E-mail in the Workplace: The Role of Stress Appraisals and Normative Response Pressure in the Relationship Between E-mail Stressors and Employee Strain

In many organizations, e-mail is an effective and dominant workplace application tool; however, research identifying its role as a potential workplace stressor remains limited. Utilizing the Transactional Model of Stress (Lazarus & Folkman, 1984), 215 full-time administrative and academic staff at a university were surveyed about workplace e-mail. The aim was to study the effects of potential e-mail stressors on emotional exhaustion as mediated and moderated by person and situation variables. Results indicated that 2 distinct e-mail stressors-high quantity and poor quality (in terms of high emotionality and ambiguity) of workplace e-mail-were associated both with stress appraisals (e-mail overload and e-mail uncertainty) and with emotional exhaustion. Furthermore, the effects of the 2 e-mail stressors on emotional exhaustion were mediated by appraised e-mail overload. Perceived normative response pressure-a relevant aspect of the specific work environment-added to the explanation of emotional exhaustion and accentuated the positive effect of e-mail ambiguity on emotional exhaustion, although effects involving normative response pressure were not explained by the stress appraisals.