (Sterling & Eyer, 1988).
CIS. Campus Information System; a specially designed
database used at Heald College.
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Culture. The shared explanations of events and
actions and the prescribed responses to specific
situations that- are held common with other
people who are part of the group, tribe, nation,
social class, or’other collectivity (Downs,
1971, p. 45).
Heterostasis. The establishment of a new steady
state by exogenous (pharmacologic) stimulation
of adaptive mechanisms through the development
and maintenance of dormant defensive tissue
reactions (Selye, 1973) .
Homeostasis. State in which physiological measures
are being kept at the optimal level for a
particular time of day, season, age of organism,
and so on (Cannon, 1914).
Locus of Control. Generalized belief that life
events are controlled by the individual's own
actions (internal orientation) or by outside
forces (external orientation)(Hurrell & Murphy,
1991).
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Personality. The sum total of psychological and
physical characteristics unique to the
individual's patterns of behavior and thought.
Plasticity. Systematic changes within the person in
his or her structure and/or function" (Lerner,
1984, p. xi).
Stress. A demand which threatens to exceed the
person's capabilities and resources for meeting
it (McGrath, 1976).
Teacher Stress. A response of negative affect (such
as anger or depression) by a teacher usually
accompanied by potentially pathogenic
physiological and biochemical changes (such as
increased heart rate) resulting from aspects of
the teacher's job and mediated by the perception
that the demands made upon the teacher
constitute a threat to their self-esteem or
well-being and by coping mechanisms activated to
reduce the perceived threat (Kyriacou &
Sutcliffe, 1978a).
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10
CHAPTER 2
REVIEW OF LITERATURE
Research on teacher stress has been conducted in
many parts of the world. For instance, in the West
Indies (Payne & Furnham, 1987); Malta (Borg & Riding,
1993); in New Zealand (Manthei & Gilmore, 1996); in
Australia and Scotland (Pithers & Soden, 1998); in
Hong Kong (Chan, 1998); and in China and Japan (He et
al. , 2 000).
Payne and Furnham's (1987) 5-point Likert-type
scale revealed that instructional and management
demands of the classroom is most stressful for
teachers. The study conducted by Borg, Riding, and
Falzon (1991) concluded that workload and student
misbehavior produce the most stress among Malta
primary schoolteachers. In New Zealand, the result
of Manthei and Gilmore's (1996) studies reveal that
higher-stress level is related to lower-job
satisfaction and reduced commitment to remain in the
job on a long-term basis.
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Teachers in Australia and Scotland identified
stress in the Occupational Stress Inventory as work
overload (Pithers & Soden, 1998). Chan's (1998)
research in Hong Kong found that students with
behavioral problems were the greatest source of
teacher stress. A comparative study of stress among
faculty in China and Japan resulted in the following
conclusions: In Japan, the main source is direct-
relation stress, i.e., not enough time to deal with
the demands of university duties; while in China,
social transaction (such as professional evaluation)
brought on the highest stress.
Studies done by Kyriacou and Sutcliffe (1978a),
Dunham (1981), Cichon and Koff (1982), Feitler and
Tokar (1982), McCormick (1996), Pithers and Soden
(1998), He et al. (2000) reveal that teachers
experience stress in many different forms. In
contrast, Milstein and Farkas (1988), Hinton,
Rotheiler and Howard (1991), and Hiebert and Farber
(1984) show that teacher stress is overrated.
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12
Definitions of Stress
Stress, from the. Latin meaning, "to stretch, "
was originally used.primarily in engineering. In
1914, Cannon first used the word stress outside of
its engineering context. Cannon described stress as
an emotional reaction to a disturbing experience.
While Cannon's concept remains the most common usage,
Selye (1936) further described stress as an innocuous
agent that damages a person's physiological and
psychological functioning.
Cannon (1914) introduced the concept of stress
to describe an intense emotional state that rises in
the consciousness when the sympathetic nervous system
is stimulated. The sympathetic nervous system is the
seat of self-preservation instinct where the
strongest emotion lies. The person either confronts
or departs from the source. He also said that
prolonged emotional strain or disturbance (stress)
might result in a degeneration of the person's
physiological mechanism.
This physiological mechanism is the internal
environment of the body. The objective of this
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13
internal environment is to preserve the constant
condition of the human .body system. Cannon (1929)
labeled this constant.condition as homeostasis.
Homeostasis are set paints in an individual's
physiological system that adjust to cope with changes
in the autonomic nervous system, thus maintaining a
normal state of resistance.
In 1936, Selye observed the effects of stress by
accident. He was attending to his patients when he
noticed a "general syndrome of sickness" (Selye,
1984, p. 16). After repeated experiments observing
tissue damage, he postulated that damage to the body
is a reaction to stress. He concluded that stress is
caused by acute non-specific nocuous agents (Selye,
193 6). By nocuous agents, Selye meant extreme
temperatures, spinal injury, excessive muscular
exercise, and the like. Selye (1984) then proposed
his definition of stress as the "nonspecific response
of the body to any demand" (p. 74). He referred to
the response as a syndrome since individual
manifestations are coordinated and are partly
independent upon each other.
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Selye (1936) labeled the response as "general
adaptation syndrome." The general adaptation
syndrome has three'.stages: first, alarm, which calls
on the defensive mechanism of the body; second, the
resistance or adaptation stage, which involves
secretions of abundant reserves of hormones to adjust
until depleted; and when the reserves are depleted,
the body reaches the third and last stage, which is
exhaustion.
Where homeostasis (Cannon, 1929) is the
maintaining of a normal state of resistance through
individual set points, Selye (1973) claimed that
heterostasis is the "establishment of a new steady
state by exogenous (pharmacologic) stimulation of
adaptive mechanisms through the development and
maintenance of dormant defensive tissue reactions (p.
443). When the body has exhausted the natural
reserves to adjust, adapt, repair, or cope with the
demands, results may vary such as inflammation,
hypertension, allergy, infection, etc. Selye also
stated that the results of stress target certain
parts of the body, never the whole body.
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15
As Cannon (1914) stated, prolonged exposure to
stress can produce injurious effects on the physical
or psychological systems of the organism. Whether
the environment is replete with high-level stress or
constant prolonged state of stress, the results are
predictably destructive unless controlled by
pharmaceuticals (Selye, 1973).
In 1966, Lazarus wrote his book on psychological
stress because he saw that "stress, as a universal
human and animal phenomenon, results in intense and
distressing experience and appears to be of
tremendous influence in behavior" (p. 2). Here the
view is on the effect on the person's behavior, an
outward manifestation of inward disequilibria—deemed
signs of stress. To Lazarus, problems of stress must
be regarded as "interdisciplinary" since they involve
psychology, medicine, psychiatry, physiology,
sociology, and anthropology.
Lazarus (1966) claimed that stress is not
emotion. It is a clash of external and internal
forces that produce varied reactions, structures, and
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16
processes that intervene between the stimulus and the
response.
Measurements and Models
When Holmes and Rahe (1967) created the Social
Readjustment Rating Scale (SRRS), little did they
know that it would be the model of stress research.
For decades this instrument scaled life events with a
ranking of 100 as the most stressful. Holmes and
Rahe opened the field on stress research and their
SRRS instrument has been modified for use in
measuring stress in different fields including stress
among college students and the United States Navy.
Mason (1975) regarded stress as a linear occurrence.
First, a stimulus, then a response, followed by
stimulus-response interactions, and finally a
spectrum of interacting factors. He identified the
internal condition that the body undergoes, not the
sources that produced stress.
McGrath (1976) appears to present the most all-
encompassing approach compared to the views that have
been discussed thus far. He defined stress as "a
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demand which threatens to exceed the person's
capabilities and resources for meeting it" (p. 1352).
McGrath developed a four-step paradigm to analyze the
stress cycle (Figure 1) . . The Appraisal Process
connects A, the situation to B, and the Perceived
Situation. The Decision Process is between B and C,
the Response Selection. The Performance Process runs
between C and D, the behavior. Finally, the Outcome
Process is between D and A. McGrath (1975)also
created a stress model that postulated three direct
effects: (a) increase in consequences (difference
between rewards and cost of successful task and
rewards and cost of task failure, (b) increase in
task difficulty, and (c) increase in actual task
difficulty.
Because of the uncertainty of success on
important tasks, arousal (experienced stress) is
heightened. On the other hand, arousal is lower when
confidence on a successful outcome is high or low
(McGrath, 1976, p. 1364).
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Outcome
Process
A. Situation D. Behavior
A
Appraisal Performance
Process Process
k
r Decision
B. Perceived
Situation
Process
C. Response
Selection
intra-organism
Figure 1. A paradigm for analysis of the stress cycle.
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19
The analysis of uncertainty of success prompted
McGrath (1976) to-reformulate his stress model. It
is reproduced in,Figure 2 with accompanying
explanation.
The new model postulates that variations in
performance demands of an objective situation have
three separate and direct effects:
1. An increase in consequences (i.e., in the
difference between the rewards and costs of
a successful task outcome on the one hand,
and the rewards and costs of task failure
on the other) (line #2) .
2 . An increase in perceived task difficulty
(line #3).
3 . An increase in actual task difficulty (line
#1) .
