Relationship between occupational stress and social support in flight nurses.

Social support has been consistently implicated as a means of dealing with stress. The purpose of this study was to examine the relationship between the levels of occupational stress and social support in flight nurses. Chosen by systematic random sampling, 160 flight nurses were asked to complete demographic, social support, and occupational stress questionnaires. Hans Selye's stress response model was used as the conceptual framework. The 113 respondents were predominately white females with university preparation. They reported low levels of occupational stress and high levels of social support (r = -0.42, p less than 0.01). Statistically significant (p less than 0.01) negative correlations were also found between social support and three of the four occupational stress subscales: job dissatisfaction, organizational stress, and somatic distress. The results of this study support the hypothesis that high levels of perceived social support are associated with low levels of perceived occupational stress.