Development and validation of a work stressor scale for Australian farming families.

OBJECTIVE: The aim of this research was to gain insight into the key stressors for Australian farming families. It is well established that the farming work environment consists of a number of unique stressors which arise from dependency on factors beyond an individual's control (e.g. climate conditions) as well as the overlap between work and family environments. Despite this, limited research has included family factors in the assessment of stress felt by farmers and their families. This research sought to develop a scale of stressors for farming families in an Australian sample.

DESIGN: A survey design was used for validity and reliability studies. The validity study involved assessment of factor structure, concurrent validity and discriminant validity. The reliability study used a test-retest reliability design.

PARTICIPANTS: Participants were recruited from across Australia (38% Queensland; 30% New South Wales) and multiple industries (43% beef; 27% broadacre cropping; 26% horticulture). The validity study involved 278 participants and the reliability study involved 53 participants.

MAIN OUTCOME MEASURE: Development of a Farming Family Stressor scale.

RESULTS: The generated Farming Family Stressor scale presented satisfactory levels of concurrent validity (e.g. r = .73 against the Farm Stress Survey total score), discriminant validity (e.g. r = -.42 to r = .53 against the Satisfaction with Life and Kessler-10 total scores, respectively), internal consistency (Cronbach's alpha >.90) and test-retest reliability (rho > .66).

CONCLUSION: This research lends insight into the complexity of stressors for farming families and has implications for occupational health and mental health programs that seek to reduce stress and improve health outcomes for that group.