An interventional study of Mentoring program in Harassment, Non-Sexual, Harassment, Sexual and Bullying, Workplace, sponsored by University of Washington. Completed at 19 sites in United States. Open to female participants aged 21 Years to 65 Years, including healthy volunteers. Per ClinicalTrials.gov, last updated 2025-09-16.
Sponsored by University of Washington · Not applicable, Interventional, and Other
Women are highly underrepresented in the construction skilled trades. In addition to facing the industry's well-known physical risks, women are subjected to discrimination, harassment, and skills under-utilization. As a result, tradeswomen have increased risk for injury, stress-related health effects, and high attrition rates from apprenticeship programs, thus perpetuating their minority status. Mentoring is a well-established technique for learning technical and personal navigation skills in new or challenging social environments. The investigators propose development and dissemination of a mentorship program through local unions of the International Association of Sheet Metal, Air, Rail and Transportation Workers (SMART), and evaluating its success in reducing women's injury and work stress, while improving retention.
Journey-level workers will be trained on effective mentoring techniques, and matched to approximately 100 women apprentices within participating local unions. Mentees will be followed for two years within the mentorship program, with another 100 women apprentices in locals not receiving the mentorship training similarly followed as controls. The impact of participation in mentoring programs will be measured through apprentices' experience of stress, coping mechanisms, safety climate, and retention in the apprenticeship programs. Specifically, the investigators propose to:
Aim 1: Develop a mentorship training program for journey-level sheet metal workers to assist women apprentices in navigating the challenges faced by women in trades
Aim 2: Disseminate the training and assist locals in developing effective mentorship programs
Aim 3: Evaluate the effectiveness of the mentoring programs specified in Aims 1 and 2
Aim 4: Disseminate the best practices for supporting women apprentices in the skilled trades.
236 studies on the registry are indexed under Occupational Stress; 64 are open to participants now.
This study's enrollment of 96 is close to the median of 89 across 167 interventional studies indexed under Occupational Stress.
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Exclusion Criteria:
This arm consists of apprentice-level, female-identifying construction workers who will receive active mentorship (the intervention) for two years from trained journey-level mentors.
Behavioral: Mentoring program
This arm consists of apprentice-level, female-identifying construction workers who will not receive mentorship.
Apprentice-level female construction workers will be assigned to a mentor who has gone through a rigorous mentorship training. Participants will be asked to meet with a mentor at least 4 times/year in person to discuss the challenges of being a female in construction, learn coping mechanisms, and otherwise discuss the unique challenges of the job environment.
Stress
Measures of feelings of stress among the female workers from the Perceived Stress Scale (PSS) where higher scores indicate a worse outcome. Minimum value is 0 and maximum value is 40.
Time frame: 1 year period
Job Satisfaction
Measures of job satisfaction from the Job Satisfaction Survey (JSS) where higher scores indicate higher job satisfaction. Minimum value is 1 and maximum value is 6.
Time frame: 1 year period
Social Support
Measures of social support both in and out of work from the Medical Outcomes Study (MOS) Social Support Survey. Higher scores indicate greater feelings of social support. Minimum value of 1 and maximum value of 5.
Time frame: 1 year period
Recruitment Details Recruitment for round 1 of the study took place from March-May 2021. Recruitment for round 2 of the study took place from July-December 2023. All recruitment activity took place remotely via video conferencing software, email and phone, with union locals as the recruitment locations.
| Milestone | Mentees | Control Apprentices |
|---|---|---|
| Started | 56 | 40 |
| Completed | 29 | 23 |
| Not completed | 27 | 17 |
| Withdrew: Lost to follow-up | 24 | 17 |
| Withdrew: Withdrawal by subject | 3 | 0 |
Measures of feelings of stress among the female workers from the Perceived Stress Scale (PSS) where higher scores indicate a worse outcome. Minimum value is 0 and maximum value is 40.
| score on a scale | Mentees | Control Apprentices |
|---|---|---|
| Stress | 17.6 ± 6.5 | 13.1 ± 4.5 |
Measures of job satisfaction from the Job Satisfaction Survey (JSS) where higher scores indicate higher job satisfaction. Minimum value is 1 and maximum value is 6.
| score on a scale | Mentees | Control Apprentices |
|---|---|---|
| Job Satisfaction | 2.9 ± 0.6 | 3.0 ± 0.4 |
Measures of social support both in and out of work from the Medical Outcomes Study (MOS) Social Support Survey. Higher scores indicate greater feelings of social support. Minimum value of 1 and maximum value of 5.
| score on a scale | Mentees | Control Apprentices |
|---|---|---|
| Social Support | 4.4 ± 0.9 | 4.3 ± 0.8 |
Collected over Adverse events were not assessed as they were not applicable to our study.. Non-serious events are listed at a 0% frequency threshold.
| Group | Deaths | Serious | Other |
|---|---|---|---|
| Mentees | — | — | — |
| Control Apprentices | — | — | — |
51 and 39 mentees and apprentices, respectively, completed the baseline measures in the survey. For job satisfaction and social support, all records are reported in the data table. In the case of perceived stress, 48 records for mentees and 38 records for controls are reported in the data table. The reason for this is because not all participants responded to all questions pertaining to perceived stress, so we could not analyze all records for this outcome.
| Age, Categorical(Participants) | Mentees | Control Apprentices | Total |
|---|---|---|---|
| <=18 years | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| Between 18 and 65 years | 51 | 39 | 90 |
| >=65 years | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| Age, Continuous(years) | Mentees | Control Apprentices | Total |
|---|---|---|---|
| Median | 28 (18 to 45) | 27 (18 to 46) | 28 (18 to 46) |
| Sex: Female, Male(Participants) | Mentees | Control Apprentices | Total |
|---|---|---|---|
| Female | 51 | 39 | 90 |
| Male | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| Race/Ethnicity, Customized(Participants) | Mentees | Control Apprentices | Total |
|---|---|---|---|
| White | 28 | 26 | 54 |
| Black or African American | 5 | 8 | 13 |
| Hispanic, Latinx, or Spanish Origin | 6 | 4 | 10 |
| Other | 12 | 1 | 13 |
| Region of Enrollment(Participants) | Mentees | Control Apprentices | Total |
|---|---|---|---|
| United States | 49 | 39 | 88 |
| Canada | 2 | 0 | 2 |
| Perceived Stress(units on a scale) | Mentees | Control Apprentices | Total |
|---|---|---|---|
| Mean | 18.1 ± 8.1 | 14.1 ± 7.4 | 16.3 ± 7.8 |
| Social Support(units on a scale) | Mentees | Control Apprentices | Total |
|---|---|---|---|
| Mean | 4.4 ± 0.7 | 4.4 ± 0.6 | 4.4 ± 0.7 |
| Job Satisfaction(units on a scale) | Mentees | Control Apprentices | Total |
|---|---|---|---|
| Mean | 3.1 ± 0.5 | 3.1 ± 0.6 | 3.1 ± 0.6 |
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