Workplace stress from actual and desired computer‐mediated communication use: a multi‐method study

• Author: Jean‐François Stich,Cary L. Cooper,Monideepa Tarafdar,Patrick Stacey
• Published date: 01 March 2017
• DOI: http://doi.org/10.1111/ntwe.12079
• Date: 01 March 2017

84 New Technology, Work and Employment © 2017 John Wiley & Sons Ltd

New Technology, Work and Employment 32:1

ISSN 1468-005X

Workplace stress from actual and desired

computer- mediated communication use:

a multi- method study

Jean-François Stich, Monideepa Tarafdar,

Cary L. Cooper and Patrick Stacey

The use of computer- mediated communication applications can

lead to workplace stress for employees. However, such stress is

influenced not only by how individuals actually use computer-

mediated communication applications but also how they desire

to use them. This article examines how the individual’s actual and

desired use of communication tools together influence his or her

workplace stress. It does so across a range of computer- mediated

media (e.g. email or instant messaging) and workplace stress-

ors (e.g. workload or work relationships). This investigation is

conducted using a multi- method research design. The quantita-

tive study found that desired and actual use together influenced

workplace stress, mostly for email, but not for other media. The

qualitative study further showed that such influence depends on

organisational conditions such as available media or co- workers

preferences. The findings emphasise the importance of considering

the individuals’ desired use of CMC media and their subjective

appraisals of different media.

Keywords: computer-mediated communication, email, instant

messaging, technostress, workplace stress, workload, misfit,

multi-method study.

Jean-François Stich is an Assistant Professor at ICN Business School (France) and a research fellow at CERE-

FIGE, research lab in Management at Université de Lorraine (France). His research interests gravitate around

the psychological impacts of technology on employees, covering areas such as technostress and flexible work-

ing.

Monideepa Tarafdar is Professor of Information Systems at Lancaster University and Research Affiliate at the

Center for Information Systems at the MIT Sloan School of Management. Her current research interests are

in managing individual and organizational adjustments required for effective information technology use,

information systems- enabled innovation, and healthcare information systems.

Sir Cary L. Cooper, CBE, is the 50th Anniversary Professor of Organizational Psychology and Health at Man-

chester Business School, University of Manchester. He has played a leading role in conceptual development

and theorizing in the areas of organizational stress and well- being over the past two decades.

Dr. Patrick Stacey is a Senior Lecturer in Information Management at Loughborough University. His academic

research on emotion and systems design processes in cancer care and cognate contexts has been published in

numerous, prestigious “A” journals and conferences including Design Studies, Human Relations and Com-

munications of the ACM.

© 2017 John Wiley & Sons Ltd Workplace stress from actual and desired CMC use 85

Introduction

The introduction of computers in the workplace has transformed interpersonal com-

munications. Potential negative consequences of their use have attracted considerable

attention from practitioners and academics. Specifically, the use of computer- mediated

communication (CMC) has been investigated as a potential cause of workplace stress

for individuals. Studies have found that CMC use increases work demands, leading to

work overload (Barley et al., 2011), work–life conflict (Stich et al., 2015), burnout and

psychological distress (Mano and Mesch, 2010; Barber and Santuzzi, 2015). Email ap-

plications, for instance, are often found to be overwhelming in the volume of email

they generate (Dabbish and Kraut, 2006; Mano and Mesch, 2010).

However, while use of CMC can potentially increase workplace stress, the ap-

praisal of stress is individual specific. For instance, not every employee who experi-

ences work–life conflict attributes it to the use of corporate smartphones. Indeed,

some actually perceive smartphones as part of their overall lifestyle. In such a case,

they experience less work–life conflict (Derks et al., 2016) and feel a greater sense of

professionalism (Cavazotte et al., 2014). Moreover, the same extent of CMC use may

be perceived differently by different individuals (Higgins et al., 1985), and individu-

als having a positive attitude towards email feel less stressed by them (Sumecki et al.,

2011). Every individual does not experience workplace stress from the use of CMC to

the same extent and in the same way. It is, thus, important to take into account the

individual’s subjectivities regarding the use of CMC media, when investigating the

latter’s influence on workplace stress.

These examples suggest that the influence of CMC use on workplace stress is influenced

both by how individuals actually use CMC and how they desire to do so. However, the

simultaneous influence of these two factors has not been investigated systematically in

empirical studies or literature reviews. Do actual CMC use and desired CMC use influence

workplace stress together? If so, which workplace stressors are affected and how? Is this

influence the same for every communication medium? The lack of answers to these ques-

tions is theoretically and practically problematic because it leaves a gap in our understand-

ing of how and why an individual may or may not experience workplace stress due to

CMC use. The present research has the aim, therefore, to explore how individuals’ ‘desired

use’ of CMC influences the relationships between CMC use and workplace stress.

Specifically, we address the following two research questions:

Research Question 1: To what extent do actual and desired computer-mediated

communication use together affect workplace stress experienced by individuals?

Research Question 2: How do actual and desired computer-mediated communica-

tion use together affect workplace stress experienced by individuals?

A multi- method design that includes quantitative and qualitative data is used to

investigate these research questions (Creswell and Clark, 2011). The first study uses

quantitative data and examines the extent to which actual and desired CMC use to-

gether influence workplace stress. The second study uses qualitative data, to explore

how and why individuals experience workplace stress are due to both their actual and

desired CMC use. Both studies’ purposes, samples, methods and results are presented

separately, with a final part merging their respective discussions. The article contrib-

utes to the theoretical understanding of workplace stress due to CMC use. It empha-

sises the importance of taking into account the individual’s preferences in articulating

the relationship between CMC use and workplace stress.

This article is organised as follows. In the next section, we present literature on the

influence of actual and desired CMC use on workplace stress. The research design

section presents the study’s mixed- method research approach. The quantitative and

qualitative studies’ objectives, data and results are discussed in Study 1 and Study 2

sections. An integrative discussion is presented in the final section, along with a sum-

mary of contributions and implications of the research.