Optimism, Stress, Life Satisfaction, and Job Burnout in Restaurant Managers

Researchers have suggested that dispositional optimism is related to both stress and stress outcomes (E. C. Chang, K. L. Rand, & D. R. Strunk, 2000). However, the nature of this relationship has not fully been explained. The authors contributed to a better understanding of this relationship by evaluating dispositional optimism, stress, overall life satisfaction, and job burnout in a sample of restaurant managers. Results indicated that stress and job burnout were significantly related; however, their relationship was not moderated by dispositional optimism, as would be suggested by the results of past research. The diminished personal accomplishment dimension of job burnout mediated the relationship between optimism and life satisfaction. Also, stress significantly impacted perceptions of diminished personal accomplishment and life satisfaction.

[1]  Martin E. P. Seligman,et al.  Explanatory style as a predictor of productivity and quitting among life insurance sales agents. , 1986 .

[2]  Robert L. Dipboye,et al.  Understanding Industrial and Organizational Psychology: An Integrated Approach , 1993 .

[3]  M. Seligman,et al.  Learned helplessness in humans: critique and reformulation. , 1978, Journal of abnormal psychology.

[4]  T. Kamarck,et al.  A global measure of perceived stress. , 1983, Journal of health and social behavior.

[5]  Robert Karasek,et al.  Healthy Work : Stress, Productivity, and the Reconstruction of Working Life , 1990 .

[6]  S. Jackson,et al.  The Measurement of experienced burnout , 1981 .

[7]  J. Schwartz,et al.  Effects of occupational stress on the physical and psychological health of women in a microelectronics plant. , 1992, Social science & medicine.

[8]  B. Long,et al.  Female Clerical Workers' Occupational Stress: The Role of Person and Social Resources, Negative Affectivity, and Stress Appraisals. , 2002 .

[9]  S. Jackson,et al.  Maslach burnout inventory manual , 1996 .

[10]  Sophia Kahill.  Symptoms of professional burnout: A review of the empirical evidence. , 1988 .

[11]  Victor Savicki,et al.  Theoretical and research considerations of burnout , 1983 .

[12]  S. West,et al.  Multiple Regression: Testing and Interpreting Interactions. , 1994 .

[13]  D. A. Kenny,et al.  The moderator-mediator variable distinction in social psychological research: conceptual, strategic, and statistical considerations. , 1986, Journal of personality and social psychology.

[14]  D. Strunk,et al.  Optimism and risk for job burnout among working college students: stress as a mediator , 2000 .

[15]  E. Chang.  Cultural Differences in Optimism, Pessimism, and Coping: Predictors of Subsequent Adjustment in Asian American and Caucasian American College Students. , 1996 .

[16]  Michael W. Bridges,et al.  Distinguishing optimism from neuroticism (and trait anxiety, self-mastery, and self-esteem): a reevaluation of the Life Orientation Test. , 1994, Journal of personality and social psychology.

[17]  C. Carver,et al.  Effects of optimism on psychological and physical well-being: Theoretical overview and empirical update , 1992, Cognitive Therapy and Research.

[18]  C Peterson,et al.  The future of optimism. , 2000, The American psychologist.

[19]  C. D. Fisher,et al.  Social Support and Adjustment to Work: A Longitudinal Study , 1985 .

[20]  R. Larsen,et al.  The Satisfaction with Life Scale , 1985, Journal of personality assessment.

[21]  C. Cooper,et al.  Managers and Professionals in Business/Industrial Settings , 1987 .

[22]  C. Carver,et al.  Optimism, coping, and health: assessment and implications of generalized outcome expectancies. , 2009, Health psychology : official journal of the Division of Health Psychology, American Psychological Association.

[23]  S. Folkman,et al.  Stress, appraisal, and coping , 1974 .

[24]  T. Judge,et al.  The dispositional causes of job satisfaction : A core evaluations approach , 1997 .

[25]  S. Sauter.  The Changing organization of work and the safety and health of working people; knowledge gaps and research directions , 2002 .

[26]  Cynthia L. Cordes,et al.  A Review and an Integration of Research on Job Burnout , 1993 .

[27]  Kelly L. Zellars,et al.  Burnout in Health Care: The Role of the Five Factors of Personality , 2000 .

[28]  Cary L. Cooper,et al.  Job control and worker health , 1989 .

[29]  E. Chang.  Does dispositional optimism moderate the relation between perceived stress and psychological well-being?: a preliminary investigation , 1998 .