personal and organizational outcomes related to job stress and type-a behavior: a study of canadian...

Copyright © 2005 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

S h o r t c o m m u n i c a t i o n :Pe r s o n a l a n d o r g a n i z a t i o n a lo u t c o m e s r e l a t e d t o j o b s t r e s sa n d T y p e - A b e h a v i o r : a s t u d yo f C a n a d i a n a n d C h i n e s ee m p l o y e e s

Muhammad Jamal*,†

Department of Management, John Molson School of Business, Concordia University,Montreal, Quebec, H3G 1M8, Canada

*Correspondence to: Dr Muhammad Jamal, Depart-ment of Management, John Molson School of Business,Concordia University, Montreal, Quebec, H3G 1M8,Canada† E-mail: [email protected]/grant sponsor: Social Sciences ResearchCouncil of Canada; contract/grant number: 410-99-0203Contract/grant sponsor: Fonds pour la formation dechercheurs de l’aide à la recherce; contract/grantnumber: 99-ER-0506

S t r e s s a n d H e a l t hStress and Health 21: 129–137 (2005)

Published online in Wiley InterScience (www.interscience.wiley.com). DOI: 10.1002/smi.1047

Received 4 August 2004Revised 21 January 2005

Accepted 31 January 2005

SummaryThis study examined the relationship of job stress, Type-A behavior and its two components (timepressure and hard driving/competitiveness) with burnout, health problems, job satisfaction, orga-nizational commitment and turnover motivation among employees in Canada (N = 535) and main-land China (N = 685). Data were collected by means of a structured questionnaire from Canadianemployees in Montreal and Chinese employees in Beijing. Pearson correlation and moderated mul-tiple regression were used to analyze the data. Job stress, global Type-A and its two componentswere significantly related to a number of dependant variables in both countries. Some support fordifferential effects of Type-A behavior components was found primarily in the Canadian sample.Implications of findings are discussed for cross-cultural research. Copyright © 2005 John Wiley& Sons, Ltd.

Key Wordsjob stress; Type-A; components; outcomes; cross-cultural study

Introduction

This study examined the relationship of job stressand Type-A behavior pattern (TABP) withemployees’ personal and organizational outcomesin Canada and mainland China. In the Westernindustrialized countries, during the past twodecades, considerable attention has been paid inunderstanding and improving employees’ healthand well-being in the workplace. Out of thisconcern comes a renewed emphasis on under-standing job stress (Hart & Cooper, 2002).

Though stress has been a popular topic ofresearch in health sciences, it has attracted therenewed attention of many behavioral scientistsin the last 15 to 20 years. Notable recent contri-butions have been the review of Baba, Jamal, andTourigny (1998), Hart and Cooper (2002), andKinicki, McKee, and Wade (1996). In addition,several models of job stress have been proposedin order to identify important predictors of jobstress, as well as consequences (Boswell, Olson-Buchanan, & LePine,2004; Daley & Parfitt,1996; Jamal, 1985; Parker & DeCotiis, 1983;Westman & Eden, 1996). Almost all of thesemodels have been developed and empiricallytested in developed countries (Hart & Cooper,2002; Jamal & Baba, 2001). Their portabilityand usefulness to developing countries haverarely been tested despite repeated suggestions todo so (Jamal, 1999; Jamal & Preena, 1998; Xie,1996). Accordingly, the present study examinedthe relationship of job stress and Type-A behav-ior with employees’ personal and organizationaloutcomes in a developed country (Canada) and ina developing country (China).

Our choice of Canada and China as researchsetting was based not only on practicality but alsothe empirical findings that these countries differon the most important dimension of nationalculture, individualism and collectivism (Hofstede,2001; McSweeney, 2000; Triandis, 2004). It issuggested by cross-cultural researchers that workattitudes and behavior of people in collectivistcultures are different from the work attitudes and behavior of people in individualist cultures(Carpenter, 2000; Hoppe, 2004; Triandis & Suh,2002). The present study tends to provide empir-ical evidence on differences or similaritiesbetween an individualistic culture like Canadaand a collectivist culture like China with regardto employees job stress, Type-A behavior andemotional and physical health.

