Intervention on Occupational Stress and Frustration Tolerance of Physical Education Teachers Working in Public Schools at Delhi & NCR:

Pilot Study
Awadhesh Kumar Shirotriya & Dhirendra Kumar Singh Founder Secretary, Play India Play (Trust) Assistant Professor, R.B.S Degree College, Agra (U.P.), India & Member, Play India Play (Trust) A Paper Presented at the International Seminar on Physical Education Recreation and Yogic Sciences, Banaras Hindu University, Varanasi (U.P.), January 19th -21st, 2012. Paper published in ISPERYS -2012 BHU Proceedings (ISBN No. 92-8867-511-8), pp. 424429. Abstract Every human being has a fundamental right of access to physical education and sport, which are essential for the full development of his personality. Physical education is a vital element in a comprehensive, well-balanced curriculum and can be a major contributing factor in the development of an individual in all aspects of life. Somehow, the profession of physical education is struggling very hard to make its appropriate place in the academic system in India which is definitely unfortunate. Physical Education Teachers (PETs) are an essential part of the school system in both primary and secondary educational institutions. They encourage students to be physically active and promote healthy eating habits. In India, there are limited numbers of studies on teacher stress, symptoms of it, the effects of stress on teachers and coping strategies of stress. But, there is no study on large scale that of Physical Educators' stress. High occupational stress and low level of frustration are the two main root causes of drop outs and disfavor towards physical education which are very pervasive in PETs now a day. The aim of this study was to Intervention on Occupational Stress and Frustration Tolerance of Physical Education Teachers Working in Public Schools at Delhi & NCR. Data were collected through 125 Physical Education Teachers (86 Males & 39 Females) of Delhi & NCR. Sample was selected through purposive sampling by the Occupational Stress Index by A.P. Srivatsava and A.P. Singh and Frustration Tolerance Inventory by S.N. Rai. Descriptive statistics and percentages were applied to test the research hypotheses and norms based grading was also applied to determine the exact level of both parameters. The findings indicated that large number of selected sample of Physical Education Teachers suffers with high occupational stress and low frustration tolerance. The findings of this study provides a direction as requirement of such studys in larger scale to generalized more authentic findings in terms of Occupational Stress and Frustration Tolerance.

Key Words: Physical Education; Physical Education Teachers; Occupational Stress; Frustration

Full Paper Physical education is a noble profession which has a very wide scope and all potentials to build the wholesome personality of the students and national building. A sound program of physical education in the school has a long lasting effect on the students and on their academic achievements as well. Physical education from long has been recognized as an integral part of the total education process. It is the process through which wholesome development of the child is ensured. Physical education is a vital element in a comprehensive, well-balanced curriculum and can be a major contributing factor in the development of an individual in all aspects of life. It is acknowledged that physical education helps in the development of physical, mental, emotional health and physical fitness.

The primary goal of the physical education program is to enable younger students to develop competence in fundamental movement skills through the provision of a wide variety of movement experiences and practice opportunities, which develop them appropriately. Physical Education Teachers (PETs) are an essential part of the school system in both primary and secondary educational institutions. They encourage students to be physically active and promote healthy eating habits. PETs are trained professionals that provide instruction to students to help them exercise properly and teach them to choose the right foods. PETs play a big role in childhood, all the way from Kindergarten through 12th grade. PETs accomplish these both in and out of the classroom by a number of different approaches within the school community. PETs instruct school-age students on healthy living, exercise and physical fitness. They organize and supervise athletic activity during class and instruct students on proper exercise routines and technique. Sometimes Physical education teachers also referred to as Gym Teacher, Health Education Teacher, Games/Sports Teacher and Physical Training Instructor (P.T.I.) which are totally wrong practice because as all other subjects teachers PETs are also responsible for teach Physical Education subject. Physical Education has been largely adopted as essential subject by almost all State Boards as well as Central Board of Secondary Education (C.B.S.E.), Indian Certificate of Secondary Education (I.C.S.E.) and many International Boards in their academic curriculum. The PETs role is to design a school environment and schedule that promotes play. PETs instruct students in sports, recreational activities and healthy lifestyle issues, in order to motivate, develop and enhance level of physical fitness and skills, self-esteem and interpersonal skills. Good PETs are intentional in guiding and extending childrens play, they ask open ended productive questions that extend students thinking. There are many different types of productive questions, like attention-focusing questions help children focus on important details of their play. Physical education isn't just about sports anymore.

