A two process model of burnout: their relevance to Spanish and Canadian nurses

Abstract

Nurses from Spain (N = 834) and Canada (N = 725) completed surveys assessing burnout and their perceptions of worklife. The study explored a two-process model of burnout. First, work overload exhausts nurses by exerting excessive demands and interfering with their capacity to recover
energy. Second, enduring conflicts of personal and organizational values have a diverse relationship with burnout. A series of multiple regression analyses examined the relative contributions of these two processes. One process was evident in the contribution of workload to predicting exhaustion that in turn predicted cynicism that predicted efficacy. In parallel, value congruence contributed significantly to the regressions on each of the three aspects of burnout in addition to the  workloadexhaustion-cynicism-efficacy process. Further, multiple regression analyses demonstrated that other areas of worklife—control, reward, community, and fairness—were strongly associated with value
congruence in a manner distinct from the relationship of values with manageable workload. The two samples showed evidence of both processes, but that the workload/exhaustion process was
dominant for the Canadian sample while the values/burnout process was more relevant for the Spanish sample. Implications for a comprehensive model of burnout are discussed.