The effectiveness of Task Performance is a
function of three factors:
1. Difficulty of the task (line #10).
2. Ability of the person/s (line #11).
3. Arousal (line #12) .
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20
+13
+ 1 1
+12
Perceived
Difficulty
Task
Performance
Consequences
Perceived
Consequences
Past
Experience
Actual Task
Difficulty
Perceived
Task
Ability
Objective
Situation
Demand
Actual
Task
Ability
Experienced Stress:
Arousal
Figure 2. A reform ulation of the stress model.
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21
Ability depends on experience (line #5) (as well
as on "talent").
Arousal, , in turn, depends on perceived
consequences .(line #8) , and on uncertainty
(line #9).
Uncertainty depends on the closeness (line #7)
of perceived task difficulty (which is affected both
by the situation and by actual task difficulty (line
#3 and line #4) and perceived ability (line #6)
(which is affected by ability and experience, and
probably other factors). Uncertainty is at a maximum
when perceived difficulty is equal to perceived
ability. Arousal is a product of consequences and
uncertainty (McGrath, 1976, pp. 1364-1365).
Kyriacou and Sutcliffe (1978b) defined stress as
a response syndrome of a negative effect. Their
stress model has eight components.:
1. Potential stressors which are physical or
psychological in nature.
2. Appraisal that is a threat to self-esteem
or well-being.
3 . Actual stressors.
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4. Coping mechanisms to reduce stress.
5. Teacher, stress of negative effects with
response correlates: psychological, and
physiological, behavioral.
6. Chronic'symptoms that are psychosomatic,
coronary, or mental.
7. Characteristics of individual teacher:
biographical, personality, higher-order
needs, ability to meet or cope with
demands, beliefs-attitudes-values systems.
8. Potential non-occupational stressors.
The feedback loops are: 2-4 and 7 is A = successful
2, 5 and 7 is B = stress affects appraisal; 6 and 8
is C = highly dissatisfied; and 5 & 7 is D = coping
fails (Figure 3).
Teacher Stress
In 1978, two studies on teacher stress were
published. Cichon and Koff (1978) in the United
States reported the results of their Teaching Event
Stress Inventory (TESI). Administered to K-12
teachers by the Chicago Board of Education, the
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APPRAISAL
threat to
self-esteem
well-being
psychosymatic
coronary
mental
CHRONIC
SYMPTOMS
COPING
MECHANISMS
to reduce
perceived
threat
POTENTIAL
NON OCCUPATIONAL
STRESSORS
ACTUAL
STRESSORS
POTENTIAL
STRESSORS
physical
psychological
response
correlates:
psychological
physiological
behavioral
TEACHER
STRESS
negative
affects
biographical
personality
higher order needs
ability to m eet or cope with demands
beliefs-attitudes-value system
CHARACTERISTICS OF
THE INDIVIDUAL TEACHER
Figure 3. A model of teacher stress.
to
u>
24
research revealed high levels of stress among
secondary.teachers.
In ,the United Kingdom, Kyriacou and Sutcliffe
designed'-^ model of teacher stress. The model
conceptualized teacher stress as a response syndrome
resulting in negative effects such as anger or
depressioin (Kyriacou & Sutcliffe, 1978a). Using
this concept, Kyriacou and Sutcliffe (1978b) sampled
257 school teachers in 16 medium-sized mixed
comprehensive schools in England. The study revealed
that teachers suffer extreme stress when faced with
pupil misbehavior.
While most research results seems to support the
prevalence of stress among educators, other studies
have emphasized adaptation and coping. The earliest
theory was from Darwin (1909) who viewed stress as
the organism's response to its relationship to the
environment. The organism that learns to cope and
adjust will repair itself to meet the environment's
challenges.
Lazarus (1966) and Mason (1975) regarded stress
as a linear occurrence: First, a stimulus, then a
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25
response, followed by stimulus-response interactions,
and finally, a. spectrum of interacting factors.
These interacting factors make teaching a
complex interactive process, which gives it an
ecological nature. This ecological nature is a
process of multiple contexts that demands sensitivity
among the participants/teachers and students,
particularly the teachers (Heck & Williams, 1984).
Therefore, constant adjustment is required of the
educator. This adjustment allows the educator to
cope.
Dunham's (1981) study identified the following
stressful situations among teachers:
1. Teachers feel insecure because of the
unpredictability of children's behavior.
2. Teachers feel vulnerable as they doubt the
effectiveness of their coping resources.
3. Teachers feel frustrated in their attempts
to establish good communications.
In 1982, Pettegrew and Wolf declared that stress
at that time was becoming recognized as an
occupational hazard in the teaching profession.
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Eisdorfer (1985) combined science of truth with
sense of reality from personal observation in
addressing stress. He looked at the body as doing a
juggling act— a combination of "automatic physiologic
measures and learned environmental manipulations" (p.
6). Eisdorfer's definition of stress is a process
that is "multilevel, interactive, and dynamic, with
input and output variables which may array in
organizational hierarchy from the molecular to the
behavioral-social" (p. 16). Eisdorfer proposed an
interactive stress model. The model has four sets of
variables and a descriptor component. The four
variables are Potential Activators, Mediators,
Reactions, and Consequences. The five descriptors
are Organizational Level, Intensity, Quantity,
Temporal Pattern, and Evaluative Quality (for
Consequences only) (Figure 4).
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Mediators
(x-y) (y-z)
Consequences
Potential
Reactions
Activator
Descriptors:
Organizational Level
Intensity
Quantity
Temporal Pattern
Evaluative Quality (for Consequences only)
F ig u re 4. A fra m e w o rk fo r in te ra c tio n s b e tw ee n
th e in d iv id u a l and th e e n v iro n m e n t.
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28
Milstein and Farkas (1988) concluded that
teachers by choice are in the teaching field because
they are confident in their internal locus of control
and the continuing experience makes them creative in
coping with stressful situations. These innate
qualities make them operate according to the changes
around them.
Sterling and Eyer's (1988) viewpoint is on
arousal pathology. To cope with stress, the body
adjusts and readjusts. This adjustment, they called
allostasis. Allostasis is a process involving all
the parameters of internal body functions to match
environmental demands. That is, the body maintains
its "stability through change" (Sterling & Eyer, p.
636). Unlike homeostasis or heterostasis, allostasis
operates on two principles: (a) the body
continuously re-evaluates and re-adjusts its set
points, thus effectively using its internal
resources; and (b) the body anticipates and achieves
the necessary adjustments before the needs arise.
Sterling and Eyer (1988) added that the "brain
needs information regarding the intensity of the
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29
infectious challenge so that it may weigh the
seriousness of these demands" (p. 638). This
statement, further seals Charcot's (1887-1888)
mind/body .connection thesis.
Weiner (1992) tends to lean towards Mason's
(1975) explanation of stress. First, he agrees with
Mason's concept that "stimulus-response" does not
predict behavioral or physiological response because
of individual differences. One may perceive a
situation as more stressful than the other person.
The second point is that stressful experiences are
neither universal nor non-specific, as Selye (1936)
has claimed. Third, because stress is interactive,
it is best called evocative conditions that elicit
specified set of response/s (Mason, 1975). Fourth, a
model of stress must be time-related, complex, and
mutually interactive because organisms and
environments are constantly changing.
Weiner (1992) suggests three classifications of
stressful experiences. (a) Natural occurrences and
disasters to include avalanches, floods, volcanic
eruptions, etc.; (b) Man-made disasters such as acts
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30
of terrorism, fires, muggings, war, etc.; and (c)
Personal and individual experiences as in bereavement
by death, family discord, injury, shift work, etc.
Rebuttals
Two studies purport that teachers experience the
least stress in comparison with other professions.
For example fire fighters, air traffic controllers,
dockworkers, and those who handle hazardous materials
have far more stressful situations compared to
teachers who are confined in a classroom. The study
conducted by Hinton, Rotheiler, and Howard (1991)
questioned the validity of a self-report stress
inventory as interpreted by researchers and by
readers. Their comparative study of the Stress
Arousal Check List (SACL) and Spielberg's State Trait
Anxiety Inventory (STAI) revealed that "stress scale
does not measure any stress factors ...[but] rather
assesses aspects of worry and anticipatory fear
rather than a general emotional stress reaction"
(Hinton et al.,-1991, p. 91). Citing Cox and McKay
Hinton et al. concluded that "stress cannot be
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measured directly, but only the cognitive processes
which produce it and the responses which result from
it (p. 93,) . Since cognition plays a vital role in
personality, perception of stress depends on the
personality of the individual. This dissertation
addresses two factors affecting stress. One is
personality and the other is culture, which is
discussed later.
Research by Hiebert and Farber (1984) reviewed
71 papers. They concluded that there is little
empirical support that teaching is a stressful
occupation. Hiebert and Farber expressed "concern
that the vast number of reports proclaiming teaching
as stressful might well set up an 'expectancy to be
stressed' making teachers more vulnerable to stress-
induced disorders" (p. 15). Their study classified
the 71 articles on teacher stress research into three
types. Type 1 articles were statements of personal
opinion, type 2 were self-report questionnaires, and
type 3 were merely third-party observations. Type 2
and Type 3 studies lacked consensus to support the
stressfulness of teaching. Hiebert and Farber
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32
further agreed with Brodsky (1977) and Bloch (1978)
who concluded, "people who are chronically and
severely stressed demonstrate common characteristics
regardless of their occupational affiliation" (p.
