| The purposes of this study were twofold. First, this study served as an exploration of the sources of occupational stress for popular musicians. Second, this study investigated relationships between stressful circumstances, cognitive appraisals, coping responses, and perceived overall stress, and examined as well the impact of the personal characteristics of commitment and negative affectivity, in an attempt to establish what role, if any, these constructs play in the musicians' stress process. While early stress research focused on simple cause → effect relationships between stressful circumstances and overall stress, more recent stress research endorses the importance of mediating variables, such as cognitive appraisals and coping responses, in explaining the relationship between stressful circumstances and overall stress.; This study was designed to explore different aspects of the stress process. To do this, respondents were asked to complete the Musicians' Occupational Stress Scale, an instrument designed to measure sources of musicians' occupational stress, perception of current intensity of stress for each item, and perceived overall stress. In addition, respondents were asked to describe the most stressful situation related to their work as a musician that has occurred in the last month and then, with this event in mind, answer the remainder of the questionnaire. The rest of the survey inquired about how the person felt about the event (primary appraisal), what coping options s/he felt were available (secondary appraisal), and what coping responses they used (measured using the Brief COPE). Thus, at the conceptual level, the transactional process was being tested in that the measures of cognitive appraisals and coping responses allowed the individual to describe what s/he actually thought and did in response to the stressful situation. |
