Personality traits, the level of perceived stress and coping styles in the profession of an accountant.

Abstract

Introduction and purpose of this paper. The goal of the conducted study was to verify whether personality traits of persons working in the capacity of an accountant stand out against the entire population, what coping styles are preferred by accountants, and whether they influence the level of stress felt in their professional life.

Material and methodology. To obtain answers to the above questions, 74 women employed in the capacity of accountants, of different age, job seniority, education and position were surveyed. The methods applied were: Perceived Stress Scale PSS – 10, NEO – FFI Personality Inventory, and the Coping Inventory for Stressful Situations CISS questionnaire.

Results. The conducted analysis suggests that the demographic data taken into consideration, i.e. age, job seniority, education, and position are not significantly correlated with personality traits, preferred coping styles, and the level of perceived stress. The persons working in the capacity of an accountant are characterised by higher diligence and lower susceptibility to neurosis in comparison with the average results of the population. The coping style preferred by the subjects was the task-oriented style. Their level of perceived stress was higher than the average results of the population.

Conclusions. The presented results do not give unequivocal answer concerning the causes of higher than standard average level of stress perceived by accountants. Although it remains within the limits of average level, the preferred task-oriented style, high diligence and low susceptibility to neurosis should be conducive to lowering the level of perceived stress. There are probably other factors influencing perceived stress that were not considered in this study.