21). It is where individuality plays a major role,
especially in the classroom.
The Personality Factor
As a background, Personality is largely defined
as the sum total of psychological and physical
characteristics unique to the individual's patterns
of behavior and thought. These qualities of
uniqueness develop in several stages as the
individual progresses to adulthood. The general
divisions of personality theory as presented in basic
psychology textbooks are: psychodynamic, humanistic,
trait, and social-cognitive. Each theory has its own
explanation of the emergence of personality and
stress.
The psychodynamic theory had its beginnings with
Sigmund Freud almost a hundred years ago. This
theory proposes an unrelentless struggle among the
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id, ego, and superego. The existence of these three
opposing forces inside the mind is likened to a man
on ,a tightrope holding a pole for balance. The man
represents the ego. One end of the pole is the id,
and the other end, the superego. Since the id is the
antithesis of the superego, the ego acts as the
arbiter between the superego and the id. If and when
the id wins, the individual chooses to act to an
absolutely unrelegated and unmitigated will; the
result is an irrational, impulsive behavior.
Humanistic personality theorists like Maslow and
Rogers advocate potential for growth. They emphasize
the goodness of mankind. Rogers's view was centered
on the essential worth of the individual. Maslow's
approach was based on the individual's hierarchy of
needs. The most basic needs (physiological) will
have to be met before reaching full potential (self-
actualization) . The self-actualization stage can be
repeated as many times as the individual achieves
milestones in career, personal, social, or emotional.
This personality theory expresses high optimism.
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Trait theorists Allport and Eysenck focus on
individual differences, instead of commonalities.
What characterize one person from another are their
■collective traits. Trait is a distinguishing quality
that is a consistent tendency in beliefs, desires,
behavior, etc, inherited or learned. Studies on
twins separated from birth have questioned the
strength of biology over environment influence.
Trait considers temperament as the core of individual
personality. Allport divided trait into cardinal,
central, and secondary. Eysenck's dimensions of
trait are introversion/extroversion,
stability/instability, and psychoticism.
The social-cognitive theory (formerly called
social-learning theory) emphasizes the influences of
mental processes and environmental factors in
determining behavior. This is a modification of
traditional behaviorism combined with operant
conditioning that shapes behavior through rewards and
punishment. In social-cognitive theory, value plays
a major role in decision making, problem solving, and
communication. For instance, the effort a student
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35
will put forth on a goal will depend largely on the
value he places on the outcome (grades). Performance
would be based on an if, then, consequence to achieve
the desired outcome.
Personality and Teacher Stress
Fontana and Abouserie (1993) did a study on 139
teachers using Eysenck's Personality Questionnaire
(EPQ). The results showed a significant correlation
between introversion and teacher stress. Since an
introverted person is quiet and retiring, reserved
and distant except for a few intimate friends, s/he
is therefore more readily affected by life events and
suffers more stress from professional work (Fontana
and Abouserie (1993, p. 266) .
It is the writer's view that EPQ uses too severe
a delineation of personalities. This is what Mischel
(1979) contends as radical categorization, a limiting
of an individual's capabilities. This stereotyping
makes for overgeneralization, an attribution that
fails to relate context with the person. The EPQ
moves towards central tendencies while situations,
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36
backgrounds, environments and other within-person
variances seem to be neglected. The result of an EPQ
(tp borrow from Mischel) seems "to ignore the
reciprocal interaction of person and situation in the
stream of behavior" (Mischel, 1979, p. 743) .
To define a personality type, behavior is
assessed according to frequency or cross-situational
frequency, intensity, and other information
available. According to Jenkins (1991), individual-
difference variables such as gender, social class and
marital status must be taken into consideration.
Kyriacou and Sutcliffe (1978a) concluded that the
response of the teacher to stress depends upon the
teacher's individual characteristics such as
personality traits, biographical details and the
teacher's perceptions of these demands. The stress
variables enumerated by Schaubroeck and Ganster
(1991) are anger, hostility, hardiness, locus of
control, sense of coherence, self-esteem, power of
motivation, and trait positive and negative which are
characteristics of Type A behavior patterns.
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37
Type A behavior patterns are a highly researched
.personality issue. Type A behavior patterns reflect
psychological phenomena associated with
characteristics such as competitiveness, hostility,
and impatience. These are extreme behavior
descriptors. Perhaps too extreme that moderation is
ruled out of the average performance. To arrive at
acute competitiveness, hostility, or impatience
requires a step-by-step development. In a humanistic
point of view, personality can be modified by great
effort of personal control, thus arriving at a self-
actualization of self-improvement. An instructor
aware of their Type A behavior patterns and wishing
to be a model for students will modify their behavior
to serve the purposes of education.
Another widely researched area is Person-
Environment Fit Theory. Matching personality with
environment, Person-Environment Fit touts that an
individual with characteristics desirable for
teaching would be successful in the teaching field.
Mischel (1979) rejected this idea as judgmental or
over simplification to avoid efficient processing of
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38
personnel. Mischel argued that although behavior
. patterns often may be stable, across situations, they
are not usually highly generalized. He further
stated that the nature, degree, and meaning of cross-
! situational breadth of behaviors could not be fully
assessed by measuring instruments. Mischel asserted
also that temporal stability could be gauged by how
the person's competencies, encodings, expectancies,
values, and goals or plans endure. In other words,
Mischel is pointing to congruency of internal control
and external objectives. It is almost like saying a
worker's mission should match the employer's mission,
or be closely similar.
Personality Adaptation
"Educators must create a differentiating
organizational structure to meet the personality
needs of our most competent teachers without
requiring them to abandon teaching" (emphasis added)
(Cunningham, 1982, p. 233). This teacher
differentiation requires separating different
teaching roles, assigning different tasks and
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39
responsibilities, and adding responsibility to
training and experience as a factor for determining
compensation (p. 234) .
To simplify classroom life and to help develop
teachers' inner powers, organizational development
technology can be introduced. Organization
Development is a field of study that focuses on the
work process and the individual and work groups'
function within the organization. Organization
Development experts can eliminate duplicated tasks,
analyze hostile communication, and frictions among
workers, between teacher and learners. How best to
approach organizational development than to recognize
the plasticity of the human personality?
The interactive process that pervades the
classroom makes a teacher's role complex (Heck &
Williams, 1984). Because of the constant demand on
an educator, the need to adjust is a given. Human
experience is influenced by past events, present
conditions, and the individual's physiology. All of
these variables play a part on the person's thoughts
and behavior (Lerner, 1984). This reciprocal
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40
interaction of people in a constantly changing world
makes life in general a "potential for plasticity,
that is, systematic changes within the person in his
or her structure and/or function" (Lerner, 1984, p.
xi). The teacher is, therefore, the producer of his
or her own development.
This self-regulation springs from learning what
works and what does not work. Mischel (1979) calls
this cognitive economics that allows a teacher to
process classroom situations on a daily basis. After
all, self-regulation is the core of human
functioning.
This self-regulation is manifested by how people
think about stimuli. In considering situational
variables, the person delays impulsive behavior and
gains control of the situation. Mischel (1979)
refers to this as self-enhancing information
processing. A teacher self-encodes to achieve a
positive effect, not only for him or herself, but
also for the students who rely on their leadership in
the classroom.
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Another aspect in classroom behavior for a
teacher is locus of control. Locus of control refers
to the generalized belief that life events are
controlled by the individual's own actions (internal
orientation) or by outside forces (external
orientation) (Hurrell & Murphy, 1991). In general,
"people who have an internal locus of control (or
sense of personal control) seem to function more
adaptively in many ways than do people who have an
external locus of control" (Carver, 1997, p. 580). A
teacher with a high sense of internal locus of
control self-regulates their thoughts and behavior.
This quality of plasticity enables a teacher to play
the role of administrator, manager, supervisor,
coach, nurse, etc., in a confined social
group/environment, i.e., the classroom. Lerner
(1984) suggests that a bi-directional relation exists
between an individual and society where the
individual is the key in the plasticity process.
This plasticity process is circular in that it allows
the individual to be an active agent in its own
development.
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42
In human development, plasticity is key.
"Potential for change across life . . . [is] comprised of
plastic processes . . . [at] each level . . . [and] change at
one level promotes changes at the others" (Lerner,
1984, p. 146) .
Lerner also recognized that in plasticity, there
is potential for intervention. That is why research
on teacher stress is significant. Awareness, even
recognizing its existence is never enough. After
all, "stress is the product of individuals'
interaction with their environment" (Cole & Walker,
1989, p. xii). Intervening in its occurrence is a
major step in administration's intellectual, social,
organizational—and even political—responsibility.
The Culture Factor
Another factor that can confound research on
stress is culture. Culture and stress have the most
diverse perspectives and psychological
interpretations. Research on classroom stress has
been conducted in several countries such as
Australia, Canada (Kam Loops), Hong Kong, Japan, New
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43
Zealand, Africa (Nigeria), Scotland, United Kingdom,
and the United States, to name a few. This global
interest on stress has another hurdle to face—
culture. Culture, like stress is a word with varied
connotations.
