Associations between emotional exhaustion, social capital, workload, and latitude in decision-making among professionals working with people with disabilities.
BACKGROUND
Many people working in human services in Western countries suffer from burnout, characterized by emotional exhaustion, depersonalization, and decreased personal performance. Prevention of emotional exhaustion (the first phase of burnout) constitutes a great challenge because emotional exhaustion may cause increasing turnover rates in staff and lead to a lesser quality of care. Prevention of emotional exhaustion requires knowledge of its predictors. The aim of this study was to investigate the associations between emotional exhaustion, social capital, workload, and latitude in decision-making among German professionals working in the care of persons with intellectual and physical disabilities.


METHODS
The study was based on a survey in a sheltered workshop and 5 homes for disabled persons with 175 professionals. Burnout was measured with the German version of the Maslach Burnout Inventory-General Survey (MBI-GS). A multivariate logistic regression analysis was computed.


RESULTS
Logistic regression identified the following three significant predictors of emotional exhaustion in the sample: workload (OR, 4.192; CI, 2.136-8.227), latitude in decision-making (OR, 0.306; CI, 0.115-0.811), and male gender (OR, 4.123; CI, 1.796-9.462). Nagelkerke's Pseudo-R(2) was 0.344.


CONCLUSIONS
The results of this study demonstrate that specific factors in work organization are associated with emotional exhaustion. Taking into account sociodemographic changes and the upcoming challenges for human services professionals, the results underline the importance of considering aspects of organization at the workplace to prevent burnout. Specific circumstances of male employees must be considered.
Kowalski
Christoph
C
Institute for Medical Sociology, Health Services Research and Rehabilitation Sciences (IMVR) of the Faculty of Human Sciences and the Faculty of Medicine of the University of Cologne, 50924 Cologne, Germany. christoph.kowalski@uk-koeln.de
Driller
Elke
E
Ernstmann
Nicole
N
Alich
Saskia
S
Karbach
Ute
U
Ommen
Oliver
O
Schulz-Nieswandt
Frank
F
Pfaff
Holger
H
D000328:Adult; D002055:Burnout, Professional / Q000523:psychology*; D003657:Decision Making; D004644:Emotions; D005260:Female; D005858:Germany; D006801:Humans; D008607:Intellectual Disability / Q000451:nursing* / Q000523:psychology; D016015:Logistic Models; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D015999:Multivariate Analysis; D009728:Nursing Assistants / Q000523:psychology*; D009740:Nursing Staff / Q000523:psychology*; D017009:Professional Autonomy; D012759:Sheltered Workshops; D012944:Social Support; D012947:Social Work; D011795:Surveys and Questionnaires; D016526:Workload / Q000523:psychology*