Theorizing to Improve Mental Health in Multicultural Construction Industries: An Intercultural Coping Model

Abstract

Construction workers are exposed to a range of stressors that lead to mental ill-health. In a multicultural construction workplace, the interactions between workers with different cultural backgrounds may aggravate mental health issues. Existing studies on coping typically focus on a reactive approach to managing stressors in the absence of cultural-related factors. This approach is inadequate in addressing mental health issues in a culturally diverse construction workplace. This paper presents a critical review that synthesizes and analyses theories and models of stress and coping, proactive coping, occupational stress, acculturative stress, and intercultural competence to develop a conceptual model for managing mental health in a multicultural construction workforce. The proposed model relies upon a positive coping mechanism, i.e., intercultural coping, to manage stressful events during the entire coping process in a multicultural workplace, towards achieving sustained good mental health. The proposed conceptual model contributes to the development of coping theories and positive psychology approaches and provides effective coping strategies to enhance psychological well-being in a multicultural context.

Influence of Prefabricated Construction on the Mental Health of Workers: Systematic Review

“…The research team, which includes experts in the field of construction health and safety management research and with practical experience in the construction industry, ensured that the keyword list was comprehensive and contained terms that are established in the literature. In addition, past review studies [26][27][28][29] on construction workers' mental health were consulted to confirm the comprehensiveness and adequacy of the selected keywords. The keywords were carefully selected to include possible alternate references for the study focus: mental health and the construction industry.…”

Construction Workplace Trends and Work Health and Safety

“…It is thus necessary to investigate whether and how cultural diversity can influence WHS in construction workplaces, and further how organizations and individuals can respond to this workplace trend. Liu et al's [4] review paper synthesized and analyzed theories and models of stress and coping, proactive coping, occupational stress, acculturative stress, and intercultural competence, and developed a conceptual model for managing mental health in a multicultural construction workforce. Their review also explained the practical implications for construction organizations and workers in relation to their conceptual model, and provided implications for future research.…”

Barriers and Difficulties of Students in the Mathematics Learning Process in Junior High Schools

“…That is what causes learning difficulties in children generally arise from 2 factors, namely internal factors, namely challenges that come from the child himself, and external factors, namely difficulties that come from outside the child; other researchers add that learning difficulties from internal factors are divided into two sub-factors, namely physiological factors seen from the physical condition of students, and psychological factors seen from the psychological condition of students (Liu et al, 2021;Sakdiyakorn & Wattanacharoensil, 2018). While learning difficulties from external factors consist of three sub-factors namely; family factors, community factors, and school factors (Yetkin Özbük & Coşkun, 2020;Lumbantoruan & Manalu, 2024).…”