The first known study on culture was by the
Greek historian Herodotus (Myers, 1953). Herodotus
wanted to discover what initiated the hostility
between the Greeks and the Persians. As he traveled
the some 50 societies known to the Greeks of
Herodotus's time, he recorded accounts of their
origins, their religion, art, and daily routine.
What was revealed in these recordings is referred to
today as different cultures. This approach of
Herodotus makes it necessary to understand the
organization of "people's current ways of life, which
shape their thinking" (Cole, 1996, p. 19). In the
anthropological sense defined by Tylor, culture or
civilization is a complex whole that includes
knowledge, belief, art, morals, law, customs, and any
other capabilities and habits acquired by man as a
member of society.
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44
In this study, the meaning proposed by Downs
(1971) is applied. "Culture . . . is the shared
explanations of events and actions and the prescribed
responses to specific situations that are held common
with other people who are part of the group, tribe,
nation, social class, or other collectivity" (p. xi).
By the time children enter school, they already have
some well-articulated set of explanations for the
world they encounter.
Culture is learned behavior, growing slowly upon
a person with lasting effects. Patterns and
characteristics that are unique to a given society
are passed on from generation to generation.
The acquisition of culture is essentially seen
as an "in-struction" process: that is, the human
mind becomes structured by virtue of cultural
formations that have their existence outside the
realm of our own experience, but nevertheless
become part of our interior world. (Baerveldt &
Verheggen, 19 97, p. 3)
It is not what the outside world is, but what it
is believed to be that governs one's actions and
those of all other people (Downs, 1971). Each
national culture offers a foundation for a variety of
socialization opportunities through the socio-
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45
educational process that results in value or mental
sets which become culture-specific (Hofstede, 1984).
This perception and varied interpretations influence
expectations, goals, beliefs, and everyday behavior.
From early childhood, various institutions,
especially in schools where 12 years of a person's
life is spent, continue this process.
Every student and every instructor brings with
them patterns of behavior into the classroom.
Instructor and students function within their
respective particular worlds. Within these
particular worlds is the struggle to maintain a
concurrent internal world of intentions. While a
student acts and/or reacts to a question, in their
mind is another world— the perceived reality.
What compounds the issue of culture, especially
in the classroom, is the variation of meaning,
understanding, and intentionality. Kluckhohn (1954)
wrote that human beings do not behave as biological
organisms, but rather respond to stimuli and to
situations, although not with the regularity of a
machine. The overwhelming human response is to
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"stimulus or stimulus--situation as defined and
interpreted in accordance with man-made patterns
(i.e., culture)" (p. 921). As culture arises from
behavior and returns to behavior, culture is but one
element of behavior. It may be a tissue of
externalities, yet it is built into the personality
and becomes only but a small part of the entire
personality. Thus, culture is internalized. What is
internalized determines the individual's behavior;
what influences the behavior is the selected version
of culture that the individual has internalized.
Culture then consists of explicit and implicit
patterns, of and for behavior acquired and
transmitted by symbols and systems considered
products of action and conditioning elements of
further action.
Corollary to what Kluckhohn (1954) said, Shweder
(1991) states, "Every person is stimulus bound, and
every stimulus is person bound" (p. 99). This
circular statement turns one to the term cultural
psychology, which according to Shweder is the "study
of mental representations (emotions, desires, and
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47
beliefs and their intentional objects) without the
presumption of fixity, necessity, universality, and
abstract formalism" (p. 99).
Using Shweder's definition of cultural
psychology and focusing on the mental representation
of emotions, I posit that emotions, to a higher
degree, affect the interactive environment of the
classroom. Frijda (1988) postulates that the "laws
of emotion may help to discern that simple,
universal, moving forces operate behind the complex,
idiosyncratic movements of feeling" (p. 349). By law
of emotions, Frijda means empirical regularities
generated by causal mechanisms not of a voluntary
nature and are only partially under voluntary
control. Furthermore, Frijda (1988) claims, "Not
only emotions obey the laws; we obey them. We are
subject to our emotions, and we cannot engender
emotions at will" (p. 349).
Emotional Impact/Internal Culture
Frijda (1988) proposes the definition of
emotions as "responses to events that are important
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48
to the individual" and the responses are what the
laws are about. Frijda gives nine different laws of
emotion. Using these laws, we can demonstrate how
emotions (internal culture) impact classroom stress.
1. "The Law of Situational Meaning: Emotions
arise in response to the meaning structures of given
situations; different emotions arise in response to
different meaning structures" (Frijda, 1988, p. 349).
This law of emotion is the most basic. Frijda uses
grief, brought about by personal loss, anger by
frustration as examples. It is the meaning and the
person's appraisal of the situation that is the
essence, which is the relationship between the events
and the person's concerns; not the event itself. How
the input is appraised, so shall the output be.
Appraisals can be primary or secondary which make the
law of situational meaning a conscious and/or
controlled effort. Frijda cites sentimentality and
falling in love as examples. In sentimentality,
latent attachment concerns are awakened such as in
movies on miracle workers. Falling in love is
triggered by specific sequences of events such as
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loneliness and dissatisfaction, and the object of
interest incites novelty or attractiveness. For
example, a teacher may be affected by an attitude of
indifference by a student and generalize that the
student will perform poorly. In the student's mind,
perhaps they may have had negative associations with
the subject. Perhaps they had heard unpleasant
stories about the teacher. The teacher, on the other
hand, cannot be sure that the perceived indifference
of the student is truly indifference. The
indifference might simply be a front to shield the
real reason. It must be remembered that it is the
appraisal of the person that counts in this
particular law. It is the meaning of the situation
that gives credence to the reality of the situation.
2. "The Law of Concern: Emotions arise in
response to events that are important to the
individual's goals, motives, or concerns" (Frijda,
1988, p. 351). Emotions run high on the first day of
school. As a new teacher who strives to make a good
impression on the first day of school, how the
teacher comes across is of vital importance to the
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results of their contact for the day; possibly the
whole quarter. Every student who walks into the
classroom has a foremost source of trepidation, which
will dominate the student's thoughts during the
entire class, if not the entire day. The
anticipation of the desired results will be of
primary concern. The concern is as individual and
unique as the person.
3. "The Law of Apparent Reality: Emotions are
elicited by events appraised as real, and their
intensity corresponds to the degree to which this is
the case" (Frijda, 1988, p. 352). Society's
standards of professional interaction vary from
region to region, and from country to country. The
concept of professional attire has become an issue in
many campuses and businesses. Television shows and
movies that portray the office environment are
apparent reality to the viewer. Revealing necklines
and tight-fitting, if not sheer fabrics, send a
message that this style of dressing is acceptable in
daily life. To wit, students of all ages copy this
seeming reality. This law also affects how a culture
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perceives society's standards. An American movie
flaunting women's skimpy clad bodies may read as
loose or immoral to those whose culture reveres a
woman's body as a sacred temple. In the September 7,
2 001 issue of The Honolulu Advertiser, is an example
of stereotyped apparent reality. A girl born in
Japan, who stands 5-foot 9 inches and wears size 12,
does not fit the "China Doll" image. She was turned
down by several modeling agencies because she did not
fit the mold of Oriental petite perfection and gentle
submission (Richardson, 2001). This law of apparent
reality takes a double edge— an artificial reality
portrayed as culture and culture perceived as seeming
reality.
4. "The Laws of Change, Habituation, and
Comparative Feeling: Emotions are elicited by actual
or expected changes in favorable or unfavorable
conditions" (Frijda, 1988, p. 353). Meeting
deadlines in submitting homework or course
assignments is a challenge for procrastinators. This
habit can be changed by persuasion or by guided
reminders of the given timeline. Students and
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teachers must agree on a favorable condition for this
law to be effective and symbiotic. The argument of
this law of change affecting the classroom is how
much motivation is a teacher's responsibility. If
motivation.is an internal drive, no amount of
external encouragement may be effective. Great is
the challenge of the teacher in whose hands lies the
responsibility of initiating change.
5. "The Law of Hedonic Asymmetry: Pleasure is
always contingent upon change and disappears with
continuous satisfaction. Pain may persist under
persisting adverse conditions" (Frijda, 1988, p.
353). According to Frijda, this law is a stern and
bitter law. If it is the case, then as a system and
supported by teachers and parents, education can
modify existing structures so that cheating cannot
happen. This takes effort, but cheating can be
prevented if proper punishment is meted out. The
consequences must outweigh the feeling of
satisfaction of getting away with cheating if not
caught.
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6. "The Law of Conservation of Emotional
Momentum: Emotional events retain their power to
elicit emotions indefinitely, unless counteracted by
repetitive exposures that permit extinction or
habituation, to the extent that these are possible"
(Frijda, 1988, p. 354). In Frijda's view, this law
is difficult to prove. He uses trauma to illustrate
this law. What can be so painful in class that the
emotion will be sustained for a long period?
Embarrassment in front of the class comes to mind.
According to this law, the pains of embarrassment do
not grow old; they are referred to as old events.
What happens is that when an encountered stimulus
resembles the original stimulus, images associated
with the original one are conjured; emotions surge
and the previous experience may seem fresh all over
again.
