Changes in supervisors’ behavior lead to changes in the workplace environment and could reduce aggression, poor manner to job, and physical and emotional strain in workers [1]. Moreover, supervisors’ leadership styles exert an impact on their performance, and leadership style, work environment, and job satisfaction are important factors affecting workers’ performance [2]. Furthermore, support from supervisors increases productivity indirectly by reducing the occurrence of presenteeism [3], and their communication styles and personality traits affect organizational productivity [4]. In addition, supervisors’ personalities and job stress levels have been associated with workers’ exposure to bullying in the workplace [5].

Supervisors’ behavior could influence workers’ job stress levels, and work-related stress is a serious problem that could exert an adverse effect on employees’ health [6, 7]. In particular, support from supervisors is an important factor affecting workers’ job satisfaction, and supervisors influence workers’ emotion [8]. In addition, supervisors’ behavior influences workers’ well-being, turnover intention, and job satisfaction [8–11]. For example, positive managerial behavior in the workplace could improve employees’ well-being [12], while destructive managerial leadership could exert an adverse effect [13]. Moreover, support from supervisors and coworkers, the maintenance of a relaxed atmosphere in the workplace, and increased respect for workers could reduce rates of presenteeism [14].

In previous studies, one of the many questions of the job stress questionnaire (e.g., Korean Occupational Stress Scale) used the question, "My boss helps me complete the task.", or there was a study on supervisor support [9, 15, 16]. For this reason, studies in the past have only been able to evaluate some of the various supervisors’ behaviors, and no studies have evaluated the supervisors’ behaviors using more detailed questionnaire.

The objective of the present study was to analyze the effect of supervisors’ behaviors using more detailed questionnaire, using data from the Fourth Korean Working Conditions Survey (KWCS), conducted in 2014.

This study aimed to examine the effects of supervisors’ behavior on job stress in Korean workers. In this study, Feedback, Respectful behaviors, and Good at planning were significant results with job stress. When a supervisor gives feedback, work stress of worker was high. When supervisors respect workers or organize their work well Workers’ stress was low.

In this study, Feedback, Respectful behaviors and Good at planning showed significant results.

First, the results of the current study showed that supervisors’ provision of work-related feedback increased workers’ stress levels. This finding was consistent with those of a previous study indicating that supervisors’ provision of work-related feedback increased job stress in workers [6]. However, another study showed that supervisors’ provision of feedback in an appropriate environment reduced work-related stress in workers [17]. Numerous studies have shown that the environment in which supervisors provided feedback exerted both positive and negative effects on employees’ job stress levels [17–20]. Moreover, supervisors’ feedback was shown to influence both positive factors, such as person-organization fit and organizational commitment, and negative factors, such as role stress or burnout [20]; in addition, feedback environments exerted either positive or negative effects according to the characteristics of the organization or individual workers [18]. In previous studies, defensive or self-deceitful workers were more affected by bad feedback than good feedback [21]. According to Steelman, “favorable feedback” is expressed as the frequency of receiving positive feedback such as compliments from the perspective of the employee receiving the feedback, and “unfavorable feedback” is the frequency of complaints from managers or colleagues And the frequency of negative feedback such as criticism [22]. Both “favorable feedback” and “unfavorable feedback” are important in reducing the deviance of the worker in terms of the feedback environment [17].

Second, when a supervisor respect workers, the worker’s stress appeared to be low. In previous studies, there have been few studies on the relationship between supervisors’ respectful behaviors and worker’s job stress. According to Cobb, social support consists of three components: information that they are being cared for and loved, information that they are being esteemed, and valued, and information that they belong to one of the group members. In this study, the meaning of ‘Respectful behavior’ means ‘my supervisor respects me personally’ and is one of the components of social support according to the definition of Cobb [23]. There are studies that suggest that social support affects worker’s job stress [23, 24].

Third, when the supervisor’s planning ability was good, the stress level was low. The meaning of “planning” in this study means to organize and plan work well. In previous studies, there have been few study on the relationship between supervisors’ planning ability and job stress. However, there have been studies that have increased job stress when work overload has increased [25, 26]. Supervisors are in an important position to manage role stress. They can influence role overload by determining the scope of work of an employee, and can monitor the worker’s impact on a role. When workers experience quantitative overload, they can help workers by analyzing their work, providing training that helps them work, or introducing workers who do a similar job. Or to help workers who are experiencing quantitative overload by distributing part of the work to another worker or by putting in another worker [27]. With these organizing or planning approaches, managers can reduce psychological strain by preventing worker overload [28].

The present study was subject to some limitations. For example, although the KWCS, which was a cross-sectional study, demonstrated an association between supervisors’ behavior and workers’ stress, the inference of causality in this relationship was limited. In addition, psychosocial stress, outcome variables, and independent variables were measured via a self-report questionnaire in the current study, which could have led to response biases. Moreover, as work-related stress was not measured using a standardized instrument, such as the Korean Occupational Stress Scale, in the present study, the precision of the measurement of this variable was limited. Despite these limitations, the present study clarified the association between supervisors’ behavior and job stress in workers, using nationally representative data collected via the 2014 KWCS.

According to the present study, supervisors’ behaviors affected on job stress of Korean workers. Therefore, supervisors working in private-sector organizations with fewer than 300 employees should consider the characteristics of workers and be provided appropriate feedback education, receive training in respectful behaviors and organizational skills, which could contribute to the reduction of job stress in workers.