A1 Journal article (refereed)
Coping with Technostress in the Software Industry : Coping Strategies and Factors Underlying their Selection (2025)
Siitonen, V., Ritonummi, S., Salo, M., Pirkkalainen, H., & Mauno, S. (2025). Coping with Technostress in the Software Industry : Coping Strategies and Factors Underlying their Selection. Journal of Systems and Software, In Press. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jss.2025.112341
JYU authors or editors
Publication details
All authors or editors: Siitonen, Valtteri; Ritonummi, Saima; Salo, Markus; Pirkkalainen, Henri; Mauno, Saija
Journal or series: Journal of Systems and Software
ISSN: 0164-1212
eISSN: 1873-1228
Publication year: 2025
Volume: In Press
Publisher: Elsevier
Publication country: United States
Publication language: English
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jss.2025.112341
Publication open access: Openly available
Publication channel open access: Partially open access channel
Abstract
Software industry employees are subject to the harmful effects of technostress, which is caused by information technology use.
Aim
The aim of the current study is to understand how software industry employees cope with technostress and how their employers can best support these coping efforts.
Method
We employed the critical incident technique using a qualitative approach and collected our data through a questionnaire. In total, we collected and analyzed 715 real-life accounts of coping with critical technostress incidents from employees working in the industry.
Results
We identified 27 strategies for coping with technostress and provided a comprehensive categorization of them. Additionally, we uncovered novel coping strategies and highlighted the contextual (organizational and personal) factors that influence the selection of coping strategies.
Conclusions
Our findings help in explaining the reasons and motives for up-taking specific coping strategies in the software industry. Based on our findings, employees invest considerable effort into coping with technostress, but do not receive enough support for their coping efforts. We offer insightful suggestions for support mechanisms that could be used by software organizations to enhance employees’ coping efforts and well-being.
Keywords: technostress; coping; software industry; software development; software engineering
Free keywords: technostress; coping; coping strategy; software industry; software development; software engineering
Contributing organizations
Related projects
- Academy Research Fellow Salo Markus: Technostress from the use of robots and intelligent systems at work
- Salo, Markus
- Research Council of Finland
- Software Developers’ Technostress and Work Productivity: Finding Ways to Manage Interruptions, Invasion, and Overload
- Salo, Markus
- Foundation for Economic Education
Ministry reporting: Yes
VIRTA submission year: 2025
Preliminary JUFO rating: 3
- Information Systems Science (Faculty of Information Technology IT) TJT
- Value Creation for Cyber-Physical Systems and Services (Faculty of Information Technology IT) CPSS
- Psychology (Department of Psychology PSY) PSY
- School of Wellbeing (University of Jyväskylä JYU) JYU.Well
- Emergent work in the digital era (University of Jyväskylä JYU) EWIDE