7. "The Law of Closure: Emotions tend to be
closed to judgments of relativity of impact and to
the requirements of goals other than their own"
(Frijda, 1988, p. 354). Frijda explains that the law
of closure is manifest in absoluteness of feeling
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since emotions know no probabilities. This very
absoluteness of emotion prompts one into action.
This emotion overrides other concerns, other goals,
and other actions. The law applies to single actions
such as in screaming or crying from anger. The anger
flows when something that happened is felt as
absolutely bad. The offense and the misery seems to
last forever. To a young mind, to be humiliated in
front of the class while giving an oral report can be
the end of a friendship. The offense and the misery
associated with the experience will forever linger in
the offended person's memory. The incident captures
the emotional impulse of the absoluteness of the
ended relationship.
8. "The Law of Care for Consequence: Every
emotional impulse elicits a secondary impulse that
tends to modify it in view of its possible
consequences" (Frijda, 1988, p. 355). In some
emotions, the law of closure does not apply. An
individual may be inclined towards moderation or
inhibition of response, according to Frijda. This,
he states, is "presence of emotional control." He
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suggests that control, like other emotional
responses, is elicited or maintained by stimuli.
Fury or strong passion that may be violent, can be
controlled. The embarrassed classmate can control
adverse consequences of retaliation by punching the
offender, instead of choosing not to act
spontaneously. This emotional spontaneity is a
principle of how the culture is perceived to react.
By not acting spontaneously, the person exercises
presence of emotional control.
9. "The Laws of the Lightest Load and the
Greatest Gain: Whatever situation can be viewed in
alternative ways, a tendency exists to view it in a
way that minimizes negative emotional load or in a
way that maximizes emotional gain" (Frijda, 1988, p
356). Frijda discusses two contrasting situations
here. First, to minimize negative emotional load,
one can resort to denial, avoidant thinking, or
entertaining illusionary hopes. As an extreme
example, a teacher can apply the mechanism of
depersonalization when, dealing with a student's
accusation of failing a test as the teacher's fault
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56
By not putting the self in the center of the
situation, a teacher can minimize the opposite end of
this law, which the student is putting on him or her.
That is, the student, by showing anger believes they
are achieving momentary gain by instilling or
producing guilt upon the teacher for not designing a
better test. Frijda notes that this mechanism is
quite transparent. Blaming another cannot make one
yield through manipulation for the other's gain.
Frijda concludes that not all of human emotion
is dictated by the laws of emotion. One can exert
voluntary emotional control and one can also
substitute deliberate action for an emotional
response. The laws of emotion extend to calls of
reason in as much as it does to a person's immediate
interests and needs.
While emotion has been the focal point of this
discussion, it is not to neglect the role of reason.
The approach was prompted because of the lack of
actual research on culture as a factor in classroom
stress. Many agree with Frijda (1988) who asserts
that emotions and feelings are idiosyncratic
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57
psychological phenomena, nevertheless emotions
surface, refine, and diminish according to rules that
were discussed above.
Challenge in U.S. Classrooms
As the United States continues to be a global
power, the influx of immigrants will flow in,
businesses will find a haven in capitalism, and its
educational structure will be challenged, as new
cultures from other nations crowd its classrooms.
More than that, a teacher will need to be aware of
their own country's prevalent culture, the cultures
that daily occupy the classroom, and to be able to
communicate without bias or judgment. The teacher
will have to face apd tolerate ambiguity among non-
English speakers and be able to manage their
stereotypes. All in all, the principal competency of
a U.S. teacher is flexibility in a nation of diverse
cultures. Clearly this is proof according to the
definitions stated earlier.
In the diversity of classroom population, a
teacher faces an assortment of interests, needs, and
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motives. As such, a teacher becomes like a nurse
whose education had been full of practicalities and
abstractions. The teacher needs to recognize the
cultural embodiments of each student in order to ,
define and treat the disease (emotions/motivations)
based on the student's culture. The end result is a
public, shared meaning (Johnson, 1987). As the
reader may observe, a teacher has the daunting task
of deciphering cultural differences. While
maintaining their own self-culture, they must be able
to find a common thread to focus the students on the
course and its objectives.
Looking at Darwin's (1909) natural selection
process, it can be concluded that organisms (humans
and non-humans) face challenges, adversities, and
even dangers, through integrated behavioral and
physiological patterns in order to respond
appropriately. The difference lies, of course, on
age, experience, education, gender, and other factors
contributing to the individuality of the being.
Weiner (1992) summarized it best when he said
that the psychological, behavioral, and physiological
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responses to stressors are inextricable— that is,
they are organismic. Since these processes are
organismic, they are very involved; therefore, only
the individual has any control over their own actions
or reactions. "The important role of personality
factors in producing stress reactions requires that
we define stress in terms of transactions between
individuals and situations, rather than of either one
in isolation" (Lazarus, 1966, p. 5) .
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60
CHAPTER 3
METHODOLOGY
Participants
The Educator Stress Inventory (ESI) (Appendix A)
was created with Heald College instructors in mind.
Heald College, a non-profit organization grants
diploma and associate degrees in the applied
sciences. Responses were drawn from the. entire
faculty population of the 12 Heald College campuses
located in California (10), Hawaii (1), and Oregon
(1). A third-party designed website was made
available to part-time and full-time teachers for 10
days in December 2001 and ten days in January 2002.
The Educator Stress Inventory was posted on the site
and was created to identify stressful events among
faculty at Heald College while representing events of
common concern among teachers in general.
There were 542 teachers contacted via the
college's intranet. A total of 537 e-mail addresses
were deliverable. Of the 223 responses, 214 were
non-duplicated responses. Approximately 60% of the
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61
sample was male and 40% was female. There were 73
instructors with zero to two years' teaching
experience. Respondents with 3 to 5 years experience
numbered 57; 45 had 6 to 10 years; and 3 8 had 11 plus
years.
Heald College grants Associate in Applied
Science degrees in both business and technology
programs. Respondents who teach technology courses
were 92, business course instructors were 46, general
education teachers were 45, and those teaching both
business and technology courses were 30.
There were 180 full-time instructors and 33
part-time teachers among the 213 respondents.
One hundred eleven had graduate degrees compared
to 82 with undergraduate degrees; 12 had associate
degrees, and only 9 had doctorate degrees.
Caucasians (158) had the highest representation
among the 213 respondents, and 25 were of Asian-
Pacific Islander origin. Thirty people comprised
other ethnic groups. ,
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62
Measurements and Instrumentation
Presently, there are no standard models to
examine or measure stress in a nonprofit business and
technology college that grants Associate Degrees.
The author's survey, titled Educator Stress Inventory
was patterned after Cichon and Koff's (1978) Teaching
Events Stress Inventory, and Kyriacou and Sutcliffe's
(1978b) questionnaire survey.
There were three sections to the survey. After
the 20-day posting, the Educator Stress Inventory
survey was automatically unavailable. Respondents
remained anonymous since they were identified only by
their passwords.
Section I centered on demographics. Gender,
years teaching, status, degree, and ethnicity were
obtained from the respondents.
Section II was a self-rating scale. Three
questions from Kyriacou and Sutcliffe (1978b), which
were modified, were part of Section II of the survey.
Two additional questions pertaining to Heald College
faculty were added. The five variables on this
section were general stress, overall satisfaction,
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63
career satisfaction, and two questions on student
ratings of instructional effectiveness.
General stress was measured by a single
question, "In general, how stressful do you find
being a teacher at Heald?" with four response
categories (not stressful, somewhat stressful,
stressful, very stressful). General stress was coded
on a 1-4 scale with high numbers corresponding to
higher general stress.
The second variable, overall satisfaction, was
measured by the question, "Overall, how satisfied are
you with teaching as a job at Heald?" with five
response categories (very dissatisfied, fairly
satisfied, neither satisfied nor dissatisfied, fairly
satisfied, and very satisfied). Overall satisfaction
was coded on a 1-5 scale with high numbers
corresponding to higher satisfaction.
Question three measured career satisfaction.
The question, "Suppose you were starting your career
over, would you choose a teaching career over again?"
had three response categories (certainly no, not
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64
sure, and certainly yes). It was coded 1-3 with the
high numbers corresponding to higher satisfaction.
The last two questions, "On end-of-quarter
evaluation by your students, where do you usually
fall relative to your peers on the Heald Learning
Experience Survey (LES)" and "How do students
typically rate your teaching on the LES" were
combined as one—performance ratings variable. The
bottom 33%, middle 33%, and top 33% scale was coded
1, 3, and 5. The teaching effectiveness ratings were
averaged since the average is more reliable than an
individual item, which is easier to handle. The
average scores potentially ranged from 1-5 with high
numbers indicating that an instructor received higher
student ratings. The reliability of this average
was .80.
Section III (referred to as stressors) listed 21
factors that were perceived stressful by educators.
Number 22 was left blank to allow respondents to
write a stressful event not covered by the
questionnaire.
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65
An exploratory factor analysis was conducted
(principal components with varimax rotation) to
reduce the 21 items to five different stressor
dimensions. Items 9, 15, 16, and 17 load heavily on
factor one. These items are:
9. Notification of unsatisfactory performance
. as instructor.
15. Poor promotion prospects.
16. Low compensation as a professional.
17. Undervalued as a professional.
Because each of these items dealt with
professional issues, this factor was named
"Professional Stressors."
