Communicatively Restricted Organizational Stress (CROS) on Campus: An Exploratory Investigation of Stress and Support among Predominantly White University Faculty

Communicatively Restricted Organizational Stress (CROS) is a phenomenon characterized by real and/or perceived prohibitions against communicating with others about one’s organizational stressors. Given that CROS is marked by an inability to utilize social support, effects are often profoundly negative for the organizational members. However, the extent to which CROS functions similarly across similar types of organizations is unknown. In this exploratory project, the effects of CROS are investigated in a small sample (n = 41) of predominantly white university faculty. Conceptualizations of CROS argue that it is dependent both on the existence of stress and the presence of close and potentially supportive relationships. Provided that academia is a high-stress environment characterized by a strong likelihood of the formation of Personal Workplace Relationships (PWRs), CROS should be prevalent for this population and should lead to negative effects. Results indicated that CROS exists for university faculty and that its prevalence correlated negatively with measures of social support. Furthermore, CROS-associated distress is positively associated with perceived stress, burnout, and overcommitment and negatively associated with work well-being and job satisfaction. Although objective physiological measures of health were collected, the data were not able to be analyzed. The discussion focuses on implications and directions for future research.