Job stress can be viewed as an individual’s reac-tions to work environment characteristics thatappear physically and emotionally threatening tothe individual. It indicates a poor fit between theindividual’s abilities and the work environment inwhich excessive demands are made of the indi-vidual, or the individual is not fully equipped tohandle a particular situation (Jamal, 1984). Thus,in the present study, the person-environment fitmodel of job stress was employed. The choice ofthis model was based on its incorporation of bothchronic and acute stress (Rick, Acton, & Payne,1988), its popularity in behavioral sciences (Baba

et al., 1998), and its solid empirical support(Edwards & Harrison, 1993). Notwithstandingconceptual variation, job stress usually results inthe disruption of the individual’s psychologicaland physiological homeostasis, forcing deviationfrom normal functioning in interaction with joband work environment. In the face of permanentchronic job stress, an individual’s deviation fromnormal functioning more often tends to movetoward the dysfunctional side, both from the indi-vidual and the organizational perspective (Jamal& Badawi, 1993; Maslach, Shaufeli, & Leiter,2001).

A parallel line of research in the stress domain,primarily dominated by researchers in health sciences, focussed on understanding the stress-prone behavior called TABP. Two cardiologistsdeveloped this construct while studying peoplewho were suffering from cardiac illness (Fried-man & Rosenman, 1974). They describe TABPas an action-emotion complex observed in anyperson who is aggressively involved in a chronic,incessant struggle to achieve more and more inless and less time, and if required to do so,against the opposing efforts of other things andother people. By contrast, persons described asType-B do not necessarily exhibit these charac-teristics. A large number of studies comparedType-A and Type-B differences among workingpeople in a variety of situations (Bruck & Allen,2003; Edwards & Baglioni, 1991; Jamal &Baba, 2001, 2003). As expected, most of thesestudies were conducted among employeesworking in organizations in Western industrial-ized countries.

Although Type-A and Type-B differences withregard to cardiovascular, neuroendocrine, psy-chological, social and behavioral domains havebeen examined extensively, only limited attentionhas been paid to investigate how job stress andTABP jointly affect employee well-being and thatof the organization (Berg & Schalk, 1997; Bruck& Allen, 2003; Jamal, 1999; Jamal & Badawi,1993). Type-A people not only experience highjob stress, but they are also attracted to workenvironments that are fast-paced, competitiveand have high workloads (Berg & Schalk, 1997; Jamal, 2002; Jamal & Baba, 2003; Judge, Higgins, Thoresen, & Barrick, 1999;Schaubroeck, Ganster, & Kemmerer, 1994). Sincesome of the components of TABP are assumed tobe associated with coronary heart diseases, it isessential to examine systematically the jointeffects of job stress and Type-A behavior on indi-

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Copyright © 2005 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. Stress and Health 21: 129–137 (2005)130

viduals and organizational outcomes. In thepresent study, an attempt was made to examinethe joint effects of Type-A behavior and job stresson employees’ personal and organizational out-comes in a cross-cultural setting, keeping in mindthe recent suggestions of Schaffer and Riordan(2003) for cross-cultural investigations.

