CHAPTER – III

RESEARCH METHODOLOGY

3.1. INTRODUCTION

Definitions of Research

Acc to Rusk : “Research is a point of view, an attitude of inquiry or a frame of mind, it

asks questions which have hitherto not been asked, and it seeks to answer them by

following a fairly definite procedure. It is not a mere theorizing, but rather an attempt to

elicit facts to face them once they have been assembled”. Research is likewise not an

attempt to bolster up pre-conceived opinions, and it implies a readiness to accept the

conclusions to which an inquiry leads, no matter how unwelcome they may prove. When

successful, research adds to the scientific knowledge of the subject.

Acc to George. J. Mouly “He defines research as – The systematic and scholarly

application of the scientific method interpreted in its broader sense, to the solution of

social studies problems; conversely, any systematic study designed to promote the

development of social studies as a science can be considered research”.

Acc to Francis G Cornell : “The best research is that which is reliable, verifiable and

exhaustive, so that it provides information in which we have confidence. The main point

here is that research is, literally speaking, a kind of human behavior, an activity in which

people engage. By this definition all intelligent human behavior involves some research.”

(Yogesh Kumar Singh, 2006).

Keeping in view the day to day increase in organizational stress for the employees and

ignorance about coping strategies by individuals, the following topic was selected for the

study : “A study on work- stress among employees of textile industry in Coimbatore

city”
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3.2. RESEARCH OBJECTIVES

The following are the objectives of the study,

 To find and evaluate the level of stress among the employees in textile units.

 To identify the major sources of stress and the factors responsible for stress

among Textile workers.

 To analyze the influence and impact of these factors among the employees of

different levels in textile units.

 To study different types of coping strategies adopted by the employees in stressful

conditions.

 To find out means/method of managing employee’s stress by the employers.

 To suggest better ways and means to reduce stress among the employees in select

Textile units in Coimbatore.

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3.3 RESEARCH DESIGN

1. Identifying the Problem

2. Actual Experience of Stress
Deciding for a Research (Observation, Listening)
proposal, Research
Objectives and
Hypothesis
3. Collection from
Literature
4 B. Conducting Pilot
4. A Designing Survey on 20 people
Questionnaire -

5. Deciding Sample

6. Data Analysis of Pilot Results and Inferences

Survey 1
1
.
7. Final Design of
Questionnaire RApproved
e
s
u
8. Implementation of lActual Collection of Data
Questionnaire t
s

9. Data Tabulation and

Using Ms Excel and
Classification SPSS- 15 and 16 Version

10. Data Analysis 11. Results Descriptive Statistics &

Detailed Analysis Inferential Statistics

12. Summary and 13. Recommendations and

Conclusions Suggestions

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Research design

A research design is the basic framework or plan for a study that guides the

collection of data and analysis of the data. The present study is descriptive in nature. A

descriptive research is one which is concerned with describing the characteristics of a

particular individual or of a group. Since this study describes the characteristics and

different behavioural pattern of employees influenced by stress, this research is certainly a

descriptive one.

Study Units

There are various units in the textile industry in Coimbatore city.

This study would be focused on top ten textile industries in Coimbatore city.

TEXTILE INDUSTRY LIST COLLECTED FROM SIMA

Si. Name of the textile industry

No

1 Sri Karthikeya Mills Pvt Ltd

2 Pricot Meridian Mills Pvt Ltd

3 Lakshmi Mills Pvt Ltd

4 Sri Narasimha Mills Pvt Ltd

5 Coimbatore Polytex Mills Pvt Ltd

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 6 Premier Mills Pvt Ltd

7 Combodia Mills Pvt Ltd

8 Jay Textiles Mills Pvt Ltd

9 Sri Jaganath Mills Pvt Ltd

10 Sri Kannapiran Mills Pvt Ltd

Table No:1.1 Textile Industries and their Employees strengths.

