Mental health of garment factory personnel in Bangladesh

Abstract

Background: Impaired mental health conditions in the workplace reduce the productivity of the workers, officials and organization as well. In Bangladesh, currently, more than four million workforces involved in garments factories and these workplaces concentrated mainly in Dhaka and Chittagong. This female predominant sector contributes more than 80% of export in our country. Psychological wellbeing, Stress and Depressive illness negatively influence the productivity of garments personal. There are several local pieces of research conducted in past to explore specific issues of mental health of garments workers only. The objective of the study is to assess the mental health status of the garments factory personnel including officials, supervisors and workers in a quantitative manner. Methods: This cross-sectional study conducted among 300 participants of 06 different garments factories located in Dhaka and Chittagong district. The data collected with the help of 1) Sociodemographic questionnaire 2) Depression Anxiety and Stress Scale (DASS-21) 3) Brief COPE scale 4) Psychological wellbeing scale 5) Lam Employment Absenteeism and presentism Scale (LEAPS) and the statistical analysis was done by SPSS 16 version. The DASS-21, Brief COPE and Psychological wellbeing scales are locally adapted and validated scales along with good psychometric properties. Results: The overall mean of the total psychological wellbeing score of garments employee found 212.12 and among them, 28.3% were below the normal mean score (normal mean 216). The 23.3% (n=70) of garments personnel having at least one or more mental health conditions like depression, anxiety or stress. The mean score of maladaptive coping techniques is 20.99 (normal mean 30) and the mean scores of adaptive coping techniques are 50.88 (normal mean 40). The study also found that 16% of the employee having presentism and 18% showed absenteeism (within the last 02 weeks of the interview).

It revealed that for personnel who have been suffering from depression; anxiety and stress, their total psychological wellbeing mean score and productivity are significantly (p<0.001) lower than healthy colleagues. The adaptive stress-coping positively (correlation coefficient= 0.590) and maladaptive stress-coping inversely (correlation coefficient= - 0.300) correlated with total psychological wellbeing. The employee who practices maladaptive stress coping, having significant (p<0.001) lower productivity than their counterpart and such type of stress coping significantly (p<0.001) higher among the low-income group comparing others. Conclusion: The study found that productivity is influenced by the mental health conditions of the employee of Bangladeshi garments. So, the provision of mental health assessment and care in the garments sector can play the role to raise the productivity of garments personnel.