Items 6, 7, 8, 18, and 19 addressed resource
issues listed as follows:
6. Lack of availability of books and supplies.
7. Shortage of and/or malfunctioning
equipment.
8. Inadequate physical facilities.
18. Changes and ambiguities in policy.
19. Changes in processing of grades.
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66
These items were collectively called "Resource
Stressors."
The following four items centered on students
and thus called "Student Stressors."
1. Managing disruptive students.
2 . Teaching students who are "below average" in
achievement level.
3 . Dealing with students whose primary language
is not English.
4. Students poor attitude towards class work.
The fourth factor was described as "Teaching
Stressors" because they focused on classroom
situations. They are:
5. Having a large class (30 or more students).
12. First day of school/quarter.
13. Preparing class material.
14. Grading students.
The fifth and last component directed
administration's influence as a stressor. They
were:
9. Attendance at in-service meetings.
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67
10. Attendance in co-curricular
activities/orlentation/graduation.
20. Communication with administrators.
21. Administrative work (filling forms, reading
memos).
All 21 stress items were queried with a 5-point
response scale that ranged from not stressful (zero
points) to very stressful (scored 4 points). To
derive scores on each factor, items were averaged and
the factor scores ranged from 0 (no stress) to 4
(high stress). The reliabilities of each factor
were:
Professional Stressors (alpha = .74).
Resource Stressors (alpha = .78).
Student Stressors (alpha = .77).
Teaching Stressors (alpha = .64).
Administrative Stressors (alpha = .67).
Procedure
The survey was arranged with Heald College's
Central Administration Office. With the approval the
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Chief Operating Officer and Vice President, this
researcher was provided the names of faculty. Based
on the list, the author proceeded to check the names
with their" corresponding e-mail addresses. The web
designer channeled the responses through another ISP.
To protect each respondent's identity, every
instructor was randomly assigned a number. When a
teacher had submitted responses to the survey, the
number corresponding to the teacher's name was
inactivated. This precaution was an attempt to avoid
multiple responses from one instructor-respondent.
To assure total anonymity, responses were saved
automatically onsite using each respondent's
passwords only. The survey was estimated to take
less than 15 minutes to complete.
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CHAPTER 4
PRESENTATION OF THE FINDINGS
Section I of the Educator Stress Inventory
centered on participant demographics. The results
are shown in Table 1.
Means and standard deviations for Section I of
the Educator Stress Inventory are shown in Table 2.
The mean on the 1-4 general stress scale is 2.13.
The average Heald faculty member is somewhat
stressed. The mean on the 1-5 general satisfaction
scale is 4.00. The average faculty member is fairly
satisfied with teaching at Heald. The mean on the 1-
3 career satisfaction scale is 2.66. Most of the
sample reported that they would choose teaching as a
career again.
Section II was a self-rating scale as described
earlier. The results are shown, in Table 3.
Table 4 shows the means and standard deviation
for the five stress components. The means for the
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Table 1
Frequency Distribution of Section I
Sex
Frequency Percent
Valid
Percent
Cumulative
Percent
Valid
Female 82 38.50 38.50 38 .50
Male 131 61. 50 61.50 100.00
Total 213 100.00 100.00
Years Teaching
Frequency Percent
Valid
Percent
Cumulative
Percent
Valid
0 to 2 73 . 34.30 34.30 34 .30
3 to 5 57 26 . 80 26 . 80 78 . 90
6 to 10 45 21. 10 21. 10 100.00
11 plus 38 17 . 80 17 . 80 52 . 10
Total 213 100 . 00 100 . 00
Class Type
Frequency Percent
Valid
Percent
Cumulative
Percent
Valid
Both 30 14.10 14.10 14.10
Business 46 21.60 21.60 35.70
General 45 21.10 21. 10 56.80
Technology 92 43.20 43 .20 100.00
Total 213 100.00 100 . 00
Status
Frequency Percent
Valid
Percent
Cumulative
Percent
Valid
Full-time 180 84 .50 84.50 84.50
Part-time 33 15.50 15 . 50 100.00
Total 213 100.00 100 .00
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Table 1 (Continued)
Degree
Frequency Percent
Valid
Percent
Cumulative
Percent
Valid
Associate 12 5.6 5 . 6 5 . 6
Baccalaureate 82 38.5 38 . 5 44 . 1
Doctorate 9 4.20 4.20 48 .40
Master 110 51.60 51. 60 100.00
Total 213 100.00 100.00
Ethnicity
Frequency Percent
Valid
Percent
Cumulative
Percent
Valid
African-
American 8 3 . 80 3 .80 3 . 80
Indian/
Alaskan
Native 6 2 . 80 2 .80 6. 60
Asian-Pacific
Islander 25 11.70 11. 70 18 .30
Caucasian 158 74 . 20 74 .20 92 .50
Hispanic 12 5 .60 5 . 60 98 .10
Non-Resident
Alien 4 1.90 1. 90 100.00
Total 213 100.00 100.00
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Table 1 (Continued)
Campus
Frequency Percent
Valid Cumulative
Percent Percent
Valid
Concord 21 9.90 9.. 90 9,.90
Fresno 17 8.00 8 . . 00 17 .80
Hayward 21 9. 90 9.. 90 27 . .70
Honolulu 35 16 .40 16 , .40 44 . 10
Portland 9 4 .20 4 . .20 48 . .40
Roseville 17 8.00 8 , . 00 56 . .30
Sacramento 26 12 .20 12 . .20 68 . .50
Salinas 13 6.10 6 . . 10 74 . . 60
San Francisco 15 7 . .00 7 . . 00 81,.70
San Jose 19 8. 90 8 . . 90 90 , .60
Santa Rosa 6 2 . .80 2 . . 80 93 , .40
Stockton 14 6. 60 6 . . 60 100 . .00
Total 213 100 .00 100 . . 00
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Table 2
General Stress and Satisfaction
Mean SD
General stress 2.13 0.82
General satisfaction 4.00 1.02
Choose teaching____________ 2.66 0.59
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Table 3
Frequency Distribution of Section II
Stress
Frequency Percent
Valid
Percent
Cumulative
Percent
Valid 45 21.10 21. 10 21.10
2 . 00 111 52.10 52 . 10 73 .20
3 . 00 41 19.20 19. 20 92 . 50
4 . 00 16 7.50 7.50 100.00
Total 213 100.00 100.00
Satisfaction
Frequency Percent
Valid
Percent
Cumulative
Percent
Valid 4 1. 90 1. 90 1. 90
2 .00 25 11. 70 11. 70 13 . 60
3 .00 13 6 .10 6.10 19 . 70
4 . 00 94 44 .10 44 . 10 63 .80
5 . 00 77 36.20 36.20 100.00
Total 213 100.00 100.00
Choose Teaching
Frequency Percent
Valid
Percent
Cumulative.
Percent
Valid 13 6 .10 6.10 6.10
2 .00 45 21.10 21.10 27 .10
3 .00 155 72.80 72 . 80 10.00
Total 213 100 .00 100.00
Ratings
Frequency Percent
Valid
Percent
Cumulative
Percent
Valid 1 0 .50 0.50 0.50
2 .00 1 0 .50 0.50 0 . 90
3 .00 18 8 .50 8.50 9.40
3 . 00 35 16.40 16.40 25 . 80
4 . 00 6 2 . 80 2 . 80 28 .60
4 . 00 32 15.00 15.00 43 .70
5 . 00 120 56.30 56.30 100.00
Total 213 100.00 100.00
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75
Table 4
Means and Standard Deviations of Five Components of
Stressors
Mean Standard
Deviation
Professional 2 .44 0 . 85
Resource 2 .28 0 . 75
Student 2 .11 0 . 69
Teaching 1 . 90 0 . 64
Administrative 1 . 61 0 . 64
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professional, resource, student, teaching, and
administrative stressors were 2.44, 2.28, 2.11, 1.90,
and 1.61 respectively. Because high numbers indicate
higher stress, these results show that professional
stressors are the most stressful and administrative
stressors are the least stressful. Because the
stress items were coded on a 1-4 scale and the means
for each of the stressor scale were around 2.00, it
can be concluded that the average Heald faculty
member was "somewhat stressed" on all five factors.
Section III of the survey included 21 different
stressors. For practical reasons, an exploratory
factor analysis was conducted (principal components
with varimax rotation) to reduce the 21 items to the
five different stressor dimensions identified above.
Each question was numbered according to the sequence
on the survey. The means and standard deviations of
each 21 stressor is presented in Table 5.
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Table 5
Means and Standard Deviations of Each of the 21 Stressors
Stressors________ 1_______ 2_______3______4______ 5
Mean 2.24 2.03 1.72 2.43 2.64
Std Deviation 0.92 0.90 0.82 0.98 1.09
Stressors 6 7 8 9 10
Mean 2.21 2 .42 2 . 19 2.48 1. 67
Std Deviation 1.10 1 . 06 1 . 04 1 . 16 0 . 94
Stressors 11 12 13 14 15
Mean 1.39 1.64 1. 86 1.68 2 . 07
Std Deviation 0 .73 0 . 83 0 .82 0 . 91 1. 09
Stressors_______________ 16_____ 17______18 19_____ 20 21
Mean 2.69 2.54 2.54 2.02 1.79 1.60
Std Deviation 1.12 1.14 1.03 0.98 1.02 0.85
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78
The four statements under professional stressors
were:
9. Notification of unsatisfactory performance
as instructor.
