Conference Program Continuing Education Workshops Speakers Collaborating Organizations Conference Planning & Organization Abstracts

The American Psychological Association (APA), in collaboration with the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health (NIOSH), convened the fourth interdisciplinary conference on work, stress and health, WORK, STRESS AND HEALTH '99: ORGANIZATION OF WORK IN A GLOBAL ECONOMY, at the Baltimore Convention Center, March 11-13, 1999, in Baltimore, Maryland. Pre-conference Continuing Education workshops were held on March 10th, 1999.

This was the fourth time in which APA and NIOSH joined together to convene a national conference on occupational stress and health. The first workplace stress and health conference, Work and Wellbeing: An Agenda for the 90s, was held in November 1990 and attracted about 300 attendees. The widespread interest and need for further information evident at this conference convinced APA and NIOSH to continue the work and to convene the second conference, Stress in the 90s: A Changing Workforce in a Changing Workplace, in November 1992. It attracted approximately 700 individuals from nearly 2 dozen countries. The growing agenda around occupational stress and health evident from the second conference led APA and NIOSH to convene the third conference, Work, Stress, and Health '95: Creating Healthier Workplaces, in September 1995. Over 850 people attended from 20 countries.

• New Work Contracts

Contingent work, temporary work, part-time work, wage and benefit structure, underemployment

• Organizational Policies and Work Redesign

Lean production, downsizing, continuous improvement, business process re-engineering, labor-management partnerships, introduction of new technologies

• Hours of Work

Work overload, shift work, compressed work schedules, flexible work hours, overtime

• The Workforce of the 21st Century

Demographics (aging, gender, workforce diversity), accommodations for disabled workers, welfare to work, skill obsolescence and reskilling

• Psychosocial Factors and Health in Today's Workplace

Psychosocial risk factors for illness and injury, high risk occupations (healthcare), health outcomes (musculoskeletal disorders, cardiovascular disease, traumatic injury, psychological disorders, substance abuse, post-traumatic stress), social and economic costs of job stress

• Work, Family, and Community

Child/elder care, multiple jobs, work-family balance, work at home, EAP, managed care

• Advances in Research Methodologies

New methods of measurement, research designs, cross-national comparisons, participatory action research, national and international data needs, models of stress and health

• Bridging from Research to Practice

Application and communication of research findings, collaboration of researchers and customers, regulatory and legislative initiatives, training in Occupational Health Psychology

• Best Practices: Celebrating Successful Strategies for Preventing Stress

Innovative work-family and benefit programs, labor-management collaborations, healthy work organizations