Associations between satisfaction with life, burnout-related emotional and physical exhaustion, and sleep complaints

Abstract

Objectives. Burnout is a state of work-related emotional and physical exhaustion. Burnout is related to sleep complaints. By contrast, people with optimistic attitude seem to be less vulnerable to stress and burnout. Therefore, the present study aimed at investigating the relation between burnout, depressive symptoms, satisfaction with life, and sleep complaints. Methods. A total of 2231 participants (age [years]: M=40.8; 1183 females and 1048 males) took part in the study. Participants completed a series of questionnaires such as the Tedium Measure, the Insomnia Severity Index, and the Satisfaction with Life-questionnaire. For statistical analyses, a Structural Equation Model (SEM) was applied. Results. Pessimism, emotional and physical exhaustion, depressive symptoms, and low satisfaction with life were interrelated. Emotional and physical exhaustion was related to sleep complaints, whereas sleep complaints were not related to depressive symptoms and pessimism. Satisfaction with life was related to low sleep complaints, though mediated via low emotional and physical exhaustion, and low pessimism. Conclusions. Results suggest that among burnout symptoms emotional and physical exhaustion, but not depressive symptoms, are related to sleep complaints. Satisfaction with life, via low emotional and physical exhaustion, and low pessimism, further contributes to favourable sleep.

Key words::

• Burnout
• satisfaction with life
• depressive symptoms
• sleep complaints
• emotional and physical exhaustion

Acknowledgments

We thank Nick Emler (Surrey, UK) for proofreading the manuscript.

Statement of interest

All authors declare no conflict of interest.

Notes

¹A total of 2418 people did click on the first introductory page of the internet-based study. Of those, 2,375 proceeded to complete the questionnaire. Of those, 144 had missing values higher than 5% and following Schafer and Graham (2002), these participants were excluded from further analyses. Thus, from 2,418 potentially interested people, 2375 (98%) proceeded, and data were further analysed from 2,231 participants (93.94%).

²There is growing evidence that internet-based questionnaires do provide as reliable data as p-a-p version do (cf. Mangunkusumo et al. 2005; Vereecken and Maes, 2006; Wang et al. 2005).

³In Table II only those 15 items were reported without high loadings on more than two factors (i.e. cross-loadings) and without small loadings on all factors (i.e. low communalities; cf. Brown 2006).

⁴Effect sizes (d) for t-tests were performed following Cohen (1988, 1994), with 0.4≥d≥0.20 indicating small (i.e. negligible practical importance), 0.7≥d≥0.50 indicating medium (i.e. moderate practical importance), and d≥0.80 indicating large (i.e. crucial practical importance) effect sizes. Effect sizes for ANOVAs (partial eta squared [η²]) were performed following Cohen (1988, 1994), with 0.05≥η²≥0.01 indicating small (i.e. negligible practical importance), 0.13≥η²≥0.06 indicating medium (i.e. moderate practical importance), and (η²≥0.14 indicating large (i.e. crucial practical importance) effect sizes. The main pattern of results is that effect sizes were very small.