ABSTRACT
This chapter aims to examine job stress and psychosocial work risk factors to work-related musculoskeletal disorders (WRMSDs) and present some possible theoretical causative models and mechanisms in the relationship between work stress and WRMSDs. The World Health Organization expert committee described ‘work-related’ diseases as multifactorial, where the work environment and the performance of work contribute significantly but as only two of a number of factors that contribute to the causation of the disease. While stressors can be of a more emergent or traumatic character, the transactional tradition has paid a special attention to the potential obnoxious influence of more low-intensity but often chronic daily hassles, such as those generated by most job stressors. The duration and severity of the stressors will influence the severity of the stress response. Catecholamines respond almost immediately to acute stress exposure and prepare the organism for the ‘fight-or-flight’ response.
