"Occupational Safety Education Programmes for Managing WorkRelated Stress among Adult Education Lecturers in Public Universities in Rivers State"

Abstract

The study examined occupational safety education programmes for managing work-related stress among Adult Education lecturers in public universities in Rivers State. To achieve the purpose of the study, the study developed three (3) objectives of the study, research questions and hypotheses that guided the conduct of the study. The study adopted descriptive survey design. The area of the study was Port Harcourt Metropolis in Rivers State. The population of the study was made up of 45 Adult Education lecturers in public universities in Rivers State, (Rivers State University, University of Port Harcourt and Ignatius Ajuru University of Education). The entire population of this study was taken as census without sampling. This is because it is small and manageable. The instrument used for the study was a structured questionnaire titled: “Occupational Safety Education Programmes for Managing WorkRelated Stress Questionnaire. The instrument was validated by two experts. A test of internal consistency using Cronbach Alpha method was used for the reliability of the instrument. Cumulative reliability coefficient of 0.82was obtained showing the instrument was reliable.The research questions were analysed using mean and standard deviation statistics while the null hypotheses were tested using z-test statistics at 0.05 level of significance. Based on the analysis, the study revealed that occupational safety education on health, unsafe act auditing and good housekeeping helps in managing work-related stress among Adult Education lecturers in public universities in Rivers State to a high extent. Based on the findings, the study recommended among others that the university authorities in collaboration with the universities and external medical centres should organize health seminars, conferences and workshops on the need for regular medical checkups, proper nutrition and eating habits, regular exercises, good sleeping habits, importance of vacations and discourage self medication. However, it was also concluded that occupational safety education programmes on health, unsafe act auditing and good housekeeping, are found to help lecturers manage these work-related stress to a high extent.