Ravalier PhD Theis.pdf - Anglia Ruskin Research Online

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departments where greater than 50% of employees took part in the
participative research improvements were most prominent when
compared to control groups, thus arguing that participatory approaches
are effective at improvement of psychosocial job stressors.
Participatory approaches have therefore generally been shown to be
effective tools for the improvement of the health and wellbeing in the
workplace. The approaches take individual knowledge and expertise in
account when developing a change methodology, meaning that
individuals face a different role to that encountered in traditional research.
Arguably however the most important aspect of participative research is
that the outcomes gained from the research are advantageous to both the
researcher and the participant in that changes are implemented in order
to improve a particular situation. With respect to stress management
interventions, participatory approaches are often implemented in order to
ensure organisationally-focussed changes are implemented. As such
primary stress management interventions and participatory approaches
have the potential to be strongly linked in research (see Chapter VI
onwards for how the two are linked in the presented research).
This background chapter of the presented thesis has evaluated the
impact that work stress outcomes can have on both individuals and
organisations. Indeed compelling studies have shown that individual
health and behaviours can be adversely affected by the experience of
chronic stress, which in turn impacts upon organisational effectiveness. In
order to combat these outcomes, many organisations have stress
management programs aimed at either the improvement of the
organisation, or the improvement of organisational coping strategies.
Primary organisational approaches are those which focus on improvement
of the organisation, and are often linked with the use of participatory
organisational approaches. Indeed the presented research takes a
primary organisational improvement viewpoint while utilising a
participatory approach for the improvement of employee health and
wellbeing (see Chapter VI for methodology). As such a more thorough