The employees working in the top ten textile industries of Coimbatore city are broadly

classified in to two, viz

1. Middle level employees

2. Low level employees.

It has been understood that the middle and low level employees have more work stress

compared to the work stress experienced by the top level employees. Hence it was decided

to study the aspect of work stress experienced by the middle and low level employees in

the textile industry of Coimbatore city. (Source: SIMA – 2013)

Population of the study:

The population of the study in all middle and low level employees in top ten textile

industry of Coimbatore city.

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 TABLE NO.1

Si. No Name of the textile Middle level Low level Total No of spindles
industry Employees Employees employees

Sri Karthikeya 23 670 693

Mills Pvt Ltd
2 Pricot Meridian 16 674 690
Mills Pvt Ltd
3 Lakshmi Mills Pvt 27 657 684
Ltd
4 Sri Narasimha Mills 29 574 603
Pvt Ltd
5 Coimbatore Polytex 26 504 530
Mills Pvt Ltd
6 Premier Mills Pvt 28 570 598
Ltd
7 Combodia Mills 22 453 475
Pvt Ltd
8 Jay Textiles Mills 28 264 293
Pvt Ltd
9 Sri Jaganath Mills 25 317 342
Pvt Ltd

10 Sri Kannapiran 26 327 353

Mills Pvt Ltd
Sample Design

As already stated, select units employing more than 1,000 factory employees

each, have been taken for the study and the sample was selected from these units.

The total number of factory employees working in the study units was 5260. Of

this, the researcher decided to study not less than 1000 employees (around 20%) for the

study. The sample size was 1052. Stratified sampling technique was applied to select

sample employees from each unit. The required number of employees was selected in

proportion to the total number of employees. Based on the proportion, the number of

employees selected from each unit has been given in Table No.2.

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TABLE NO. 2

Si. Name of the textile industry Middle Low level Total 20%
No level Employees emplo
Employees yees

1 Sri Karthikeya Mills Pvt Ltd 23 670 693 138.6

2 Pricot Meridian Mills Pvt Ltd2 16 674 690 138.0
3 Lakshmi Mills Pvt Ltd 27 657 684 136.8
4 Sri Narasimha Mills Pvt Ltd 29 574 603 120.6
5 Coimbatore Polytex Mills Pvt 26 504 530 106.0
Ltd
6 Premier Mills Pvt Ltd 28 570 598 114.0
7 Combodia Mills Pvt Ltd 22 453 475 95.0
8 Jay Textiles Mills Pvt Ltd 28 264 293 58.6
9 Sri Jaganath Mills Pvt Ltd 25 317 342 68.4
10 Sri Kannapiran Mills Pvt Ltd 26 327 353 70.6
5260 1052
Sampling Techniques

The employees from each unit were stratified on the basis of proportionate and 20 percent

of them were chosen on a random basis for conducting the research study.

Data Collection

The necessary data have been collected from both primary sources and secondary sources.

Primary Data

The primary data was collected afresh. The primary data was collected with the help of a

questionnaire. Moreover, the researcher used personal interview method and observation

method for collecting the required primary data.

Secondary Data

The secondary data for this study was collected from the company records, company

reports, magazines, and websites and published articles.’

3.4. Data Collection Tools

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B. Questionnaire: A well structured questionnaire comprising both open and

closed-ended questions, dichotomous questions and Likert‘s scale was designed and used

for conducting the personal interview. The questionnaire thus framed was pre-tested by

conducting a pilot study among the portion of respondents.

f) Personal interview: The questionnaire was used to collect opinions of the

respondents about their experience on stress. But, some of their opinions and feelings

which could not be expressed through the questionnaire were collected through personal

interviews.

g) Observation: The researcher felt that there was certain information which could

not be collected from either questionnaire or personal interview. Therefore, the researcher

observed the problems faced by the respondents due to stress at the work place.

Questionnaire Design

The questionnaire used for the study was divided into four parts as follows:

Set1- A- Causes of Stress–Organizational,

B-Causes of Stress–Personal

Set2- A-Consequences of Stress– Physical

B-Consequences of Stress–Psychological

C- Consequences of Stress–Behavioral

Set3- Coping with Stress- Relaxation techniques, Yoga, Meditation, Recreation,

Set4- A- Role of HR in Combating Stress - Counseling

B- Role of HR in Combating Stress - Policies.

