Stress-management strategies of firefighters : a fortigenic approach

Abstract

Firefighters not only perform a firefighting function, but also render emergency, fire prevention and rescue services, all of which are inherently stressful. This research was undertaken to determine the relationship between certain psychological strengths of firefighters and the strategies they adopt to cope with stress. The measuring instruments were applied to the entire sample, after which a stanine scale was used to distinguish between individuals who achieved low and high scores respectively with regard to psychological strengths. An interview, based on the phenomenological paradigm, was conducted using five firefighters from each of the low-scoring and high-scoring groups. An analysis of the qualitative results indicates that firefighters with high levels of psychological strengths cope differently with stress compared with those with `weak' psychological strengths.