Sense of Coherence (SOC) may Reduce the Effects of Occupational Stress on Mental Health Status among Japanese Factory Workers

Abstract

To examine if sense of coherence (SOC) can reduce the adverse effects of job stress on mental health status, self-administered questionnaires were distributed among 740 workers in a manufacturing industry. The questionnaire contained SOC, Job Content Questionnaire (JCQ), and General Health Questionnaire (GHQ-12). Complete answers were recovered from 466 workers (62.8%), consisting of 387 males and 79 females, with ages of 45.1 ± 12.0 yr, and used for the analysis. The logistic regression analysis revealed the followings: Both for males and females, high GHQ was significantly associated with scores on SOC and JCQ job demand subscale, i.e. the mental health status was adversely related to job demand whereas it was positively associated with SOC. Similarly, the mental health status was affected adversely by managerial work in males, whereas was positively by co-workers support in females. Thus, high SOC enables workers to cope with their job demand, which is a potent job stressor, indicating that SOC is an important factor determining their coping ability to job stress for both genders. Male managerial employees may cope with their strong job stress because of high SOC, protecting their mental health status. Social support seems also significant for prevention of mental well-being of female workers from work-related stressors.

Good Stress Management Capability Is Associated with Lower Body Mass Index and Restful Sleep in the Elderly

“…SOC scores should be regarded as complementary to and not a substitute for information already known to be associated with an increased risk for future illness (Suominena et al 2001). Our results demonstrated that SOC scores within the low GHQ-12 group were significantly higher than those in the high GHQ group, which is consistent with previous studies (Matsuzaki et al 2007;Sagara et al 2009;Urakawa and Yokoyama 2009). Generally, the GHQ-12 has been used in primary health care screenings in general population surveys as well as in general medical practice (Doi and Minowa 2003).…”

Adverse Childhood Experiences and Psychosocial Well-Being of Women Who Were in Foster Care as Children

“…68,69 For example, research indicates that a person with a strong SOC experiences not only a better quality of life, but also favorable health outcomes. 68,70 The response to each question was a rating between 1 and 7, resulting in SOC scores ranging from 13 to 91. High scores reflect a greater sense of coherence or personal control over one's life.…”

Assessment of work related stress among female public service workers in Kaunas

“…Therefore, a strong relation found between SOC and stress confirmed the protective role of SOC in our study. According to the scientific data, a strong sense of coherence has a positive effect on coping with work-related stress [31,35,53,55] and occupational problems [30]; employees with a stronger SOC are better protected from the negative effects of some work stressors [56].According to scientific data, employees with a different level of SOC perceive psychosocial environment differently -associations are significant between SOC and high work demands, social support, influence at work [33] as well as low job control [57], adverse organizational climate and job insecurity [58]. A protective role of SOC was observed when the employees experienced negative changes of the psychosocial work environment during an organizational merger [59].…”

“…Stronger SOC allows adopting a problemfocused coping profile that allows for better coping with work-related stressors [30]. High SOC enables workers to cope with their job demands -which are a potent job stressor -indicating that SOC is an important factor determining their coping ability [31]. It follows that a good stress management capability allows for avoiding adverse consequences of stress [27].…”