Stress is a mental and physical condition, which affects an individuals productivity, effectiveness, personal health, mental health and quality of work. Job stress victims experience lowered quality of work life, low self esteem and job satisfaction. The harmful and costly consequences of stress demonstrate the need for strategies to limit stressors within the organization. Organizations that do not adopt strategies to alleviate stress may find their employees looking elsewhere for better opportunities. The impact of stress from overwork, long hours at work and work intensification has had a major and often devastating effect on organizations of developed nations OCCUPATIONAL STRESS Stress has now become an area of concern for all types of occupation. There is little doubt, however, that some professions have fared worse than others. It has long been argued that workers involved in high levels of personal interaction, such as security forces and teachers, are more vulnerable to occupational stress and professional burnout than those in product-oriented organizations. All occupations are associated with stress, but teaching occupation is significantly more stressful than others. Occupational stress, also known as job stress, has been defined as the experience of negative emotional states such as frustration, worry, anxiety and depression attributed to work related factors. Teaching related stress, commonly termed teacher stress, is defined as a teachers experience of unpleasant, negative emotions, such as anger, anxiety, tension, frustration, or depression, resulting from some aspect of their work as a teacher Like other forms of occupational stress, it can have serious implications for the healthy functioning of the individual as well as for the organization in which the individual serves. Work related stress may become so burdensome that it can prevent teachers from carrying out their job responsibilities, reducing job effectiveness. Increased levels of stress may result in anxiety, avoidance behaviors, low frustration tolerance and increased absenteeism. Sources of Occupational Stress Srivastava and Singh identified twelve sources of occupational stress like: role overload, role ambiguity, role conflict, group pressures, low profitability, under participation, low status, responsibility for poor people, intrinsic impoverishment, strenuous work, poor peer relations and powerlessness. FRUSTRATION TOLERANCE Frustration is an emotional response to circumstances where one is obstructed from arriving at a personal goal. The more important the goal, the greater the frustration. It is comparable to anger and disappointment. Sources of frustration may be internal or external. Internal sources of frustration involve personal deficiencies such as a lack of confidence or fear of social situations that prevent one from reaching a goal. Conflict can also be an internal source of frustration when one has competing goals that interfere with one another. External causes of frustration involve conditions outside the person such as a blocked road; or conditions linked to the person's actions but

not directly such as lack of money, or lack of sexual activity. All individuals at one time or another, in greater or lesser amount have to tolerate frustration in their life. The frustration tolerance refers to the amount of stress one can tolerate before his integrated functioning is seriously impaired. Thus, frustration tolerance refers to the capacity of the individual to show persistence in efforts despite repeated failures and antagonistic environment. Thus it is necessary to tolerate the frustration resulting from such events as failure in examination, loss of status etc., to maintain the integration of the personality. The person who continues his effort may be said to have more frustration tolerance that one who discontinues his efforts or indulges in any reactionary mode of behavior. Variables Affecting Frustration Tolerance A large number of independent variables related to frustration tolerance have been studied. These variables can be divided into the following categories: Organism variables, Environmental factors, Task characteristics, Cultural variables and other variables like Success in any task, Reinforcement also affects frustration tolerance. A PETs requires a greater variety of talents than any other teaching area. His/her responsibilities are diverse in a school or an educational institution and it is important for him/her to come up to the expectations and aspirations of academia, students, teaching community, society and the profession of Physical Education in the matter of personal qualities and attributes. In proportion to the expectations of the society, the PETs are not given due place and recognition. This leads to stress, dissatisfaction and low level of Frustration tolerance. The aim of current pilot study was to assess occupational stress and frustration tolerance of Physical Education Teachers Working in Public Schools at Delhi & NCR. Conceptualization of this study was mainly based on the facts that occupational stress and low level of frustration are the two main root causes of drop outs and disfavor towards physical education which are very pervasive in PETs now a day. We used survey methodology in this study and based on extensive review of literature, we postulated following hypothesis: It would be hypothesized that there would be high occupational stress and low frustration tolerance of Physical Education Teachers Working in Public Schools at Delhi & NCR. METHODOLOGY Sample Selection 125 qualified Physical Education Teachers (86 Males & 39 Females) of Delhi & NCR. Sample was selected through purposive sampling from various public schools. The age of the subjects were ranging from 23-35 years. Minimum qualifications of Physical Education Teachers were BPEd and BPE. All the subjects belonged to different states and union territories of India and all the subjects had a minimum of 4 years job experience.

Table-1 Selection of Subjects City Delhi Meerut Ghaziabad Faridabad Noida Noida Gurgaon Sonipat Total Research Tools 1. Occupational Stress was measured using the Hindi version of Occupational Stress Inventory(OSI) developed by AP Srivatsava and AP Singh consisting of 46 items, each to be rated on a five-point scale. e.g., 5 for strongly agree, 4 for agree 3 agree, 2 for disagree and 1 for strongly disagree. Total score on this scale is considered for the assessment of occupational stress. More the score on this scale indicates more stress. 2. Frustration Tolerance was measured using the Frustration Tolerance Inventory (FRTO) developed by S.N. Rai. This battery consists of four puzzles. Respondent were required to draw the figures for solving the puzzles. Puzzle number I and III time (in minute and seconds) were summed and mean time were calculated for each subject to know his frustration tolerance. PROCEDURES Data for this investigation were collected from 125 Physical Education Teachers (80 Males & 45 Females) of Delhi & NCR. Sample was selected through purposive sampling from various public schools. Good rapport established by researchers with all the subjects and clearly explained the purpose of the pilot study, we asked them to cooperate for the development and promotion of the Physical Education Profession and concerned professionals. The data collection process starting with seeking permission from the subjects concerned to involve subjects in the study. Almost all the subjects agreed to co-operate in the study. Researchers were assured and motivated them, all the concern subjects that each of them will receive a copy of the abstract of study. The data was collected from by using Hindi version of occupational stress index (OSI) and Frustration Tolerance Inventory (FRTO).These index and inventory are standardized, valid, reliable and objective, which are extensively used in Indian context. & Male 12 14 15 14 Greater 16 10 05 86 Female 06 05 10 05 07 04 02 39 Total 18 19 25 19 23 14 07 125

