Occupational stress and its outcomes: the role of work-social support in the hospitality industry

Pages755-773
Date16 October 2019
Published date16 October 2019
DOIhttps://doi.org/10.1108/PR-11-2018-0478
AuthorSaira Yousaf,Muhammad Imran Rasheed,Zahid Hameed,Adeel Luqman
Subject MatterHr & organizational behaviour,Global hrm
Occupational stress and its
outcomes: the role of work-social
support in the hospitality industry
Saira Yousaf
School of Management,
University of Science and Technology of China, Hefei, China
Muhammad Imran Rasheed
School of Management,
University of Science and Technology of China, Hefei, China and
Department of Management Sciences,
The Islamia University of Bahawalpur, Bahawalpur, Pakistan
Zahid Hameed
Department of Management Sciences,
Khawaja Fareed University of Engineering and Information Technology,
Rahim Yar Khan, Pakistan, and
Adeel Luqman
Department of Commerce,
Fatima Jinnah Women University, Rawalpindi, Pakistan
Abstract
Purpose The purpose of this paper is to apply conservation of resource (COR) theory and the buffering
hypothesis of social support to explore occupational stress and its negative outcomes such as job engagement
and turnover intentions for front-line hospitality industry employees in the Peoples Republic of China.
Design/methodology/approach Primary data were collected in two waves from 318 front-line employees
in a chain of restaurants located in the eastern region of the Peoples Republic of China.
Findings Integrating COR theory and the buffering hypothesis of social support, job satisfaction is found
to be a mediating mechanism in the relationships between occupational stress and job engagement and
occupational stress and employee turnover intentions for front-line hospitality industry workers. Moreover,
the authors found the boundary condition role of work-social support. The relationships between stress and
its negative outcomes are weak for the employees receiving high social support at work.
Originality/value This study calls for researchersattention towards the issues of occupational stress
focussing on the implications of work-social support for front-line hospitality industry employees.
Keywords Quantitative, Turnover intentions, Occupational stress, Job satisfaction, Job engagement,
Social support, Hospitality industry
Paper type Research paper
Introduction
Occupational stress has been revealed as a strong factor that contributes to negative outcomes in
workplaces for employees and organisations during the past few decades (Falconier et al., 2015;
Hobfoll, 2001; Toquam et al., 1997). The outcomes of occupational stress include, but not limited
to, reduced work output, increased accidents, absenteeism, turnover, poor performance and high
workfamily conflicts (Armstrong et al., 2015; Perrewe and Anthony, 1990; Schiffrin and Nelson,
2010; Stordeur et al., 2001; Toquam et al., 1997). In hospitality sector organisations, occupational
stress has been discussed as an important issue for front-line workers. For example,
Murray-Gibbons and Gibbons (2007) suggested occupational stress as an alarming issue among
chefs in the Netherlands. Zhao and Ghiselli (2016) found hospitality job characteristics as a major
Personnel Review
Vol. 49 No. 3, 2020
pp. 755-773
© Emerald PublishingLimited
0048-3486
DOI 10.1108/PR-11-2018-0478
Received 30 November 2018
Revised 10 May 2019
31 July 2019
Accepted 11 August 2019
The current issue and full text archive of this journal is available on Emerald Insight at:
www.emeraldinsight.com/0048-3486.htm
755
Occupational
stress and its
outcomes
job stressor in China. Asensio-Martínez et al. (2019) argued that hospitality industry workers are
exposed to job stressors, which lead them to experience burnout at jobs.
Employee turnover has been raised as a major issue for organisations in the hospitality
sector worldwide (Blomme et al., 2010; Davidson et al., 2011; Karatepe and Olugbade, 2017).
On the other hand, employee turnover causes several problems for organisations including,
but not limited to, training and recruitment cost, personnel replacement cost, the loss of
skilled labour and disruption of company operations (Ayuninnisa and Saptoto, 2015).
Recent research has highlighted the issue of the high rate of employee turnover in the
hospitality sector in China (Afsar et al., 2018; Essays, 2013; Karatepe and Olugbade, 2017).
These studies have called researchersattention to understand the reasons behind this
major issue of the high turnover rate in the Chinese hospitality sector.
Conservation of resource (COR) theory (Hobfoll, 1989) and buffering hypothesis of social
support (Cohen and Wills, 1985) can be applied to better understand the effect of occupational
stress on important employee outcomes. Examples of such outcomes are turnover intentions
and job engagement in the hospitality industry. COR theory (Hobfoll, 1989) implies that
occupational stress decreases employee resources, which may subsequently result in negative
outcomes at work. We believe that occupational stress in the hospitality industry leads to a
decrease in employee job satisfaction. Such a decrease may subsequently results in less job
engagement and high turnover intentions. Cohen and Wills (1985) presented the buffering
model of social support and argued that social support can offset the negative effect of stress in
the workplace. Drawingon the theory ofthe buffering hypothesis of socialsupport, we propose
that work-social support from supervisors and coworkers acts as a moderator on the
relationships between occupational stress and its negative outcomes. Our hypothesis regarding
the boundarycondition roleof work-social supportis also consistentwith COR theory (Hobfoll,
1989). This result suggests that resource gain in one domain offsets the resource loss in another
domain. Here, social support from coworkers functions as a resource gain, which can
compensate for the negative effect of resource loss from occupational stress. The present study
suggests and tests a conceptual model of occupational stress and its outcomes with the
boundary condition role of work-social support in the hospitality industry. Hence, our study
makes several contributions to the existing literature. First, taking the two valuable outcomes,
turnover intentions and job engagement, this research study comprehensively discusses the
role of occupational stress in the hospitality industry. Second, job satisfaction is the underlying
mechanism in the relationships between occupational stress and its outcomes. In addition, this
study explains and answers how stress exerts its negative impact on employee outcomes in the
hospitality industry. Third, the present study explores the boundary condition role of social
support.Hence, a solution whenthe relationships between occupational stress and its negative
outcomes are weak and how the front-line hospitality industry employees can survive in the
environment of occupational stress is presented (Figure 1).
Theory and hypotheses development
Occupational stress in the hospitality industry
Brown and Campbell (1990) described occupational stress as the self-perceived unpleasant
or bad impact on an individual. Butts et al. (2009) defined occupational stress with regard to
its psychological and physical effects on individuals. They take stress as physical, mental or
emotional strain at work. Cooper et al. (2001) suggested that occupational stress occurs
when a discrepancy exists between the work demands and a persons ability to carry out
those demands. Anderson (2003) suggested that stress occurs in each and every large and
small workplace, whereas Dar et al. (2011) viewed occupational stress as a common
phenomenon in all spheres of life. Stress is unavoidable in workplaces; employees who
experience stress are likely to be less motivated, exhibit poor performance and low
productivity (McCarthy et al., 2016). Numerous research scholars have investigated the
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