As mentioned earlier, there exists a largenumber of empirical studies, from both labora-tory and field settings, relating Type-A and Type-B differences in physiological and health variablesand relating work-related variables such as jobsatisfaction, performance, burnout, and absen-teeism (Jamal & Baba, 2003). Most of thesestudies relied almost exclusively on the globalmeasure of Type-A behavior. Although globalType-A behavior has been fairly consistent inshowing a modest relationship with a number ofphysiological, health and work-related variables(Jamal, 2002), it has been suggested that becauseof the multidimensional nature of TABP, theusage of the component measures of Type-Abehavior might improve the predictive validity ofthe Type-A behavior construct (Spence, Helmre-ich, & Pred, 1987). There are only a few studiesin existence in which both the global Type-Ameasure and the component measures of Type-Awere used (Barling & Charbonneau, 1992; Birks& Roger, 2000; Edwards & Baglioni, 1991;Jamal & Baba, 2003). Most of these studies wererestricted in terms of the choices of the dependantvariables. Moreover, most of these studies wereconducted among employees in developed coun-tries. The present study was conducted in a devel-oped and a developing country. Both globalType-A behavior and component measures ofType-A were used. Both personal outcomes(burnout, health problems and job satisfaction)and organizational outcomes (organizationalcommitment, turnover motivation) were used asdependant variables. However, in recent yearssome researchers have raised concerns about the usefulness of Type-A behavior construct inexplaining employees health, work attitudes andbehavior (Kaplan, 1992; Riska, 2000).

Keeping in mind the extensive literature on jobstress and the global TABP for the last 30 years,a number of hypotheses were developed. Specifi-cally, the following hypotheses were tested in thiscross-cultural study:

Hypothesis 1: Job stress will be positively relatedto burnout, health problems and turnovermotivation in both countries.

Hypothesis 2: Job stress will be negatively relatedwith job satisfaction and organizational com-mitment in both countries.

Hypothesis 3: Global Type-A behavior and itscomponents (time pressure and hard driving/competitiveness) will be positively related withburnout, health problems and turnover moti-vation in both countries.

Hypothesis 4: Global Type-A behavior and itscomponents (time pressure and hard driving/competitiveness) will be negatively related withjob satisfaction and organizational commit-ment in both countries.

Hypothesis 5: Global Type-A behavior will mod-erate the relationship between job stress anddependent variables. That is, Type-A employ-ees with high job stress will be more seriouslyadversely affected than Type-B employees insimilar situations.

Method

Research setting

The present study was conducted in two coun-tries: Canada and the People’s Republic of China.Full-time employed people in the cities of Montreal and Beijing provided the data. Care wastaken to make the research setting cross-sectionalin both places so that no single occupationalgroup unduly dominated the sample.

Procedures

In both countries, data were collected by meansof a structured questionnaire. In Montreal, bothEnglish and French versions of the questionnairewere employed. In Beijing, the questionnaire wastranslated into Mandarin Chinese. In both places,a back-to-back translation procedure was usedrecommended for cross-cultural studies (Schaffer& Riordan, 2003). In both countries, local MBAstudents were trained as research assistants by the researcher. They were given training in datacollection with specific instructions on how toapproach potential respondents. Approximately1100 questionnaires were distributed among full-time employees working in various organizationsin Montreal. With two follow-ups, 535 com-pleted questionnaires were returned yielding aresponse rate of 48 per cent. In Beijing, approxi-mately 1100 questionnaires were distributed

Job stress, Type-A behavior and outcome

Copyright © 2005 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. Stress and Health 21: 129–137 (2005) 131

among employees working in various organiza-tions. With two follow-ups, 685 completed ques-tionnaires were returned yielding a response rateof 62 per cent. A higher response rate among theChinese employees might be due to the novelty ofsuch work attitudes survey in China.

Sample characteristics

In the Canadian sample, the majority of therespondents were male (65 per cent), married (82per cent) and were French speaking (55 per cent).The average respondent was 42 years of age, had16 years of education and had been in the laborforce for the past 15 years. In the Chinese sample,the majority of the respondents were married (75per cent) and were male (58 per cent). Theaverage respondent was 36 years of age, had 13years of education and had been in the labor forcefor the past 15 years.

Measures

In both countries, the same standardized scaleswere employed to assess the study’s variables inorder to make comparisons meaningful. Descrip-tions of scales are presented later.

