Affiliations: School of Psychology, The University of Queensland,
Brisbane, Australia | School of Psychology and Counselling, Queensland
University of Technology, Brisbane, Australia
Note: [] Address for correspondence: Dr. Blake M. McKimmie, School of
Psychology, University of Queensland, Brisbane Qld 4072, Australia. Tel.: +61 7
3346 9519; Fax: +61 7 3365 4466; E-mail: [email protected]
Abstract: Workers who experience fire in the workplace are faced with
disruption to their work routine, as well as the emotional strain of the fire.
In the broader occupational stress literature, researchers have suggested that
social support will be most effective at reducing the negative effects of
stressors on strain when the type of support matches the type of stressor being
experienced (either instrumental or emotional). This study was a preliminary
investigation into employee responses to less routine stressors, such as
workplace fires, and the role of different sources of social support in
predicting coping effectiveness. This study also was a first attempt at
considering the influence of the social context (in terms of group
identification) on the effectiveness of social support as a predictor of coping
effectiveness. Specifically, it was predicted that social support would be more
effective when it came from multiple sources within the organization, that it
would be especially effective when provided from a group that workers
identified more strongly with, and that simply feeling part of a group would
improve adjustment. Both quantitative and qualitative data were collected from
33 employees who had recently experienced a significant fire in their
workplace. Results suggested that the type of stressors experienced and the
type of support were mismatched, but despite this, coping effectiveness was
generally moderate to high. There was mixed support for predictions about the
effects of social support–no moderating effect of group identification on
coping effectiveness was observed for measures of workplace support, although
it did moderate the effects of family support on this adjustment indicator.
