At present, the use of new information and communication technologies (ICT) demands the management of computer tools and the Internet, introduced in most productive sectors and in all functional areas of organizations, becoming an indispensable part of these [1, 2] Despite the benefits of technology on the technical and social level, technological changes can cause human and social problems[ 3].
In Peru, in relation to the implementation of ICTs, the National Institute of Statistics and Informatics and the Sectoral Offices of the National Statistical System, during the year 2019, registered 100 thousand 627 companies, of which 94.1% of the companies used mobile telephony, 93.8% used computers, 92.2% used the internet, 84.6% used fixed telephony, 17.4% used intranet, 15.1% Personal Digital Assistant (PDA) / Tablet and 7.4% extranet. However, only 23.3% of the business units trained their workers in the use of Information and Communication Technologies, while 76.7% did not. Therefore, it is necessary to add that the use of ICT creates demanding conditions in the workplace, and these demands have the potential to create stress in workers. Due to this, phenomena such as techno-stress originate [4, 5, 6, 7].
According to [6], techno-stress is defined as the restlessness, fear, tension and anxiety that arises when learning and using computer-related technologies, directly or indirectly, and which ultimately ends with rejection. psychological and emotional that prevents further learning or using such technologies. A difference between common stress and technostress is the effect it generates on one: in common stress, positive stress (Eustress) and negative stress (Distress) appear, unlike technostress, which manifests itself in a clearly negative way, affecting the activities of the workers. Similarly, another notable difference between common stress and technostress is in the types they have. While common stress presents the aforementioned types (positive and negative stress), the term technostress mainly encompasses three: technofatigue, referring to the situation in which a person experiences feelings of tiredness and exhaustion (mental and cognitive) as a consequence of use of technology, also complemented by skeptical attitudes and beliefs of ineffectiveness with the use of ICT; techno-addiction, which consists of a phenomenon characterized by the uncontrollable compulsion and need to make continuous, obsessive and compulsive use of ICTs and new technologies at all times and in all places [8], and techno-anxiety, in which the subject experiences high levels of unpleasant physiological arousal, and feels tension and discomfort due to the present or future use of some type of ICT. In addition techno-anxiety stems from technophobia, understood as the feeling of fear and/or unjustified and irrational rejection of technology. Additionally, techno-stress has been seen as a potential cause of Burnout syndrome, work fatigue, psychosocial discomfort and a decrease in arousal levels [3].
The need to design psychometric tools on technostress arose in the sixties and, over the years, measuring instruments on technostress have been developing. Its final objective was to gauge the degree to which attitudes towards technologies affect the psychosocial health of users and, consequently, find solutions. Mainly in the United States, technostress was managed with instruments such as the Computer Anxiety Rating Scale (CARS-C), Computer Thoughts Survey (CTS-C), General Attitudes Toward Computers Scale (GATCS-C), Computer Technology Hassless Scale (CTHS) and Technostress Questionnaire (TQ) [3, 1]. Likewise, numerous investigations resort to manufacturing their own techno-stress instruments [9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15]. However, these fail to encompass the concept of techno-stress in its entirety, being partial to anxiety or being pigeonholed in the impact of a type of technology, computers, instead of incorporating ICT in general. Given these limitations, the WONT-Psychosocial Prevention research team from Spain presented the RED-Tecnoestrés, which contemplates the experience of technostress from the dimensions of skepticism, fatigue, anxiety, ineffectiveness and, additionally, incorporating addiction to technology [3]. This last instrument has been used, especially, in the Latin American region [16, 17, 18, 19, 20, 21, 22, 23, 24], so its possible adaptation, validation and application in our country is promising.
In Peru, an attempt was made to adapt the RED-Tic to 321 employees of public and private companies in metropolitan Lima, among women and men aged 18 to 56. This questionnaire passed certain criteria which demonstrate validity and reliability [25].
However, the aforementioned research failed to pass the criteria of ten judges and the scarcity of Peruvian research on techno-stress makes a further psychometric review of this questionnaire necessary, both facts highlighted in its recommendations. Likewise, in said investigation the dimension of techno-addiction was not taken into account, for which reason its psychometric analysis is necessary. The implementation of the test is extremely important for organizational psychologists since techno-stress is a real problem in the world of work and that will have to be managed and prevented to guarantee the well-being of people, taking into account that these consequences depend both on the characteristics of ICT, as well as other factors of age, gender, education and confidence, which can affect the levels of techno-stress in the worker. Ergo, in the application of this test, the workers and, on a large scale, the organization will benefit directly.
For all the aforementioned, the present investigation had the objective of adapting to the Peruvian context and evaluating the psychometric properties of the RED-Tecnoestrés questionnaire, to demonstrate the validity and reliability of this instrument within the implementation in Peruvian organizations.