1. Workplace Well-being in the Age of Technology
NCDA 2017 - Roundtable #3-9
Occupational health​ is not only the absence of illness but the presence of wellness.​ Technostress can negatively impact employee wellness and employer
productivity. While workplace information and communications technologies (ICT) create efficiency, productivity, and flexibility like never before in work history, it
can also have negative effects on individual cognitive, psychological, and physical health, as well as organizational outcomes. ​We present the concept of
technostress, then focus on some prevention and interventions to increase workplace wellness while looking ahead to tech changing job and industry structures.
Lynn Atanasoff, The Pennsylvania State University - ​lma100@psu.edu​ and Melissa Venable, HigherEducation.com - ​melissa.a.venable@gmail.com
➡ What is “Technostress?”
-​ ​An adaptation disorder or a response to one’s inability to cope with technology in a healthy way ​(​Brod, 1984​)
-​ ​Mental stress created by technology that results in physiological and emotional arousal ​(​Arnetz & Wiholm, 1997; Weil & Rosen, 1997​)
Example Technostress Concepts in Literature
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2. ➡ What do career counselors and coaches need to know about the changing world of work?
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4. ➡​How can career counselors/ coaches impact workplace wellbeing in the age of ICT?
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6. Select References & Resources
Arnetz, B. & Wiholm, C. (1997). Technological stress: Psychophysiological symptoms in modern offices. ​Journal of Psychosomatic
Research 43​(1), 35-42.
Atanasoff, L. & Venable, M. (in press). Technostress: Implications for Adults in the Workforce. ​Career Development Quarterly​.
Ayyagari, R., Grover, V., & Purvis, R. (2011). Technostress: Technological antecedents and implications.​ MIS Quarterly, 35 ​(4), 831.
Brod, C. (1984). ​Technostress: The Human Cost of the Computer Revolution​. Reading, MA:Addison Wesley Publishing.
Day, A., Paquet, S., Scott, N., & Hambley, L. (2012). ICT Support Scale [Database record]. Retrieved from PsycTESTS. doi:
http://dx.doi.org/10.1037/t17025-000
Day, A., Paquet, S., Scott, N., & Hambley, L. (2012). ICT Demands Scale [Database record]. Retrieved from PsycTESTS. doi:
http://dx.doi.org/10.1037/t17024-000
Fuglseth, A. M., & Sørebø, Ø. (2014). The effects of technostress within the context of employee use of ICT. ​Computers in Human
Behavior, 40,​ 161-170.
Ragu-Nathan, T. S., Tarafdar, M., Ragu-Nathan, B. S., & Tu, Q. (2008). The consequences of technostress for end users in
organizations: Conceptual development and empirical validation. ​Information Systems Research​, ​19​(4), 417–433.
Reidl, R. (2013). On the biology of technostress: Literature review and research agenda. ​The DATA BASE for Advances in Information
Systems, 44 (1)​, 18-55.
Reidl, R., Kindermann, H., Auinger, A. & Javors, A. (2013). Computer breakdown as a stress factor during task completion under time
pressure: Identifying gender differences based on skin conductance. ​Advances in Human-Computer Interaction
http://dx.doi.org/10.1155/2013/420169
Riedl, R., Kindermann, H., Auinger, A., & Javor, A. (2012). Technostress from a neurobiological perspective: System breakdown
increases the stress hormone cortisol in computer users. ​Business & Information Systems Engineering, 4(2), ​61-69.
Salanova, M., Llorens, S., & Ventura, M​.​ (2014). Technostress: The dark side of technologies. In C. Korunka C. & P. Hoonakker (Eds.),
The impact of ICT on quality of working life ​(pp. 87-104), New York: Springer.
Tarafdar, M., D’Arcy, J., Turel, O., & Gupta, A. (2015) The Dark Side of Information Technology. ​MIT Sloan Management Review,​ ​56
(2),​ 60-70.
Tarafdar, M., Tu, Q., Ragu-Nathan, T. S., & Ragu-Nathan, B. S. (2011). Crossing to the dark side: Examining creators, outcomes, and
inhibitors of technostress.​Communication of the ACM​, ​54​(9), 113–120.
Weil, M. M., & Rosen, L. D. (1997). Technostress: Coping with Technology@ home@ work@ play. New York: John Wiley and Sons.
World Economic Forum. (2016). ​The future of jobs: Employment, skills and workforce strategy for the fourth industrial revolution​.
Retrieved from ​http://www3.weforum.org/docs/WEF_Future_of_Jobs.pdf
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