15. Poor promotion prospects.
16. Low compensation as a professional.
17. Undervalued as a professional.
The five statements on resource stressors were:
6. Lack of availability of books and supplies.
7. Shortage of and/or malfunctioning
equipment.
8. Inadequate physical facilities.
18. Changes and ambiguities in policy.
19. Changes in processing of grades.
The student factor listed the following
stressors:
1. Managing disruptive students.
2. Teaching students who are "below average"
in achievement level.
3. Dealing with students whose primary
language is not English.
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79
4. Dealing with students' poor attitude
towards class work.
The teaching stressors included these
statements:
5. Having a large class (i.e. 30 or more
students).
12. First day of school/quarter.
13. Preparing class material.
14. Grading Students.
Administrative stressors were:
10. Attendance at in-service meetings.
11. Attendance in co-curricular activities/
orientation/graduation.
20. Communication with administrators.
21. Administrative work (filling forms, reading
memos).
Correlations between demographic variables and
stressors are shown in Table 6. For analyses, all
variables were coded as dichotomies (1,2) with the
variable name corresponding to a value of two. The
variable "male" was significantly related to four of
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80
Table 6
Correlations Between Demographics and Stressors
Prof Resource Student Teaching Admin
Male -0 . . 19 -0 ..14 -0 ..17 -0 ..24 -0 . . 12
11 + years -0 . , 01 -0 ..10 -0 . . 06 -0 ..18 -0 . . 03
Technology -0 . . 12 0 ..06 -0 ..07 0 ..01 -0 . . 02
Full-time 0 . . 10 0 ..07 0 . . 12 0 ,.02 0 ..20
Grad degree 0 . , 19 0 ..00 0 ,.03 0 ,.04 -0 . . 04
White 0 . . 12 0 ,.11 0 . . 13 0 ..05 -0 , . 06
the five stressor variables. Male reported less
stress on the professional, resource, student, and
teaching dimensions. Only four of the remaining
correlations were significant: (a) those instructors
with 11 or more years' teaching experience reported
less stress on the teaching dimension, (b) full-time
instructors reported more stress than part-time
instructors on the administrative stress dimension,
(c) instructors with a graduate degree (Masters or
Doctorate) reported more stress on the professional
stressors dimension, and (d) White (non-Hispanic)
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81
faculty reported more stress on the student
stressors' dimension. A dichotomous variable
"technology" also was created to contrast faculty who
taught business (coded 1, N=46) in contrast to
technology (coded 2, N=92), but none of the stressor
variables correlated with this variable.
Table 7 displays the correlation between the
three measures of general stress and satisfaction and
the five categories of stress.
Table 7
Correlations Between General Stress/Satisfaction and
Stressors
Prof Resource Student Teaching Admin
Stress 0 ,.53 0 ..49 0 ..41 0 ..42 0 ..39
Satisfaction -0 ..33 -0 ..33 -0..16 -0 .. 11 -0..30
Choose to
Teach -0 . .15 -0 .. 07 0 . . 00 -0 .. 11 0 ..03
Table 7 shows strong correlations between self-
rated general teacher stress and the five stress
dimensions. All of these correlations are
significant statistically. Instructors who are
generally stressed out are likely to report higher
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82
levels of stress in each of the five stress
categories: professional, resource, student,
teaching, and administration.
Along the same lines, the relationship between
general satisfaction and each of the five stress
indicators is negative, suggesting that faculty who
are generally satisfied with teaching at Heald
College report lower levels of stress. Four of the
five correlations are significant. In contrast,
regrets over choice of teaching as a career only
correlates with professional stress. This
correlation is negative suggesting that those
instructors who report that they regret choosing
teaching as a career feel greater stress over
professional issues.
In reference to Table 8, none of the
correlations are significant (i.e., none of the
observed probabilities (significant on the output)
are less than .05. The results show that the
following variables did not correlate with teacher
ratings: gender, experience, technology versus
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83
business, full versus part time, graduate degree
versus no graduate degree, and White versus others.
Table 8
Correlations Between Demographics and Teaching
Ratings
On Table.9, only the correlation between whether
or not they would choose to teach college again was
significantly related to teacher ratings, r (211)
=.33 P.<.05. Instructors who choose (to teach) get
good ratings and are more likely to "do it all over
again" than instructors who do not get good ratings.
Demographics Ratings
Male
Years 11
Tech
Full-'time
Graduate
White
-0 .04
0 . 05
0 . 02
0 .10
0 . 03
0 .10
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84
Table 9
Correlations on Teacher Ratings
Stress Satisfaction ^ „
________________________to Teach
Pearson
Ratings Correlation -0.01 0.12 0.33
Sig. (2-
tailed) 0.78 0.06 0.00
N 213 213 213
Table 10 shows very conclusively that good
teaching ratings are not associated with lower
stress. This is contrary to expectations, but may be
deemed as a valid conclusion based on the data
collected.
Table 10
Correlations on Teacher Ratings
Prof Resource Student Teaching Admin
Pearson
Ratings Correlation 0 . 03 0.12 0.00 0 . 04 0 . 04
Sig.
(2-tailed) 0 .59 0 .07 0 . 91 0 .53 0.49
N 213 213 213 213 213
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85
Section III of the Educator Stress Inventory-
asked respondents to add a stressor that did not
appear in the survey. Most of the answers were
repetitions of items in the five components. A few
stressors that were deemed significant under each
component follow.
Professional
■ Evaluations - from both students and
administration
* Fear of layoff (2x)
* Finding our own substitutes
* Getting a new class(es)
■ LES (3x)
■ In-classroom evaluation visits by
administrators
■ Inequity in compensation
■ Job security (6x)
■ Not knowing what course you are teaching
until the day of class!
■ Not being compensated for all the extra
work we do
■ Performing my own evaluation
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86
■ Racist attitude of some instructors towards
minority instructors
■ Working nights and not being compensated
more than day teachers. Night teachers
feel less than . . . .
Resource
■ Bridging night and day classes (2x)
■ Not having a "home" base. No office space
(2x)
■ Need more class prep time
* Schedule Changes
Student
■ Educational integrity
■ Catching cheating/cheaters (3x)
■ Fear of violent students
■ Students who think a bad grade is
racism/sexism
Teaching
* Things I can't control
■ Ambiguous course objectives
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87
■ Class assignments given day before class
■ Grad projects (2x)
■ Limited vacation time (2x)
■ Not enough classes to teach
■ Not having lab assistance to help during
labs
■ Under-compensation for non-teaching events
■ Trying to teach without pampering the
students
Admini s tra tive
0 Administrative interference in classroom
“ Administrative variability/inconsistency
■ Lack of admin support for teachers
■ Poor dean quality
■ Unfair administration practices...
discrimination!
A few stressors not listed on the survey merit
some attention. They are as follows:
■ "Password" surveys
■ Additional education requirements to
maintain professional expertise
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88
8 1 Answering e-mail
■ Colleagues complaining about little things
■ Commuting (2x)
■ Deadlines for grades at end of semester
■ Dealing with Dress Code (6x)
■ Attendance policy (2x)
* Dealing with peers
“ Drug and alcohol
■ CIS (12x)
■ Home life (2x)
■ Inadequate training; sometimes unreliable
support from Information Technology
department (2x)
■ Job verses Family time
■ Layoffs, uncertainty about future
" Slow internet access (2x)
■ Questionnaires like this
■ Taking stress tests (2x)
CIS (Campus Information System), appearance
(dress code) and attendance policies are unique to
Heald College. The Information Technology department
oversees computers in all campuses. The main server
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is located in the Central Administrative Offices in
San Francisco, California.
The last entry "taking stress test" hinted at'
fear that the respondent/s will be traced and the -
result would affect their employment at Heald.
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90
CHAPTER 5
SUMMARY AND CONCLUSIONS
Summary
Stress is a relevant issue in any occupation,
more so in teaching where constant interaction with
students provides a complex ecological basis. Most
studies of stress in education have focused on public
schools (K-12). The present study was centered on
faculty in a nonprofit business and technology
college.
The Educator Stress Inventory survey was created
for Heald College, a nonprofit organization that
grants diploma and associate degrees in the applied
sciences. Responses were drawn from the entire
faculty population of the 12 Heald College campuses
located in California (10), Hawaii (1), and
Oregon (1).
There are no standard models to examine or
measure stress in a nonprofit business and technology
college that grants Associate degrees. The author's
survey, titled "Educator Stress Inventory: (ESI), was
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission.
91
patterned after Cichon and Koff's (1978) "Teaching
Events Stress Inventory," and Kyriacou and
Sutcliffe's (1978b) questionnaire survey.
The ESI was posted on the web for 20 days; after
which it was automatically unavailable. The purpose'
was to identify stressful events among faculty at
Heald College while representing events of common
concern among teachers in general. Respondents
remained anonymous since they were identified only by
their passwords.
There were three sections to the survey.
Section I was on demographics—gender, years teaching,
status, degree, and ethnicity were obtained from the
respondents.
