Stress at work, coping, and workers' health of an acquired firm in Hong Kong

The structure of the Occupational Stress Indicator (OSI) was adopted as the model to investigate the impact of acquisition stress on workers' health effects. Data were obtained from 101 employees of an acquired firm in Hong Kong. Workers' perceived work pressure was negatively related to job satisfaction, and positively related to mental ill-health, and physical ill-health. Hierarchical moderated regression analyses were employed to study the stressor-strain relationship, and the extent coping strategies moderate this relationship. The results showed that a combination of stressors related significantly to the strain effects, but only a few individual stressors were strong predictors. Coping strategies had direct effect on the strain variables; and also moderating effect on the stressor-strain relationship. Further analyses revealed that only a few individual coping skills were particularly useful in buffering some of the stressor-strain relationship. The results of the study provide some validation data of the OSI in a Chinese sample.