The development and empirical testing of a psychological detachment and burnout structural model for academics

[摘要] ENGLISH SUMMARY : The discipline of Industrial Psychology endeavours to enhance the well-being and success ofemployees; the organisations to which they belong, and society as a whole. In light of such efforts; the issue of burnout amongst employees becomes a prevalent and vital phenomenon in which Human Resource practitioners and Industrial Psychologists need to address. Linkedto burnout is the phenomenon of psychological detachment. Recent empirical research has shown how psychological detachment, when actively used by the employee, acts as aneffective buffer to the harmful effects of burnout. However, a lack of psychological detachment on the part of the employee would allow for the onset of burnout over time. It is in acknowledging and exploring the relationship between burnout and the psychological detachment phenomenon that it becomes imperative to gain insight into the determinants of psychological detachment. Given the vast amount of research confirming high levels ofburnout in academics; this study was directed at understanding the factors that influence whether or not the academic employee psychologically detaches themselves from work after the core working hours.This study made use of an ex post facto correlational design with a convenience sample of 148 academic employees who responded to an online questionnaire. The questionnaire utilised empirically sound instruments (the Media and Technology Usage and Attitude Scale, the Segmentation Preferences and Supplies Scale; the Quantitative Workload Inventory; the Developmental Inventory of Sources of Stress; the Occupational Fatigue Exhaustion/Recovery Scale; the Recovery Experience Questionnaire; the State of being Recovered Questionnaire; the Intrinsic Motivation Inventory and the Maslasch Burnout Inventory) to tap in to the constructs underpinning the study's structural model. The results revealed that seven of the twelve paths in the structural model were found to be statisticallysignificant. The results revealed that the variables of recovery, work pressure, work-home segmentation preferences, exhaustion/acute fatigue and technology all have a substantial influence on the psychological detachment, burnout process either as a main, indirect ormediating effect. The results of this study calls for further empirical studies on these variables and the inclusion of other important psychological detachment determinants.

[发布机构] Stellenbosch University