Psychometric analysis of the UK Health and Safety Executive's Management Standards work-related stress Indicator Tool

Abstract

Numerous tools have been developed that attempt to measure work-related stress and working conditions, but few practical instruments in the literature have been found to have a reliable psychometric factor structure. In the UK, the Health and Safety Executive (HSE) Management Standards (MS) Indicator Tool is increasingly used by organizations to monitor working conditions that can lead to stress. In Health and Safety Executive (2004), a factor analysis was conducted demonstrating the reliability of the scales. However, the authors acknowledged that direct reassessment of the same factor structure was impossible as the questionnaire was split into two separate modules for data collection. Furthermore, the tool is designed to enable comparisons between as well as within organizations to take place, yet reliability has only previously been tested at the individual level. The current study is the first to examine the factor structure of the HSE MS Indicator Tool using organizational-level data. Data collected from 39 UK organizations (N = 26,382) was used to perform a first-order Confirmatory Factor Analysis (CFA) on the original 35-item seven-factor measurement scale. The results showed an acceptable fit to the data for the instrument. A second-order CFA was also performed to test if the Indicator Tool contains a higher order uni-dimensional measure of work-related stress. These findings also revealed an acceptable fit to the data, suggesting that it may be possible to derive a single measure of work-related stress. Normative data comprising tables of percentiles from the organizational data are provided to enable employers to compare their organizational averages against national benchmarks.

Uloga stresora na radu i iracionalnih uverenja u predikciji nastavničkog stresa

“…It can be seen that Cronbach's alpha coefficient is lower for the demands and role subscales, but for the other subscales is satisfactory. All α coefficients in this study were lower than in earlier piloting of the instrument on a British sample of employees (Edwards, Webster, Van Laar, & Easton, 2008).…”

Work-related wellbeing in UK prison officers: a benchmarking approach

“…Since its inception, the HSE risk assessment framework has been widely utilised to monitor the working conditions that lead to stress (Edwards et al, 2008;Mellor et al, 2011). The framework has been used to provide reference values for exposure to job-related stress in different occupational groups to allow comparisons with recommended standards and highlight the job characteristics that require urgent attention (Houdmont et al, 2012;Kinman and Wray, 2013).…”

Meditation Awareness Training (MAT) for Work-related Wellbeing and Job Performance: A Randomised Controlled Trial

“…The WSIT has excellent levels of reliability (internal reliability α = .92) and validity. A confirmatory factor analysis by Edwards, Webster, Van Laar, and Easton (2008) (n = 26,382 participants across 39 organisations) demonstrated that the instrument has a hierarchical factor structure in which seven first-order factors (i.e., the seven work-stress domains) each test distinct dimensions of work-stress, whilst a single second-order factor confirms that each subscale also taps aspects of the same underlying work-stress construct 11 (Edwards et al, 2008). The combined score of each work-stress domain provides a global indication of WRS.…”