Academic performance and burnout: an efficient frontier analysis of resource use efficiency among employed university students

Abstract

We examine the impact of university student burnout on academic achievement. With a longitudinal sample of working undergraduate university business and economics students, we use a two-step analytical process to estimate the efficient frontiers of student productivity given inputs of labour and capital and then analyse the potential determinants of technical efficiency. Employing a data envelopment analysis (DEA), we find that student efficiency varies by type of course, with quantitative courses such as economics, having the highest level of dispersion. The longitudinal analysis indicates that both university-related exhaustion and work-related exhaustion are negatively related to student productivity.

Keywords:

• burnout
• efficient frontier
• academic performance
• data envelopment analysis
• university student

Notes

1. The terms ‘stress’ and ‘burnout’ tend to be used somewhat interchangeably in much of the academic literature, although the term ‘burnout’ is a more recent phraseology arising from Herbert Freudenberger’s work on ‘burnout’ in the 1970s. Some researchers, such as Divaris et al. (2012), refer to ‘stress’ as a broader concept (typically measured by questions related to a person’s perceived ‘stress’ in various life and work situations), while ‘burnout’ is more specifically related to a ‘state of fatigue or frustration’ (see Freudenberger and Richelson 1980), and more specifically to Maslach’s three dimensions, particularly exhaustion. Other researchers see ‘burnout’ as a specific outcome of ‘stress’ (e.g. Watson et al. 2008).

2. For more details, including DEA mathematical structures, interested readers are referred to the manuals for various DEA programs, such as that by Coelli (1996), or the several textbooks describing efficient frontier analysis (e.g. Cooper, Seiford, and Tone 2006; Cook and Zhu 2013).

3. The study was approved by institutional research, and each participating student signed a release form allowing access to actual grade point average (GPA) data for purposes of the research.

4. In the USA, fraternities and sororities are social organisations for undergraduate male and female students, respectively. They are often called ‘Greek’ because they are designated by Greek lettering and often have rituals loosely based upon Greek ideas. Oftentimes, students will live in a residence specifically for a particular fraternity or sorority. While these organisations often have philanthropic components, fraternities and sororities are also designed as cohesive social and support organisations for member students during the term of study, and even after graduation.

5. The results from the VRS model are very similar and for the purpose of brevity are not shown.

6. We also analysed other potential ‘time-consuming’ activities in different Tobit regressions, such as involvement in varsity athletics, marriage, children, internships and hours spent on other extracurricular activities. In general, these did not have any statistical significance in the estimated regressions when the burnout variables were included and for the purpose of brevity are not reported. Most likely the impact of these variables is captured in the dimensions of burnout.