The questionnaire comprised of a total of 119 items/questions. The Likert scale was used

to collect responses throughout. This ranged from 1 to 5, it had choices from (Strongly

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disagree =1, Disagree= 2, Neutral =3, Agree =4, Strongly Agree =5). Employees were

given the choice to select their preferences and mark accordingly.

The detail of the questions asked under each set was as follows:

Set 1A- Causes of Stress – Organizational . This asked the respondents questions about

causes of Stress (Organizational) in which the employees were asked to answer/ comment

on twenty six statements, all of which were closed ended.

Set 1B- Causes of Stress – Personal which had sixteen statements which emphasized on

personal / individual stress concentrating on knowing whether individuals suffered from

stress and what situations they were in, and to what extent the organization is responsible

etc.

Set- 2A- Consequences of Stress- Physical in which the employees were asked to answer/

comment on twelve statements. All the statements were again closed ended. Set-2B-

Consequences of Stress- Psychological which had eleven statements and Set-2C-

Consequences of Stress- Behavioral which had ten statements. The intention was to find

out whether the employees were suffering from stress, and whether the stress level was

taking a toll and other related illnesses and outcomes.

Set-3- Coping with Stress – Relaxation, Yoga , Medi tation , Recreation which had

fifteen statements and employees were asked to fill up the same. The researcher intended

to find out whether stress coping is possible and which technique would be more useful

and productive such as Yoga or Mediation or simply some relaxation techniques or

whether the organization should provide some recreation making it available in the

premises so that the environment itself is stress free.

Set-4A- Role of HR in Combating Stress– Counseling . This had twenty statements and

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employees were asked to fill up them as per the above mentioned Likert scale. The

researcher intended to find how HR is intervening in employees health and well being,

what is the level of HR as a mentor and facilitator, how HR can help reduce stress, what

type of strategies are being implemented by the HR department etc.

Set-4B- Role of HR in Combating Stress – Policies. The questions under this were nine

and the same scale was used to collect the data. Here the intention of researcher was to

find out how the HR Policies were designed and whether they were accepted by

employees, what is degree of acceptance and how HR can really create a stress free

atmosphere.

3.5. Reliability and Validity

All social research involves measurement or observation. And, whenever we measure or

observe we are concerned with whether we are measuring what we intend to measure or

how our observations are influenced by the circumstances in which they are made. The

content validity was tested by giving the questionnaire to three experts in the field of

Organizational Behavior, Human Resource Management and Industrial Psychology and

their feedback has been used to finalize the questionnaire.

As mentioned earlier, the questionnaire was divided into four parts Set- 1, Set-2,Set- 3 and

Set-4. To test the reliability of the questionnaire Cronbach’s alpha test for all the sets of

questionnaire was carried out.

Reliability Statistics

Cronbach’s Cronbach’s alpha based N of

Alpha on Standardized items items

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Set 1-A Causes of
.652 .634 26
Organizational Stress
Set1- B Causes of Stress –
.937 .938 16
Personal
Set2- Consequences of stress –
.929 .931 12
physical
Set2- Consequences of stress –
.929 .930 11
psychological
Set2- Consequences of stress –
.912 .912 10
Behavioral
Set3- Coping with Stress –
.842 .852 15
Relaxation, Yoga , Meditation
Set4- Role of HR in
.944 .944 20
combating Stress- Counseling
Set4- Role of HR in combating
.906 .907 9
Stress- Policies

Hence the questionnaire which stood the test for internal validity of the questionnaire.

3.6. TOOLS FOR ANALYSIS

The statistical tools used to analyze the data with reference to the selected objectives of the

study, include Simple Percentage, Mean, Range (Minimum and Maximum), Standard

Deviation, Chi square Test, ANOVA, Multiple Regression, Henry Garrett Ranking

Technique, and Factor analysis.

