Job stress and the VDT clerical worker

Article type: Research Article

Authors: Gardner, Ella P. | Ruth, Stephen R. | Render, Barry

Affiliations: School of Business Administration, George Mason University, 4400 University Drive, Fairfax, VA 22030, USA

Abstract: The objective of this research was to compare the results of a recent study of the effects of VDT use on worker well-being with two other broad-based studies done previously in different areas of the United States. The populations sampled represent the millions of clerical and administrative workers whose jobs are being automated. The 140 clerical and administrative workers in the current study represent a sample of U.S. Navy civilian employees in the Washington, DC area. Our results found that: (1) there are a variety of health complaints associated with increased hours of VDT use; (2) more VDT users experience job boredom than non-users; (3) frequent users experience more work pressure and more control by management than occasional users. The authors confirm that VDT operators, especially those who use VDTs more than four hours a day, experience more stress than non-users.

Keywords: Computers and society, organizational impacts, human factors, video display terminals (VDTs, CRTs), office automation, ergonomics, health, occupational stress

DOI: 10.3233/HSM-1988-7409

Journal: Human Systems Management, vol. 7, no. 4, pp. 359-365, 1988