Job stress

Job stress was assessed with the 13-item scaledeveloped by Parker and DeCotiis (1983). This isa Likert-type scale with 1–5 response options, 1indicating a strong agreement and 5 indicating astrong disagreement with the item. A higher scoreon this scale indicated a higher degree of jobstress. This scale is frequently used to tap overalljob stress and has good psychometric properties(Jamal & Baba, 2003).

Type-A behavior

Type-A behavior was assessed with the Framing-ham scale (Haynes, Feinleib, & Kannel, 1980).This scale has 10 items with varied responseoptions. The scale has been used frequently inhealth sciences and is validated against coronaryheart diseases (Edwards & Baglioni, 1991). Ahigher score on this scale indicated the Type-Abehavior and a lower score indicated the Type-B

behavior. In line with recent suggestions (Jamal,1999; Jamal & Baba, 2003), the Framinghamscale was divided into two components; timepressure and hard driving/competitiveness. Thus,there was one global Type-A behavior scale andtwo subscales of Type-A behavior based on twocomponents.

Burnout

Burnout was assessed with the 22-item MaslachBurnout Inventory (Maslach & Jackson, 1981).This scale measures employees’ burnout in termsof three dimensions; emotional exhaustion,depersonalization and lack of accomplishment.This is a Likert-type scale with response optionsfrom strongly agree to strongly disagree. A higherscore on this scale indicated a higher degree ofburnout. This scale has been widely used inbehavioral and health sciences and has excellentpsychometric properties in cross-cultural research(Jamal & Baba, 2003; Maslach et al., 2001).

Health problems

Psychosomatic health problems were assessed byadapting measures from Michigan studies ofworkers’ health (Jamal & Badawi, 1993). Healthproblems examined in the present study includedheadaches, upset stomach, gas and bloated feel-ings, trouble getting to sleep, loss of appetite,changes in bowel movement, early morning sick-ness, dizziness during the day, nervousness orshakiness inside, and inability to relax. Eachhealth problem has 1–5 response options, 1 rep-resenting having to face the problem less thanonce a month and 5 representing having to facethe problem several times a week. Individuals’responses on various health problems were com-bined to create the index of health problems. Ahigher score on the index indicated a higherdegree of health problems. This scale is frequentlyused in behavioral sciences and has excellent psy-chometric properties in cross-cultural research(Jamal & Baba, 2003; Xie, 1996).

Job satisfaction

Job satisfaction was assessed by using theHoppock scale (McNichols, Stahl, & Manley,1976). This scale has four items and each item

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has well explained 1–7 response options. A higherscore on this scale indicated a higher degree of jobsatisfaction.

Organizational commitment

Organizational commitment was assessed withthe 16-item scale developed by Meyer and Allen(1984). It is a Likert-type scale with responseoptions from 1–5, indicating strong agreement tostrong disagreement with each item. A higherscore on this scale indicated a higher degree oforganizational commitment. The scale is regu-larly used to tap organizational commitment andhas good psychometric properties (Jamal & Baba,2003).

Turnover motivation

Turnover motivation was used by asking eachrespondent to give his or her probability ofleaving the present organization within 2 yearsfrom the day the questionnaire was completed.This measure has been reported as a reasonablyvalid measure of actual turnover (Morrow, 1999).A higher score on this measure indicated a higherdegree of turnover motivation.

Results

The means, standard deviations and reliabilitycoefficients (alpha) of all variables in the presentstudy are presented in Table I. Reliabilities variedfrom 0.69 (global Type-A) to 0.94 (health prob-lems) in the Canadian sample. In the Chinesesample, reliabilities varied from 0.68 (harddriving/competitiveness) to 0.88 (burnout). Inboth countries, reliabilities were judged to begood for survey-type research. More informationabout reliabilities are provided in Table I.

Intercorrelation among dependent variableswere computed and are presented in Table II.Burnout was moderately correlated with job sat-isfaction, health problems and turnover motiva-tion in both countries. Similarly, job satisfaction,organizational commitment and turnover moti-vation were moderately correlated in both coun-tries. Since none of the intercorrelation wasjudged to be too high, all the dependant variableswere kept for further analysis.