DATA ANALYSIS Descriptive statistics i.e., Mean and Standard Deviation were applied to test the research hypotheses and norms based grading was also applied to determine the exact level of both variables. Table-2 Variable Occupational Stress Frustration Tolerance Mean 156.89 5.019 Table-3 Norms Based Grading of Occupational Stress (In Frequency and Percentage) High Moderate Low (156-230) (123-155) (46-122) Frequency Percentage 60 48% 55 44% 10 08% Standard Deviation 18.69 2.69

Table-4 Norms Based Grading of Frustration Tolerance (In Frequency and Percentage) High Tolerance Low Tolerance Frequency Percentage 50 40% 75 60%

DISCUSSION OF FINDINGS The analysis of data reveals which supports our hypothesis that there is high percentage of Occupational Stress and low level of frustration tolerance in PETs. This may be attributed to the fact that PETs do not have a fixed work pattern and they must be geared to meet expected and unexpected duties for unspecified periods of time. The higher job stress of PETs could also be attributed to the fact that the managements of schools often make too much interference in the working of these schools and let down the teachers in the eyes of parents and public. Probable other reasons for justifying results could be that lack of principal support, high job demands, hectic work schedules, conflicting demands ,shift work , poor relations with co-

workers ,lack of promotional avenues, ,excessive overtime, multiple & prolonged tours, limited leaves, less number of annual increments and low remuneration. This study has some limitations that should be outlined. First, the sample represented a small percentage of the population of PETs from the public schools therefore, the results of this study cannot be generalized beyond this group. Second, the OSI and FRTO scales though validated on Indian population were not specifically validated on student, PETs. CONCLUSION Job stress or occupational stress and low frustration tolerance among Physical Education teachers has become quite inevitable these days due to manifold increase in job complexities and challenges. Recently, Physical Education Teachers occupational stress and level of frustration tolerance have become an area of interest among researchers and physical educationist in our country. Present pilot study has indicated that the occupational stress levels of selected PETs are high and frustration tolerance is low this is profound problem that must be attended to and concerned if the quality and productivity of physical education is not to be undermined. References: 1. Alay, S. & Koak, S. (1999). A Study of Stress Sources, Symptoms and Strategies of Physical Educators in Elementary Schools. Hacettepe University Journal of Education, (16-17), 11-14. 2. Gilmore, A et al. (1996). Teacher Stress in Intermediate Schools. Educational Research, Vol. 38, No. 1, pp. 3-19. 3. John J. De Nobile, John McCormick, (2010) Occupational stress of Catholic primary school staff: a study of biographical differences, International Journal of Educational Management, Vol. 24 Issue 6, pp.492 506. 4. Shirotriya, A.K. & Basumatary B. (2010) Occupational Stress & Frustration Tolerance of Indian Security Forces. Indian Journal of Psychometry and Education Vol.41 (2), pp. 214-218. 5. Shirotriya, A.K. & Basumatary B. (2011) Psychological Study on Indian Security Forces Lap Lambert Academic Publishing, Saarbrucken, Germany. 6. Shirotriya, A.K. (2011) Defining the Role & Contribution of Physical Education and Physical Education Teachers towards the Society. Journal of Physical Education and Yoga, Vol. 2, No. 1, pp. 130-135. 7. Singh, Ranjit (2009) Job stress, job satisfaction and adjustment among physical education teachers of Haryana schools, Journal of Exercise Science and Physiotherapy, Vol. 5, No. 2,p.p.106-110. 8. Srivastava, A.K., (1999) Management of Occupational Stress: Theories and Practice, New Delhi, Gyan Publishing House. 9. Tsai Eva, Fung Lena and Chow Lina, (2006) Sources and manifestations of stress in female kindergarten teachers, International Education Journal, 7(3), 364-370.

This Research Paper can be cited as:

Shirotriya A.K. & Singh D.K. (January, 2012). Intervention on Occupational Stress and Frustration Tolerance of Physical Education Teachers Working in Public Schools at Delhi & NCR: Pilot Study. Research paper presentation at the International Seminar on Physical Education Recreation and Yogic Sciences, Banaras Hindu University, Varanasi (UP), India.

Address for Correspondence Awadhesh Kumar Shirotriya Founder Secretary, Play India Play Shrotriya Kunj 144, Civil Lines Opposite Commissioner Residence Meerut (UP) 250001, India Phone: 0121-2670029, +919897289144, +919027036144 Email: aks144@gmail.com Website: www.playindiaplay.org