The Impact Of ICT Technostress On Employees' Emotional Exhaustion:Mediating Effect Of Role Conflict And Role Overload

In modern enterprises,employees are facing various kinds of stress.One of the factors leading to stress is technology.ICT technostress refers to the psychological,physical and behavioral discomfort caused by individual's direct or indirect exposure to modern information and communication technology(ICT).At present,there are few domestic studies on the topic of ICT technostress at work,and the negative impact and mechanism of technostress on employees' physical and mental health are worth exploring.Existing foreign studies have pointed out that ICT technostress can bring negative effects on individuals' psychology,such as emotional exhaustion.However,previous literatures mainly studied the direct effect of ICT technostress on emotional exhaustion,but few studies have discussed the path through which technostress can influence emotional exhaustion.So in this paper,firstly,based on the Conservation of Resources Theory,we will discuss the impact of ICT technostress on employees' emotional exhaustion.Then,from the perspective of the Sociotechnical System Theory,an organization is composed of social systems and technical systems.The application of ICT in the organizations can change the roles of the individuals in their workplaces.Many studies have shown that role conflict and role overload are important factors directly predicting emotional exhaustion.Therefore,a model with role conflict and role overload as dual mediators is established to study the mechanism of ICT technostress on emotional exhaustion,that is,whether ICT technostress can affect emotional exhaustion through role conflict and role overload based on the Sociotechnical System Theory.We collected data by means of questionnaire survey.The research objects are the employees of three enterprises in Jiangsu province who use information and communication technology in their daily work.Finally,we made an empirical analysis with 316 valid samples.The analysis found that ICT technostress can positively predict employees' emotional exhaustion,and the dual mediating effect of role conflict and role overload on ICT technostress and emotional exhaustion is significant.However,from the perspective of specific mediating effect,role overload plays a major mediating role between ICT technostress and emotional exhaustion.But the mediating effect of role conflict on ICT technostress and emotional exhaustion is not significant,which needs to be further discussed.