Age and Workplace Stress
Age as a factor in workplace stress
Summary of Findings:
Older workers may experience more workplace stress than their younger co-workers if their employers fail to provide necessary support and resources.

This study also showed that stress levels between younger and older workers were broadly similar when the following conditions were provided:
- A high degree of autonomy
- Good, transparent working relationships with management
- When workers were treated with fairness and respect
If these conditions were not met, older workers reported higher levels of workplace stress than their younger colleagues.
Lessons & Conclusions:
As a result of this study, employers may want to consider the age of workers when planning to provide a healthy work environment. This might be particularly important in jobs with poor resources.
- Improving the autonomy of workers is important, although may be more important for older workers
- Another factor to take into account is the transparency and fairness within the workplace. Although this always important to improve workplace wellbeing, older workers may feel more stress if managers and employers fail to provide this
This study has growing relevance for the future as the average age of workers increases.
Credits & Further Info:
Study: Do resources matter for employee stress? It depends on how old you are
Source: Portland State University (Lale M.Yaldiz, Donald M.Truxillo, ToddBodner, Leslie B.Hammer)
Published in: Journal of Vocational Behaviour 2018
Method: A survey of 243 municipal employees aged 24-65 over the course of 1 year.
Further Reading: