The Relationship Between Personality Traits and Stress at Work

Introduction

Stress is a normal, necessary and unavoidable phenomenon of life which can create temporary discomfort as well as long term consequences. The concept of stress was introduced into medical terminology in 1936 by the Canadian philosopher Selye. He describes "General Adaptation Syndrome" as the body's attempt to respond to the demands of the environment (Selye 1977). Scientific data confirms the idea that personality is an important factor in identifying, reacting, and approaching stressful events. It is a well-known fact that the perception of stress depends on the degree of compatibility between individuals and their environment, so that individual experiences only state if a certain situation is considered as threatening (de Jong & Emmelkamp 2000). Research conducted in 2000 identified the relationships between physical health and positions characterized by increased repetition, monotony, sustained alertness, and working shifts (Le Blanc et al. 2000).

According to these studies, stimuli with stress-generating potential within an organization can be divided into four major classes: job content, working conditions, employment conditions, and social network in the workplace. Results of a study on health professionals conducted in 2005 show that personal relationships with patients are highly demanding and require emotional sensitivity and involvement. In the medical profession emotion management is considered an essential part of the job (Best et al 2005). Other researchers point out that increased exposure of women to daily stress, including occupational stress, is caused by their marital and parental roles (Kiecolt-Glaser & Newton 2001). Many studies consider self-confidence to be an important source of coping. Individuals with a high level of self-confidence are more prone to adopting more effective coping strategies than those with low self-confidence (Cassidy & O'Connor 2004).

Personality types are important factors in determining stress, thus being able to explain how some people are managed to function for years by handling large amounts of stress, while others collapse after a few months under the same amounts of stress (Cooper 2005). A key component of sustainability is provided by the coping mechanism of these people, which involves an active modification of stress perception by approaching it as a challenge they are capable of overcoming (Landy & Conte 2004).

All the big changes in life create a certain amount of stress. This is partly because big changes in life cause strong emotions, and even joy and excitement can upset the body and start affecting it a lot. Big events in life can be stressful because every new experience requires some adjustment, they motivate us to change our behavior in some way, but only a few of them cause stress. As for example, stop the traffic signals when the red light turns on. Normally, this does not stress. But imagine if you are in a hurry for an important meeting or have to catch the train and the red light, of course it will be too late. In this case stress is caused, because the situation not only requires adjustment, but it creates both tension and anxiety. Some events, wars and natural disasters, are generation after generation very stressful. The danger is real, life is threatened and often people can do little or nothing to save themselves.

In a more general classification, stress is divided into: Eustres-positive or beneficial stress; and Distress — negative or harmful stress. But, depending on the time, we also have long-term stress and short-term stress. Long-term stress is very harmful, and even causes damage and disorders in different parts of the body. Not all forms of stress are negative. The word "Eustres" is used to describe positive stress. Eustress comes as a result of experiencing joyful experiences such as a victory or a successful achievement. In a state of stress certain types of hormones engage and bring the body into a state of alarm as if it were ready for battle or ready to give a quick response. This is exactly why we often feel tense and deeply anxious when we are in a state of excessive stress. Stress weakens the immune system and makes us more vulnerable to infections.

In addition to physical stresses such as illness, noise, temperature extremes, there are three major psychological causes of stress: pressure, conflict, frustration. Pressure occurs when we try to meet the social and psychological demands we make on ourselves or others. When we try to maintain self-confidence by forcing ourselves to achieve higher standards we experience an internal pressure.

Internal pressure is caused when we study hard in school, when we try to be more popular with our friends, when we try to overcome great difficulties when we try to look attractive. In the presence of internal pressure we try hard to achieve more. Without internal pressure we would not be motivated to improve and try harder. However, as a result of internal pressure we experience a harmful stress.

External pressure is caused by the demands other people make on us. We try to please the people who are important to us. We can try to weaken just to please or seduce a loved one, get high grades to make happy parents, be successful to be liked by our peers, and so on. External pressure helps us to adapt to the social environment. But when others make too many demands on us or when those demands are difficult, then we experience stress. Sometimes different pressures are exerted on us at the same time and cause a situation called conflict.

When we talk about personality we are talking about those aspects that are part of each of us, constant, enduring. If you are aggressive nowadays, the chances are high that you will be aggressive tomorrow, if you are shy now, you will be very shy when you wake up tomorrow morning.

