Date of Graduation
7-2021
Document Type
Dissertation
Degree Name
Doctor of Education in Human Resource and Workforce Development (EdD)
Degree Level
Graduate
Department
Rehabilitation, Human Resources and Communication Disorders
Advisor/Mentor
Maddox, James F.
Committee Member
Samuels, Mandel G.
Second Committee Member
Blisard, Paul
Keywords
Accommodations; Adult learning; Andragogy; Anxiety; Business education; Disorders; Human Resource Development
Abstract
Anxiety disorders are the most common mental illness in the U.S. and affect 40 million adults, or 18.1% of the population each year. Anxiety plays an essential role in encouraging productive learning outcomes; however, uncontrolled anxiety could result in heightened emotions that create barriers to learning. Employees who have anxiety disorders may experience these barriers to learning when in traditional training programs and may require support or accommodations to boost their unique learning needs for development in the workplace. Human Resource Development (HRD) professionals’ challenge is how best to intervene when an employee exhibits behaviors of learning anxiety to nurture and promote productive workplace learning that leads to skill development and career advancement. This basic qualitative study seeks to determine how individuals with an anxiety disorder may be better supported in the workplace through accommodations and using best practices in anxiety management that are typically applied in clinical settings or formal education environments. The research questions ask how individuals respond to anxiety in workplace learning and what practices they feel would help them manage the heightened anxiety. Data was collected through semi-structured interviews consisting of open-ended questions. The voluntary participants, who self-identified as having learning anxiety, were selected using theoretical random sampling. Content analysis was applied to examine the data for codes, categories, and themes. Key results indicate that learning is impaired, which negatively impacts learning and job performance when one experiences learning anxiety. The data also revealed that the participants believed they would benefit from accommodations provided by HRD professionals who understand the detrimental impact of learning anxiety.
Citation
Piscitelli, A. (2021). Overcoming Learning Anxiety in Workplace Learning: A Study of Best Practices and Training Accommodations that Improve Workplace Learning. Graduate Theses and Dissertations Retrieved from https://scholarworks.uark.edu/etd/4169
Included in
Adult and Continuing Education Commons, Educational Assessment, Evaluation, and Research Commons, Educational Leadership Commons
