Assessing stress at work across occupations and cultures using the occupational stress inventory revised

Workplace stress is common across occupations and across nations. Culture is thought to impact on stress levels including what are common stressors, how the stress is experienced and what coping mechanisms or resources are used. However, there has been limited research examining these differences or supposed differences across cultures, and none that seem to have used a direct comparison across one professional area using the same extensive and validated questionnaire. One questionnaire that has potential for such direct comparison is the Occupational Stress Inventory-Revised (OSI-R: Osipow, 1999) which assesses three main dimensions related to stress: “occupational roles” (stressors), “personal strain” (experienced stress), and “personal resources” (coping resources). The current study examined a cross-national application of the OSI-R among Australian and Turkish teachers (and to Manual data) to identify whether patterns of latent structure of the OSI-R were similar (and therefore whether the questionnaire would be useful in wider research and professional application). Structural equation modeling and fit indices results generally confirmed the three-dimensional model posited by Osipow (1999) and suggested that the occupational role stress dimension could be sub-divided: the similar latent factor results obtained suggesting the stability of the OSI-R in this cross-cultural workplace setting. The implications for research and practice are discussed.