J Korean Acad Psychiatr Ment Health Nurs.  2011 Sep;20(3):315-324. 10.12934/jkpmhn.2011.20.3.315.

Effects of Perception of Job Stress and Stress Coping Style on Mental Health of Firefighters

• Lee HJ
• Kim HS
• Park SY

• KMID: 2321919
• DOI: http://doi.org/10.12934/jkpmhn.2011.20.3.315

Abstract

PURPOSE
This study was conducted to identify factors which influence mental health of firefighters.
METHODS
Participants in this study were firefighters from D city who were doing activities like extinguishing fire or rescuing sufferer at fire or accident scenes. A survey was conducted from September 14 to 24, 2010. Research tools were perception of job stress, problems-focused coping, seeking social support, emotion-focused coping, and wishful thinking coping which are sub-domain of coping stress, and SCL-90-R. Data were analyzed using SPSS/WIN 14.0, and included t-test, one-way ANOVA, and Scheffe back-testing. Pearson's correlation coefficient and stepwise multiple regression were also conducted to identify factors influencing mental health.
RESULTS
Mental health was positively correlated with perception of job stress, emotion-focused coping, and wishful thinking coping. Effective variables were perception of job stress (beta=.38, p<.001), emotion-focused coping (beta=.28, p<.001), and problemfocused coping (beta=-.15, p=.012). These variables explained 26% of the variance in mental health.
CONCLUSION
The results suggest that improvements in problem-focused coping and decreases in perception of job stress and emotion-focused coping are important in promoting the mental health of firefighters.

Keyword

Firefighter; Mental health; Job stress; Coping

MeSH Terms

Firefighters*
Fires
Humans
Mental Health*
Thinking

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