Research problem:

For a number of years, work-related mental health problems have been a major issue for organizations and the people who work in them. However, the amounts of money and the efforts invested to date in prevention do not seem to have produced the expected results. Organizations that aspire to manage this problem are faced with a sizeable obstacle. They have few tools whose effectiveness has been proved. In addition, it is difficult for them to have access to a strategic process so as to evaluate, measure, analyze and manage the risks that affect mental health at work. Based on this perspective, an action-research process involving three phases, namely (1) Diagnosis, (2) Intervention and (3) Evaluation, is proposed.

Goals:

Phase 1 of the study - Diagnosis -- began in April 2000 and ended in December 2002. Four organizations participated in this phase: a higher education institution, a company in the metallurgy sector, a hospital and a tree nursery. Its main aims were to:

1. Assess empirically the extent of the problem of mental health at work as well as the organizational factors perceived by the employees to be a risk to their mental health;
2. Assess the activities of prevention and human resources management in order to identify the means and tools in place to act on employee stressors.

Methodology:

Data were collected through questionnaires, semi-structured interviews and focus groups, for the purpose of validation, in four participating organizations. A total of 3142 people answered the questionnaire and 56 participants were interviewed. The data gathered were subject to statistical processing and content analyses.

The questionnaire-based data helped to determine, for each of the job categories under study, the percentage of individuals with a high level of psychological distress as well as the organizational risk factors associated with mental health problems. Then, stakeholders in each job category of the participating organizations were interviewed to determine the presence or absence of primary prevention activities (management and work practices) in relation to the factors that constitute high-risk levels to mental health. More specifically, management practices and work practices were examined from two perspectives: (a) they may constitute levers for the prevention of mental health problems or (b) they may constitute obstacles to the prevention of these problems. The interviews also helped to identify secondary and tertiary prevention activities, the process and reasons for which they were implemented as well as the factors that contribute to their success or failure.

To sum up, the aim of the research process advocated was to quantify the extent of psychological distress problems in the work environments, to target the organizational factors that can explain this distress and, lastly, to identify the levers and obstacles so as to deal with these problems.