Person correlations were computed to examinethe relationship of job stress, global Type-Abehavior and its components with dependentvariables. These correlations are presented inTable III for both countries. Job stress was sig-nificantly and positively correlated with burnout,health problems and turnover motivation in both



Table I. Means (M), standard deviations (SDs) and reliability coefficients (alpha) for Canadian (CAN) andChinese (PRC) samples.

Variable Sample Number of items M SD Alpha reliability

(1) Burnout (CAN) 22 2.43 0.61 0.86(PRC) 22 2.12 0.39 0.88

(2) Health problems (CAN) 10 2.32 0.96 0.94(PRC) 10 1.94 0.66 0.86

(3) Job satisfaction (CAN) 4 4.44 0.92 0.85(PRC) 4 4.96 1.24 0.79

(4) Organizational commitment (CAN) 16 3.12 0.48 0.75(PRC) 16 3.33 0.69 0.79

(5) Turnover motivation (CAN) 1 2.19 1.06 —(PRC) 1 1.67 1.12 —

(6) Job stress (CAN) 13 2.69 0.88 0.86(PRC) 13 2.31 0.69 0.83

(7) Global Type-A (CAN) 10 2.39 0.59 0.69(PRC) 10 2.17 0.71 0.73

(8) Time pressure (CAN) 5 2.36 0.65 0.72(PRC) 5 1.989 0.71 0.78

(9) Hard driving/competitiveness (CAN) 5 2.17 0.55 0.73(PRC) 5 1.87 0.66 0.68

countries, clearly supporting hypothesis 1. Jobstress was also found to be significantly and neg-atively correlated with job satisfaction and orga-nizational commitment in both countries, thussupporting hypothesis 2. In sum, hypothesis 1and hypothesis 2 are clearly supported by thedata in the present study.

Hypothesis 3 predicted a positive relationshipbetween global Type-A and its components withburnout, health problems and turnover motiva-tion. Global Type-A and the components of timepressure and hard driving/competitiveness weresignificantly and positively correlated withburnout, health problems and turnover motiva-tion in both countries supporting hypothesis 3.Significant differential effects were found for time

pressure and hard driving/competitiveness onhealth problems in both countries and on burnoutin the Canadian sample. In all three instances,correlations were higher for the component timepressure than for the component hard driving/competitiveness.

Global Type-A and the components of timepressure and hard driving/competitiveness weresignificantly related to job satisfaction and orga-nizational commitment in the Canadian sample.In the Chinese sample, Type-A and its two com-ponents were significantly related to job satis-faction only. Thus, hypothesis 4 was partiallysupported by the data in the present study. Sig-nificant differential effects were found for timepressure and hard driving/competitiveness on

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Table II. Intercorrelation among dependent variables for Canadian (CAN)a and Chinese (PRC)b samples.

Variables Sample

(1) (2) (3) (4) (5)

(1) Burnout (CAN) —(PRC) —

(2) Health problems (CAN) 0.38 —(PRC) 0.29 —

(3) Job satisfaction (CAN) -0.42 -0.35 —(PRC) -0.27 -0.21 —

(4) Organizational commitment (CAN) -0.22 -0.07 0.43 —(PRC) -0.18 0.06 0.55 —

(5) Turnover motivation (CAN) 0.32 0.28 -0.39 -0.44 —(PRC) 0.22 0.23 -0.42 -0.52 —

a N = 535, r = 0.11, p < 0.01.b N = 685, r = 0.09, p < 0.01.

Table III. Pearson correlations of job stress, global Type-A and its two components with dependent variables forCanadian (CAN) and Chinese (PRC) samples.

