**4. Findings**

**Table 2** displays the demographic characteristics of the sample. Most of the respondents were between 18 and 40 years old (52%), had some to no college experience (53%), were male (55%), identified as White (75%), and gained an average of seven years of work experience in the TSA. **Table 3** presents the respondents' experiences with the job, organizational, and environmental stressors. This data demonstrates that the respondents' experiences with work stress vary. The majority of the respondents indicate that they have relatively low levels of job stress. A vast majority of the respondents "*strongly to somewhat*" agree that their co-workers treat each other with respect (88%), can be counted on when help is needed (79%), and their organizational treats them fairly (62%).

There is also a high agreement among the respondents that environmental stress is high in their work. The vast majority of the respondents indicate that they are "*somewhat to very*" concerned about the citizens views (61%) and negative media coverage (61%). However, the respondents appear to disagree about the level of organizational stresses they experience. While the majority of the respondents "*strongly to somewhat*" disagree that their organization cares about their opinions and well-being and provides fair rewards, a lessor but considerable number of employees differ with these assessments.

**Table 4** presents data regarding the correlations between the study variables. The correlations between demographic characteristics of the respondents and the work stressors are particularly interesting. Age and years of experience were both positively correlated with the job stressors. The respondents who were older and had more years of work experience reported experiencing less job stress than their counterparts who were younger and had fewer years of work experience. However, the opposite was true for the relationship between the environmental stressors and age. Concerns about the environmental stressors appeared to increase with age. Older respondents reported being more concerned about the environmental stressors than those who were younger. Also notable is the fact that the organizational stressors were unrelated to all the control/demographic variables in this study except for years of experience. The salience of the organizational stressors increased as the respondents' years of experience increased. The correlations among the work-related stressors were also


*Does Stress Type Matter? Clarifying the Relationships between Public Service Motivation… DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.112707*

#### **Table 2.**

*Respondents characteristics and control variables.*

noteworthy. The job and organizational stressors appear to work in similar directions. The respondents who indicated that they experienced elevated levels of job stress also reported elevated levels of organizational stress. However, the job and organizational stressors worked in opposing directions when compared to the environmental stressors. The respondents who reported experiencing high levels of the job or organizational stressors also reported experiencing lower levels of the environmental stressors.

Two SEM models were utilized to test the relationship between PSM, the work stressors, job satisfaction, and turnover intentions. The first model explored these relationships with control variables, while the second model excluded them. The first model had lower fit to the data and did not result in any meaningful differences regarding the relationships among the study variables. As a result, the second model


*Organizational Culture – Cultural Change and Technology*

**Table 3.**


**Table 4.**

*Bivariate correlations among study variables.*

*Does Stress Type Matter? Clarifying the Relationships between Public Service Motivation… DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.112707*

#### **Figure 2.**

*Standardized regression estimates (GFI = 0.998, NFI = 0.996, CFI = 0.998, RMSEA = 0.033) (\*\* = \* = p ≤ 0.05; \*\* = p ≤ 0.01).*

was adopted for parsimony and improved model fit. The fit indices indicate that the statistical model has a good fit to the data (GFI = 0.998, NFI = 0.996, CFI = 0.998, RMSEA = 0.033). The SEM findings are displayed in **Figure 2** as standardized regression estimate, and the significance of the estimates is presented in **Table 5**.

Three hypotheses were advanced in this study. Hypothesis 1 suggested that PSM would be positively associated with the job, organizational, and environmental stressors. The findings regarding this hypothesis were mixed. PSM only had a positive relationship with the environmental stressors, maintained negative relationships with


#### **Table 5.**

*Study variables standardized estimates by model paths.*

### *Does Stress Type Matter? Clarifying the Relationships between Public Service Motivation… DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.112707*

the organizational-level stressors, and was not significantly related to the job-level stressors. While the respondents with high levels of PSM reported experiencing significantly higher levels of environmental stressors, they also reported significantly lower levels of the organizational level stressors than their counterpoints with lower levels of PSM. Even more, PSM's association with environmental stressors appears to be the strongest relationship, when compared to its association with the organizational stressors.

Hypothesis 2 posited that the job stressors would be positively associated with the organizational and environmental stressors. Once more, the findings of this were mixed. While both the organizational and environmental stressors were related to the job-level stressors, the directions of one of these relationships were different. Job-level stressors were positively related to the organizational stressors but negatively related to the environmental stressors. This suggests that the respondents who reported experiencing high levels of the job stressors were significantly more likely to report experiencing high levels of the organizational stressors but significantly more likely to report experiencing lower levels of the environmental stressors. Similarly unexpected was that no meaningful relationships were found between the organizational and environmental stressors.

Hypothesis 3 suggested that the job, organizational, and environmental stressors would be associated with lower job satisfaction and higher turnover intentions. The findings regarding this hypothesis were also mixed. As expected, the organizational stressors were related to both job satisfaction and turnover intentions. The respondents who experienced high levels of the organizational stressors were significantly more likely to report having lower job satisfaction and higher turnover intentions. However, while the job stressors were also negatively related to job satisfaction, they had no significant direct relationship with turnover intentions. Even more surprising was the finding that the environmental stressors were not directly related to either job satisfaction or turnover intentions.

The finding of this study also provided pertinent information regarding the significance of the mediations among the study variables and the work outcomes. Given the fact that the organizational stressors maintained significant direct relationships with both turnover intentions and job satisfaction, it is important to determine the extent to which these relationships were fully or partially mediated by the job stressors and/or the work outcomes. Bootstrapping was used to clarify this issue. A full mediation is present when the significance of the indirect pathway reduces the significance of the direct pathway, whereas a partial mediation is present when both the direct and indirect pathways are significant, even though one pathway may be dominant. As shown in **Table 6**, the findings revealed that the association that the organizational stressors had to job satisfaction and turnover intentions were partially


#### **Table 6.**

*Bootstrap mediation analysis unstandardized results.*

mediated by the job stressors and job satisfaction, respectfully. However, the direct relationship between organizational stressors and turnover was the most dominant path when considering the pathway through job satisfaction, whereas the indirect path though the job stressors was the dominate pathway in terms of its association with job satisfaction.