Chi-square Test :

The degree of influence of the independent variables pertaining to respondent‘s

level of perception towards their life and work was studied by applying chi-square

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test. In order to identify the factors influencing the level of perception

among the employees in the paper industry, a Chi-square ( ) test was applied and the

formula is given below.

2
2 (O E)

Chi–square test ( ) =

With Degree of Freedom (D.F.) = (c-1) (r-1) where,

O = Observed frequency,

E = Expected frequency,

c = Number of Columns,

r = Number of Rows.

Multiple Regression Analysis

The regression is a statistical relationship between two or more variables. When there are

two or more independent variables, the analysis that describes such relationship is the

multiple regression. This analysis is adopted where there is one dependent variable that is

presumed to be a function of two or more independent variables. In multiple regression, a

linear composite of explanatory variables is formed, in such a way that it has maximum

correlation with an active criterion variable. The main objective of using this technique is

to predict the variability of the

dependent variable, based on its co-variance with all the independent variables. It is useful

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to predict the level of dependent phenomenon through Multiple Regression Analysis

models, if the levels of independent variables were given. The linear multiple regression

problem is to estimate coefficients of β1, β2, ….., βj and β0 such that the expression,

Y = β0 + β1 + β2 X2+………+ βj XK

provides a good estimate of an individual Y score based on the X scores,

Where,

Y= Level of Stress X1=

Respondents‘ Age

X2= Respondents‘ Gender

X3= Respondents‘ Education

X4= Respondents‘ Designation

X5= Respondents‘ Department

X6= Respondents‘ Salary

X7= Respondents‘ Marital Status

X8= Respondents‘ Number of dependents

X9= Respondents‘ Family system

X10= Respondents‘ Working Experience

X11= Respondents‘ Working company name

X12= Respondents‘ Working Time

and β0, β1, β2 ,……., βj are the parameters to be estimated.

Discriminant function analysis

Discriminant analysis is a technique designed to characterize the relationship

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between a set of variables, often called the response are predictor variables, and a grouping

variable with a relatively small number of categories. To do so, discriminant function

creates a linear combination of the predictors that best characterizes the differences among

the groups. The technique is related to both regression and multi-variate analysis of

variants, and as such it is another general linear model technique. Discriminant attempts to

find the linear combinations of the predictors that best separate the populations. The study

assumes two predictor variables i.e., X are the low, Y are the high. How respondents do

managing stress while in working in paper industry? Does all the factors selected in the

analysis differ among these groups? In general, what are all the variables which

significantly discriminate the respondents of one group from other group. Discriminant

function analysis answers these questions in three stages viz., 1. Construction of

discriminant function 2. Classification 3. Interpretation.

Garrett Ranking Technique

This technique was used to rank the different problems faced by the paper industry

employees and managing methods followed by them. In this method the respondents were

asked to rank the given problem and coping strategies according to the magnitude of the

problem. The order of merit given by the respondents are converted into ranks by using

the following formula.

100 (R ij 0.5)

Percentage Position =

Nj

The percentage position of each rank thus obtained is converted into scores by referring to

the table given by Henry Garrett. Then for each factor the scores of individual respondents

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were added together and divided by the total number of respondents for whom the scores

were added. These mean scores for all the factors were arranged in order of ranks and the

inference were drawn.

Factor analysis

Factor Analysis is used to study a complex product or service in order to identify the major

characteristics or factors considered important by the respondent. The purpose of factor

analysis is to determine the responses to the several numbers of statements, which are

significantly correlated. Factor analysis is applied to assess the significance of the factors

that are responsible for employees‘occupational stress.

3.7. LIMITATIONS OF THE STUDY

This study is not without its limitations, which should be noted. The present investigation

was carried out under the following limitations:

1. The study was confined to adults (aged 20 - 50) only.

2. This study was conducted in Coimbatore city of Tamil-Nadu state, India.

3. As the study was for 2 years only, time was a limiting factor. Due to time

constraint, only large scale units were taken up for this study.

4. The behavioural symptoms of stress were excluded from the study.

5. Only self-report data were obtained. The findings made in the study may be biased

by the incorrect information given by the employees.

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