OCCUPATIONAL STRESS, TRANSFER AND AGE AS PREDICTORS OF JOB SATISFACTION AMONG IMO ANGLICAN CLERGYMEN

Abstract

Job satisfaction is conceptualized in this study as the emotional, cognate orbehavioural reactions a person expresses in relation to their occupation. It is reflected in an individual.s level of commitment to work, the feelings of joy and comfort they attribute to the work they do amongst others. The priestly vocation is an occupation which is assumed to be ordinarily satisfying despite challenges like occupational stress and transfer of the priest. This study examined the impact of occupational stress and transfer on job satisfactionamong Anglican clergymen. Five hypotheses were postulated and tested. 150 Clergymen were drawn from Anglican Communion in Imo State using purposive sampling method. Their ages ranged from 22 to 65 years, with a mean age of 43.67years. The participants were administered with the job . related tension scale and Minnesota satisfaction questionnaire, while transfer and age were measured as categorical variables. Cross sectional survey design was adopted, multiple regression analysis was used for data analyses withSPSS version 21. Occupational stress was found to have a significant moderate negative relationship with job satisfaction and a significant predictor of it; while transfer and age had insignificant low negative relationship that were not predictive of job satisfaction. The study recommends that the Anglican Communion in Imo State should incorporate ministerial strategies that would aim at reducing the stressors affecting the clergy, like increasing number of pastors in a parish and providing stress management programmes.