The Bristol Stress and Health at Work Study¹ found that 1 in 5 people are suffering from high levels of work related stress. This equates to approximately 5 million workers with 6.7 million working days lost each year due to work related stress.

In a recent survey by The Industrial Society 83% of Managers said that stress was a problem in their organisation. 46% believed the cost to be significant. 42% did not know how much stress was costing their organisation. Whilst the level of stress existing within an organisation is a complex issue and therefore difficult to quantify, other indicators of stress such as increased absenteeism, accidents and increased staff turnover are measured within most organisations.

Increased absenteeism, decreased productivity, poor judgement, poor quality and poor customer care were thought to be the most damaging effects of stress in the workplace.

1. The Bristol Stress and Health at Work Study was prepared by the Department of Experimental Psychology and the Department of Social Medicine for the Health and Safety Executive. The research had three main aims. First, to determine the scale and severity of occupational stress in a random population sample. Second, to distinguish the effects of stress at work from those of general life stress. Finally, to determine whether objective indicators of health status and performance efficiency were related to perceived occupational stress.

   These aims were investigated by conducting an epidemiological survey of 17,000 randomly selected people from the Bristol electoral register, a follow-up survey 12 months later, and detailed investigation of a cohort from the original sample. The results revealed that approximately 20% of the sample reported that they had high or extremely high levels of stress at work. This effect was reliable over time, related to potentially stressful working conditions and associated with impaired physical and mental health. The effects of occupational stress could not be attributed to life stress or negative affectivity. The cohort study also suggested that high levels of occupational stress may influence physiology and mental performance.