RESEARCH SYNTHESIS: OCCUPATIONAL STRESS AND ADM OUTCOME

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The long-term objectives of this proposal are: (1) to develop a system appropriate for the quantitative synthesis of the literature relating various occupational stressors as risk factors for physical and mental health disorders, (2) to determine which risk factors are strongly associated with such adverse outcomes, and (3) to apply this knowledge to the design and evaluation of specific interventions. There now exist quanitative procedures for accomplishing the research synthesis proposed, and the literature relating various risk factors found in the workplace to alcohol, drug, and mental health (ADM) problems is sufficiently large as to require such analysis. For example, such methods will identify and explain contradictions in the literature and estimate the magnitude of the relationships between presumed stressors and ADM outcomes. The proposed work brings together a team of research methodologists and content specialists who have requisite skills to accomplish these objectives. The methodologists have been involved in extending the meta-analysis" techniques developed by Glass (1977) to a variety of applied research settings similar to those found in the occupational stress literature. Similarly, other methodologists have adapted these analytic methods to handle correlational results of the type that characterize this research literature. The combination of both these methodological developments are essential to the proper conduct of the proposed research synthesis. Equally important is knowledge of the content area, especially an understanding of the many variables and measures used in this occupational research studies. The content team has over two decades of experience and contains members who have conducted seminal studies in the area. They will provide conceptual guidance in the retrieval and coding of the studies. This project will focus specifically on the extensive literature relating occupational stressors as factors for ADM disorders. During the two years of this proposed research project, at least two separate major analyses will be conducted. Separate syntheses will be performed of studies using objectively and subjectively defined stressors to avoid problems in combining noncomparable measures. In order to accomplish this a specific coding and analysis system will be developed during the first year. Subsequent analyses will examine individual categories of stressors (e.g., role strains, environment, etc.), if necessary (i.e., variation in effect size estimates are not due to sampling error), and the influence of various moderating variables (e.g., individual predispositions, situational factors, etc.)