The term introvert and extrovert was popularized by Carl Jung. Extrovert types tend to be talkative, with energetic behaviors, while introverts manifest in more reserved and lonely behaviors. In any case, people fluctuate in their behavior all the time, and even extreme introverts and extroverts do not always act according to their type.

Excitement is the brain that wakes itself up by putting it on alert, a state of information. Braking is the brain that calms itself, in any common sense of fatigue and falling asleep or in the sense of defending itself in the event of overwhelming stimulation.

The extroverted type according to Jung has a positive attitude towards objects, affirms the importance to the point that manages to refer to them as well as his subjective attitude. The introverted type always acts by abstracting how to infringe on the rights of the object of his libido he wanted to protect himself from the extraordinary power he possesses in himself

As for learning difficulties it is assumed that extroverts will not have much learning difficulties because they are open, and if they have dilemmas about any problem they very easily ask others to find an adequate solution to that problem while in introverts it happens the opposite thing, because they have a closed character and are reluctant about anything, and that these persons in their future may fail in many spheres of life.

Extroverts are sociable, and feel very comfortable around society, in groups, or at gatherings. They are generally happy have self-esteem, and are optimistic and look at the world in a positive light, they also prefer more decorative clothes, much better understand a problem when they speak loudly, in order to get the opinion of others about that problem. They are generally on the move, but you like to get others to activate as well. Introverts tend to be closed, selfish, they are mostly anxious, and are interested in a self-mental life, prefer to focus on a single activity, they feel pleasure while reading, writing, fishing, etc. introverts generally choose more comfortable, simpler clothes.

Methodology

The research was of quantitative type and as a tool for data collection was used the questionnaire, which consists of two parts. One part presents statements and questions about personality and the other part the level of stress.

The research included a total of 60 teachers from schools in the municipality of Prizren, and gender and age is based on a random sample. Questionnaires were initially distributed in schools and data were collected within a period of 1 month. Gender aspect, age and other demographic aspects were according to random sample. I personally initiated and implemented the research.

SPSS program was used for data processing, while descriptive methods and correlation were used as methods of analysis to measure the correlation between the two variables, ie how much personality affects the level of stress at work.

Research problem: Stress is one of the normal phenomena, which in most cases are accompanied by problems and defects in the work we perform. There is a big burden in our education system, due to various reforms and socio-economic transition, but on the other hand we also have problems with the quality of teaching which are affecting the development of teaching in inadequate forms. All these factors are led by the personality traits of each person, especially in teachers in schools. To measure the impact and correlation between personality traits and stress at work, this research was conducted in schools with teachers, to see if personality factors are influencing the increase in stress in teacher work.

The main purpose of the research is the correlation coefficient of personality type to the level of stress in the work of teachers.

Results

The general level of personality factors affects the increase of stress at work. The correlation method for data analysis was used to confirm this impact. Three variables were analyzed, personality as an independent variable and two dependent variables, the stress that corresponds to the things that teachers find difficult to do, and the stress that teachers do the most.

The results show that the correlation between personality and stress (things that teachers find difficult to do) is .113 a low positive correlation, while the significance level is .389 which means that it is above the 5% confidence level, while even the correlation between personality and stress (the things teachers do most) has a low negative correlation of -.159, whereas the significance is .224 which is above the 5% confidence level. From this it can be concluded that in none of the cases do we have a significant correlation or influence of teachers' personality, on their stress at work. So, we say that statistically the overall level of personality factors does not affect the increase of stress at work.

Teachers who feel attractive and extravagant do not have high stress. To confirm this statement, a statistical analysis of the correlation of was performed which is .243, while the significance is .061, which means that statistically these teachers who feel comfortable do not have high stress. With this we accept the hypothesis that teachers who feel themselves to be attractive and extravagant do not have high stress.

Teachers who feel the need for power have high levels of stress. To confirm this statement, a data analysis was performed, which showed a correlation of 290* and a significance level of 025, which means that the desire for power affects the level of stress to be higher. So the hypothesis has been confirmed that teachers who feel the need for power have high levels of stress.

Conclusion

According to the analysis of the results of this study, personality is an important factor for each individual, especially his impact on stress at work. For teachers the formation of personality should be done during the stages of development and formal education. Teachers have different personalities and also have different work habits. The hardest things or the ones that do them the most are an issue that probably needs to be further researched, interviewing them to arrive at perhaps the most accurate answers they have given. From the confirmation of the hypothesis it has resulted that personality has no influence on the increase of stress in the work of teachers.

References