Prevalence and predictors of secondary trauma in the legal profession: a systematic review

Abstract

There has been increased scrutiny of occupations that less obviously experience adverse impacts from indirect exposure to trauma. In legal professions, repeated exposure to clients who have experienced trauma comprises a significant part in the role of lawyers, attorneys, solicitors and judges. The current review aimed to explore the prevalence and risk factors of secondary trauma reported by such legal professionals. A systematic search using seven psychological and legal databases elicited 10 articles for review. Quality appraisal revealed several methodological frailties in the reviewed articles. Thus, the findings should be interpreted with caution. Results indicated comparatively high prevalence of secondary trauma in legal professionals, and highlighted predictors and correlates of secondary trauma (gender, work experience, personal trauma and level of exposure). The review emphasised significant variability between the studies making systematic comparisons challenging, as well as the need for further conceptually consistent and scientifically robust studies.

Key words:

• attorney
• burnout
• compassion fatigue
• judges
• lawyer
• legal profession
• post-traumatic stress disorder
• secondary traumatic stress
• solicitor
• vicarious trauma

Acknowledgements

This work was supported by the University of Leicester.

Ethical standards

Declaration of conflicts of interest

Stine Iversen has declared no conflicts of interest

Noelle Robertson has declared no conflicts of interest

Ethical approval

This article does not contain any studies with human participants or animals performed by any of the authors.