in any organizational environment, stress may produce either positive or negative results.
Selye (1950, p. 55) considered the possibility that a variety of damaging influences, or stressors, could produce the same reactions, or stress outcomes, within an organism. He was the first to publicly hold that, while excessive stress may be damaging to an organism, (1) an absence of stress was not desirable, and (2) moderate stress may have beneficial effects
(Selye, 1950, p. 470). This expanded concept of stress contained three levels: (1) the environment; (2) the organism's appraisal and evaluation of the environment; and (3) the organism's reaction to the environment. An organism appraises and evaluates the environment as threatening, helpful, or neutral. Responses on the part of an organism may be psychological, physiological, or both. This perception of stress is significant in several ways. One of the most important is the recognition that it is not
...