Section II was a self-rating scale that included
three modified questions from Kyriacou and Sutcliffe
(1978b). Two additional questions pertaining to
Heald College faculty were added, thus there were
five questions: general stress, overall
satisfaction, career satisfaction, and two questions
on student ratings of instructional effectiveness.
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92
Section III listed 21 factors (referred to as
stressors)that were perceived stressful by educators.
Number 22 was left blank to allow respondents to
write a stressful event not covered by the
questionnaire.
The Educator Stress Inventory revealed that the
average Heald faculty is somewhat stressed and is
fairly satisfied with teaching at Heald. Most of the
sample reported that they would choose teaching as a
career again.
Instructors who are generally stressed reported
higher levels of stress in each of the five stress
categories: professional, resource, student,
teaching, and administration.
It is also significant to note that: (a) those
instructors with 11 or more years' teaching
experience reported less stress on the teaching
dimension, (b) full-time instructors reported more
stress than part-time instructors on the
administrative dimension, (c) instructors with a
graduate degree (Masters or Doctorate) reported more
stress on the professional stressors dimension, and
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93
(d) White (non-Hispanic) faculty reported more stress
on the student stressors dimension.
Conclusions
Stress has become a byword to express anything
and everything that defies explanation. It
encompasses thoughts, feelings, situations, actions,
and reactions that humans can point at to express
frustration. In short, blame it on stress.
The globalization of the concept of stress
cannot be fully translated into another language.
For instance, the closest equivalent word for stress
in Hawaiian is ko"iko"I, fuerza in Spanish, var
stressad in Swedish, and Managerkrankheit in Dutch.
It is the English word that carries weight and
myriads of connotations to stress.
Research on stress has covered physiological,
emotional, and mental factors. Studies using
measuring scales such as Likert, SRRS by Holmes and
Rahe (1967), the Occupational Stress Index used by
Pithers & Fogarty (1995) , and every conceivable
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94
design make each finding significant and conclusions
noteworthy.
Stress has been theorized as an emotional
situation that results in degeneration of a personis
physiological mechanism (Cannon, 1914) affecting its
homeostasis (Cannon, 1929) to the result of a nocuous
agent (Selye, 1936) to an "intense and distressing
experience . . . of tremendous influence on behavior"
(Lazarus, 1966, p. 2) to a linear occurrence— a
stimulus, a response, stimulus-response interactions,
a spectrum of interacting.factors (Mason, 1975) to "a
demand which threatens to exceed the person's
capabilities and resources for meeting it" (McGrath,
1976, p. 1352) to a response syndrome of a negative
effect (Kyriacou & Sutcliffe, 1978b) to "aspects of
the environment that are demanding or disorganizing
for the individual" (Derogatis, 1982, p. 272), or to
an interactive model (Eisdorfer (1985).
Whether stress is used as a dependent or
independent variable, the outcomes seem to point to
its prevalence and as an occupational hazard. These
many conflicting results have brought the word stress
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95
to tenuous misuse or reference. However stress is
defined or viewed, the dynamics rests upon the
individual.
It was the premise of this author that organisms
are by nature imbued with the power to choose. '
Therefore a person has the choice to accept or reject
stress, be it conscious or subconscious.
It is with the intent to prove this premise that
the Educator Stress Inventory was designed for Heald
College faculty. The findings corroborate that
stressors experienced by K-12 and university and
college faculty are similar to those experienced by
the faculty at Heald. The 21-item Educator Stress
Inventory asked what situations were deemed stressful
and were rated from highest to no stress at all. The
responses were taken collectively and summarized
according to categories. The general results reveal
that teaching is an unstable profession filled with
concerns on job security and administrative mistrust.
However, the stress level is moderate enough that
teachers continue to teach.
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission.
The 21 stressors were reduced to five stressor
dimensions. The professional stressors were aimed at
instructor performance, promotion, compensation, and
value as a professional. The five resource stressors
were on equipment, books and supplies, physical
facilities, policy, and processing of grades. The
student stressors included disruptive students, those
below average, ESL speakers, and poor attitude. The
teaching stressors covered large classes, first day
of school, preparation, and grading. Attendance at
in-service meetings, co-curricular activities,
communication with administrators, and administrative
work fell under administrative stressors.
Survey-questionnaire research such as this study
has its shortcomings. Kyriacou & Sutcliffe (1977)
cited at least six of them: (a) different teachers
may interpret the meaning of questions differently,
(b) responses may be affected by ego-defensive
mechanisms, (c) teachers may genuinely lack insight
into their own situation, (d) stress is essentially
multifactorial, (e) research may not uncover
relationship between sources of stress themselves,
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97
and (6) sources of stress and those factors that
determine whether they actually result in, teacher
stress on individual instructors.
The choice still remains upon the person. To
use Selye's (1984) example, if you meet a drunken
person on the street and he confronts you, you have a
choice, conscious or unconscious, to avoid or tackle
him or her.
Every stage of an organism is affected by its
environment, experiences, and individual make-up.
Each organism acts and reacts according to the stage
they are in and according to the degree and/or level
of experience and make-up they possess.
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98
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APPENDIX
EDUCATOR STRESS INVENTORY SURVEY
106
AND COMPONENT MATRIX
Educator Stress Inventory
Thank you for participating in this survey. The purpose of this
questionnaire is to find out what events bring the most stress to
instructors who teach at Heald College. Kindly place an "X" in
the box by the item that pertains to you.
SECTION I
Gender: Female □ Male Q
Years
Teaching:
0 - 5 □ 6-10 □ 11+ □
School: Business □ Technology □ Both □
Employment
Status:
Full Time Q Part Time Q
Degree: Associate □ Baccalaureate □ Master Q Doctorate □
Ethnicity:
African-
American
□
Asian-
Pacific
Islander
□
American
Indian/Alaskan
Native
□
Caucasian
□
Hispanic
□
Non-Resident
Alien
□
SECTION II
In general, how
stressful do you
find being a teacher
at Heald?
Not
Stressful
□
Somewhat
Stressful
□
Stressful
□
Very
Stressful
□
Overall, how
satisfied are you
with teaching as a
job at Heald?
Very
Satisfied
□
Fairly
Satisfied
□
Neither
Satisfied
nor
Dissatisfied
□
Fairly
Dissatisfied
□
Very
Dissatisfied
□
Suppose you were
starting your career
over, would you
choose a teaching
career over again?
Certainly
Yes
□
Not
Sure
□
Certainly
No
□
On end-of-quarter
instructor
evaluation by your
students, where do
you usually fall
relative to your
peers?
Bottom
33%
□
Middle
33%
□
Top 33%
□
How do students
typically rate your
teaching?
Very Poor
□
Poor
□
Average
□
Good
□
Very Good
□
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission.
| SECTION III
107
As a teacher, how great a source of stress have you found these factors in
the last six (6) months? Please rate according to the following scale:
1 Not Stressful 2
Somewhat
Stressful
3 Stressful 4 Very Stressful
Managing disruptive student
Teaching students who are "below
average" in achievement level
Dealing with students whose primary
language is not English
Students poor attitude towards class
work
Having a large class {i.e. 30 or more
students)
Lack of availability of books and
supplies
□ □
Shortage of and/or malfunctioning
equipment
Inadequate physical facilities
Notification of unsatisfactory
performance as instructor
□ □
Attendance at in-service meetings
Attendance in co-curricular
activities/orientation/graduation
First day of school/quarter
□ □
Preparing class material
Grading Students
Poor promotion prospects
□ □
□ □
Low compensation as a professional
□ □
Undervalued as a professional
□ □
Changes and ambiguities in policy
Changes m processing of grades
Communication with administrators
Administrative work (filling forms,
reading memos)
Other types of stress not covered by
this questionnaire:
Please check that all questions have been answered. Thank you.
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108
Table 11
Component Matrix*
Component
1 2 3 4 5
17 0 . 66 -0 . 34 0.35
16 0 . 64 -0.32
4 0.62 -0 . 33
18 0.60 -0.32
19 0.5 9
15 0.55 0 .35
21 0.53 0 . 36
7 0.51 -0.46 -0.41 0.35
1 0.51 0.33 -0.39
5 0.49 -0.31
2 0 .48 0.38 -0.30 0.41
8 0 .47 -0 .42 -0 .44
12 0.46 0.38 -0.30
13 0 .46 0.40
3 0.43 0.40
6 0.43 -0.53 -0.36
10 0 . 35 0.52 0.38 0.35
20 0.39 0.48
11 0.40 0.39 0 .42
9 0.31 -0 .32
14 0 .45 0.40 -0 .46
Extraction Method: Principal Component Analysis
* 5 components extracted
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission.

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Creator Claude, Lilia Hernandez (author)

Core Title Faculty perception of stress in a non-profit business and technology college

School Rossier School of Education

Degree Doctor of Education

Degree Program Education

Publisher University of Southern California (original), University of Southern California. Libraries (digital)

Tag education, business,education, higher,education, vocational,OAI-PMH Harvest,Psychology, industrial

Language English

Contributor Digitized by ProQuest (provenance)

Advisor Hocevar, Dennis (committee chair), Bachelor, Barry (committee member), Michael, William B. (committee member)

Permanent Link (DOI) https://doi.org/10.25549/usctheses-c16-246378

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