Variable Sample

Job Global Time Hard driving/stress Type-A pressure competitiveness

(1) Burnout (CAN) 0.48* 0.44* 0.53* 0.34*a

(PRC) 0.41* 0.33* 0.36* 0.29*(2) Health problems (CAN) 0.52* 0.48* 0.61* 0.26*a

(PRC) 0.34* 0.29* 0.38* 0.19*a

(3) Job satisfaction (CAN) -0.39* -0.26* -0.29* -0.23*(PRC) -0.22* -0.16* -0.18* -0.14*

(4) Organizational commitment (CAN) -0.29* -0.22* -0.13* -0.31*a

(PRC) -0.15* -0.07 -0.06 -0.07(5) Turnover motivation (CAN) 0.29* 0.22* 0.16* 0.28*

(PRC) 0.19* 0.12* 0.07 0.17*

* p < 0.01.a Difference in correlations is significant (p < 0.01).

organizational commitment in the Canadiansample alone. The strength of correlation washigher for the component hard driving/competi-tiveness than for the component time pressure.

Moderated multiple regressions were used totest hypothesis 5, which concerned the interactiveeffects of Type-A behavior on job stress anddependent variables. To determine the joint con-tribution of job stress and global TABP on fivedependent variables, hierarchical regressionswere performed in which job stress was enteredfirst, followed by global TABP and then job stress¥ global TABP. Out of 10 possible interactioneffects in two countries (5 dependent variables ¥2), only three were found to be significant, whichpartially supported hypothesis 5. The three sig-nificant interaction effects involved the variablesof burnout in both countries and health problemsin the Canadian sample. The unique varianceexplained by the interaction effects for burnoutwas 3 per cent (p > 0.01) for the Canadian sampleand 4 per cent (p < 0.01) for the Chinese sample.The unique variance explained by the interactioneffects for health problems was 6 per cent (p <0.01) for the Canadian sample. A close examina-tion of the data through subgroup analysisrevealed that in all three significant interactioneffects, Type-A employees suffered more seriouslyfrom the adverse consequences of job stress thanType-B employees.

Discussion

The results of the present study indicated that jobstress was significantly related to burnout, healthproblems, job satisfaction, organizational com-mitment and turnover motivation both in Canadaand China. Similarly, global Type-A behavior wassignificantly related to all five dependent variablesin the Canadian sample. However, in the Chinesesample, global TABP was significantly related tofour of the five dependent variables (the excep-tion was organizational commitment). Thesefindings are in general agreement with the bulk ofthe existing studies on job stress and Type-Abehavior that were primarily conducted in devel-oped countries (Baba et al., 1998; Hart &Cooper, 2002; Jamal & Baba, 2003; Lee,Jamieson, & Earley, 1996). Before the findingsare discussed further, a note of caution is war-ranted about the perceptual nature of variousmeasures used and the cross-sectional nature ofthe present study. For future cross-cultural

research, it is desirable to use multiple measuresof the same construct and to use some objectivemeasures along with perceptual measures in thesame study (Schaffer & Riordan, 2003). If it ispossible, a longitudinal research design should beused in studying cross-cultural hypotheses.

The findings that job stress is related to personaland organizational outcomes are consistent withthe meta-analysis of Lee and Ashforth (1996).Their results indicated that job stress factors suchas work overload, ambiguity and conflict were significantly related to overall burnout and itsdimensions in studies they included in their meta-analysis. Almost all of the studies includedin Lee and Ashforth’s (1996) meta-analysis wereconducted in developed countries. A number ofrecent studies of employees in developing coun-tries also tend to be supportive of the adverseeffects of job stress on employees’ personal andorganizational outcomes (Jamal, 1999; Parker &Baba, 1996; Wang, Baba, & Jamal, 2004). In across-cultural study of college teachers in Canada(N = 420) and Pakistan (N = 335), job stress wasfound to be significantly related to burnout, worksatisfaction and turnover motivation (Jamal,1999). In another study, Parker and Baba (1996)found that job stress was significantly related toburnout, job satisfaction and depression amongflight attendants employed by a national carrier ina developing country. Similarly, in a recent studyof nurses in mainland China (N = 550), job stresswas found to be significantly related to depres-sion, emotional exhaustion, and depersonaliza-tion (Wang et al., 2004). Finally, in a study ofmanagers in Taiwan, it was found that job stresswas significantly related to mental and physicalhealth (Lu, Tseng, & Cooper, 1999). Thus, thefindings of the present study, along with a fewavailable empirical studies from developing coun-tries, further extend the pervasive adverse effectsof chronic job stress on employees’ personal andorganizational outcomes.

