Prevalence of occupational stress in servants of a federal university

Abstract

Introduction: Stress in the work context arises from situations in which the demands exceed the workers capacity to adequately respond to them or originate when the conditions offered and resources made available are insufficient to meet them. Objectives: To analyze the psychological demand, work control and social support among employees of a public university in the state of Minas Gerais. Methods: Quantitative, descriptive, and analytical epidemiological study. Data collection took place using an online questionnaire that included sociodemographic and occupational questions and the Demand-Control Model Scale, short version, including social support. Data were analyzed using the Stata version 14.0 program using descriptive and bivariate statistics. Results: The population consisted of 247 servants, including 49.2% teachers and 50.8% administrative technicians in education. In relation to gender, 59% were women and as to marital status, 51.8% were married. Regarding demand, 54.1% of workers had low demand, 59% had low control and 60.7% had low social support. The category of quadrants that included the largest number of servants was passive work with 31.2%. In the final model, the professional category variable maintained a significant association with occupational stress. Conclusions: The high prevalence of occupational stress (60.2%) and the low social support highlight the need for interventions so that these workers become agents of change in their work processes, being responsible for decisions made in their daily work.