Perceived Well-Being and Personal Stress in an Energy Boom Town: Contrasts and Similarities Across Divergent Groups

Perceived well-being and personal stress indicators among various subpopulations in two small western towns (one stable, one affected by an energy development boom) are examined to assess the notion that residents of energy boom communities experience generalized social pathology and disruption. A 2-stage data collection process used hand-delivered, self-completed, hand-collected questionnaires from a random sample of 95 houses and 98 mobile homes in Evanston, Wyoming (boom town) and 100 households in Tremonton, Utah (stable community). Questionnaires to 640 energy industry workers in contractor-operated workcamps had a low response rate (11.4%), but provided some indicators of attitudes/perceptions. Respondents were divided into mobile home households (largely newcomers), household units with more than five years residence (oldtimers) and less than five years residence (newcomers), and workcamp residents. Results indicated that although important variations in concern for personal safety, feeling at home, and satisfaction with friendships and spare-time activities occurred between these subpopulations, personal stress indicators illustrated minimal differences between boom town and stable community populations, suggesting that boom town residents appeared to cope fairly well and consequently tended not to exhibit atypical levels of stress. (MH)