The findings of the adverse effects of Type-Abehavior on employee and organizational well-being are consistent with the bulk of the litera-ture on the topic (Jamal, 1999; Jamal & Baba,2001, 2003; Schaubroeck et al., 1994). Not onlyare Type-A’s pushed by their personality disposi-tions to jobs that are fast paced and challenging,but they experience adverse consequences of jobstress more severely than other employees (Bruck& Allen, 2003; Jamal & Baba, 2003). The resultsfrom the moderator analysis lend further supportto the earlier argument. Global Type-A behavior



moderated three of the 10 relationships betweenjob stress and outcomes in two countries. Ingeneral, Type-B employees were found to be lessaffected than Type-A employees by the adverseconsequences of job stress.

As mentioned previously, some support wasfound for the differential effects of the componentmeasures of Type-A behavior on outcome vari-ables in the present study. There are only a fewempirical studies in existence in which bothglobal and component measures of Type-Abehavior have been used to examine their impacton some individual and organizational outcomes(Jamal & Baba, 2003). Barling and Charbonneau(1992) in a sample of undergraduate students (N= 113) found that achievement striving (AS) pre-dicted grade point average and proof reading performance and that impatience/irritability (II)predicted headaches and sleep habits but did notpredict either respiratory infections or digestiveproblems. In another study of undergraduate stu-dents, time pressure was found to be related tosomatic complaints, anxiety and severe depres-sion, but competitiveness was generally unrelatedto such symptoms (Lee et al., 1996). In both ofthese studies, correlations of global TABP withoutcome variables were not reported. In a studyof executive managers, Edwards and Baglioni(1991) found some support for the differentialeffects of Type-A behavior components on mentaland physical health. They used 10 different mea-sures of mental and physical health and also pro-vided correlations of global Type-A and itscomponents with the measures of health. Theglobal Type-A showed significant relationshipswith five of the 10 measurers of health. The com-ponent of time pressure was also significantlyrelated to five of the 10 measures, whereas thecomponent of hard driving/competitiveness wassignificantly related to only one of the 10 mea-sures of health. In a recent study of workingpeople taking part-time classes, it was found thatglobal Type-A and achievement striving wereunrelated to neuroticism and negative affectivity,but impatience/irritability were significantlyrelated to both neuroticism and negative affectiv-ity (Bruck & Allen, 2003). Finally, in a study oftelecommunication and hospital employees, dif-ferential effects of component measurers werefound only with regard to health problems out ofsix outcome variables in the hospital sample(Jamal & Baba, 2003).

In the present study, differential effects of com-ponent measures were found for health problems

in both countries and for burnout and organiza-tional commitment in the Canadian sample.Thus, at this time, evidence of differential effectsof global versus component measures of TABPtends to be somewhat supportive with regardonly to health related outcomes. More rigorousresearch with a variety of outcome variables indifferent organizations and cultural settings hasto be conducted before more definitive conclu-sions can be drawn. However, it is recommendedthat this type of research is needed to fully com-prehend the dynamics of and portability ofWestern developed and tested models of employeehealth and well-being to developing countries.

Acknowledgments

This study was supported by grants from the Social Sci-ences Research Council of Canada (410-99-0203) andFonds pour la formation de chercheurs de l’aide à larecherce (99-ER-0506) from the Province of Quebec,Canada. The author acknowledges the assistance ofBarry Kaufman, Bella Galperin, Usman Raja, Amer Al-Roubaie, Memuna A. Jamal, and Mubashir M. Jamalin data collection and analysis.

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