PERFORMANCE-MONITORING
JOB-STRESS
SOCIOLOGICAL-FACTORS

ELECTRONIC PERFORMANCE MONITORING AND SOCIAL CONTEXT: IMPACT ON PRODUCTIVITY AND STRESS

The effects of electronic performance monitoring on job productivity and stress were investigated. The study group consisted of 202 university undergraduate psychology students. They were assigned to perform a data entry task alone, in a noninteracting group, or in a social interacting group. Subjects performed data entry tasks for 15 minutes without monitoring or while being monitored by a supervisor through a computer. The subjects completed a questionnaire to evaluate social attitudes and to rate perceived stress. The monitored subjects judged to be highly skilled keyed significantly more entries than nonmonitored highly skilled subjects. Among the subjects judged to have low keying skills, nonmonitored subjects keyed more entries than monitored subjects. Subjects who performed the task as part of a group keyed more entries than those who worked alone. When the data were analyzed on the basis of social attitudes, subjects who worked alone or in a noninteracting group reported feeling more stressed than those who worked in an interacting group. Nonmonitored subjects felt less stress than monitored subjects.

Journal of Applied Psychology, 80(3):339-353, 1995. (64 references)

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