Religiosity Stress and Well being Research Methodology

METHOD

The cross sectional survey method was employed in the course of this research.

Research Setting

This research was conducted in Nigeria; in the city of Lagos, with a dense population distribution. This setting involves a high demand for health care services; and also availability of infrastructure.

Although the above stated is true; we are not clear as to whether the staff employed in these hospitals under study is enough to take care of the teeming population of patients. Via unstructured interview, we found there to be 4 nurses per ward; and over 30 patients per ward; and ward rounds by different cadres of doctors; in LUTH to be specific.

Also, Military Hospital Ikoyi; not only serves the Nigerian Military personnel, but is also on retainership agreement with companies located nearby and outside the country; an agreement known as HMO.

The setting reflects a relatively busy hospital.

Population/Sample and Sampling Procedure

For the purpose of this study, we selected a sample size of 250 in order to be able to effectively account for our correlation coefficient. This is because; a smaller sample size miight not be sufficient in power and effect size calculations. We want to be confident that our statistics are reliable.

Due to the relative inaccessibility of the respondents, the study was done on an availability basis; hence, the sampling method here can be referred to as accidental sampling because the questionnaires were administered via friends and family friends acting as assistant researchers; hence, the probability cannot be reinstated as random.

The population of study involves health workers in Lagos. Two hospitals were selected ; Lagos University Teaching Hospital and Military Hospital, Ikoyi. The first is a public hospital; but due to the availability of specialist treatment, the charges might resemble a regular private hospital; except of course the patient is on Health Insurance, (NHIS); and other staff insurance covers.

Because of the ability to retain highly skilled professionals, the hospital is a place where terminal diseases are often referred to; as it is like a last bus stop. In an informal interview with House Officers, they were unable to place their fingers on the exact numbers, but they were assertive of the presence of close to 1000 health workers on the hospital's payroll as at the time of the interview. This number also includes the lab technicians, nurses, pharmacists, physiotherapists, radiographers, occupational therapists, and other health personnel.

In the Military Hospital, an informal interview revealed the presence of up to 100 staff as health workers. Due to this, we decided to take a sample of 200 from LUTH; and 50 from Military Hospital, Ikoyi.

Research Design

This research work was done using correlation research design. In this case, there are more than one independent variable; Religiosity; and workplace stress; and also two dependent variables work place stress and well being. This is because one of the aims of the research is to find the relationship between religiosity and reported workplace stress.

This research is set to investigate relationship between variables.

Instruments

Workplace stress Scale:

This scale was constructed with the help and sponsorship of Marlin Company and American Institute of Stress (1998). It consists of 8 items. The response format of the scale is in linkert scale 5 point style; ranging from 1= never to 5 = very often. The author reported a reliability coefficient of this scale which are reasonably high (Cronbach's alpha. 0.87; retest reliability r= 0.88). The mean was used to dichotomize work overload into high and low work load. The scale has been previously used by Oyeleke, (2017) in his research on work stress, family conflict and well being.

Religious Scale (RAS):

The instrument is a 5-item scale developed by Agbo (2010), (University of Nsukka). The Religious Affiliation scale was designed to assess the level of religiosity of an individual. A 5 point response format was used to obtain information. Responses are: Strongly Disagree =1, Disagree=2, Neutral=3, Agree=4, Strongly Agree=5. Agbo (2010) tested the reliability of the scale in her study using a Nigerian sample and obtained a reliability coefficient of .84.

General Health Questionnaire -12;

This is a standardized and generally accepted scale used to measure general health, endorsed by World Health organization. The questionnaire has been used to assess whether or not a person is in a healthy state of mind; in terms of general health with lower scores indicating signs of depression or anxiety symptoms. The scale has a validity of 0.87; and a reliability of 0.909. It is also scored on a 4 point manner; whereby, the final score is subtracted from 11. Being a 12 item scale, the individual can score between 1 and 37; and if the final score is greater than or equal to 3, there is psychiatric morbidity; as obtained from a Nigerian study. The scale has been previously used by Baba Awoye, Abdullahi, Ganiyu, & Olatunji, (2013) in their study of mental health assessment of medical doctors in University of Ilorin Teaching Hospital; where they found a 14.9% prevalence of psychiatric morbidity among the doctors; in a sample of 350.

Procedure

This research includes getting Letter of Introduction from the Department to be able to access certain personnel; and contacting friends to join in sharing the questionnaires to different personnel; basically insider friends. There is promised confidentiality of responses to be conveyed to respondents.

After the questionnaires are collected, (300); the valid ones 250 or more are coded and operationalized in order to generate a relative ratio scale from the linkert scale system to be used for further analysis of the variables.

Data Analysis

The data gathered during the course of this survey were analyzed using the Statistical Software Package for Social Sciences (SPSS); first to generate tables to properly visualize our descriptive statistics and understand our sample population's norms and demographics.

Also, the inferential statistics will be done using correlation analysis on SPSS.

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