Hallam Karen T, Leigh Danielle, Davis Cassandra, Castle Nathan, Sharples Jenny, Collett James D
Centre for Youth AOD Research and Practice, Youth Support and Advocacy Service, Melbourne, Australia.
Institute for Innovation in Mental and Physical Health and Clinical Translation, School of Medicine, Deakin University and Barwon Health University Hospital, Geelong, Australia.
Drug Alcohol Rev. 2021 Jul;40(5):847-855. doi: 10.1111/dar.13209. Epub 2020 Dec 23.
Youth work specialises in helping vulnerable young people face life challenges during critical stages of their development. It is a complex and demanding role and factors influencing occupational stress in youth workers are rarely investigated. This study examined whether youth alcohol and other drug workers with greater compassion satisfaction, self-care practice and self-care agency experienced different rates of occupational stress including burnout and secondary traumatic stress.
A convenience sample of 258 Australian youth alcohol and other drug workers completed an online questionnaire battery. A four-stage data analysis was conducted utilising multivariate analysis of variance, bivariate correlations, linear multiple regression models and mediation modelling.
Burnout and secondary traumatic stress exhibited moderate negative correlations with compassion satisfaction, self-care practice and the different forms of self-care agency. Further, a decrease in lacking power for self-care, a form of self-care agency, was the strongest contributor to both burnout and secondary traumatic stress. Support was found for a mediation pathway whereby self-care agency led to greater self-care practice, which in turn increased compassion satisfaction, lowering burnout and secondary traumatic stress.
The findings suggest that it would be beneficial for self-care agency to be a key focus of youth worker training and professional development programs.
青年工作专注于帮助弱势青年在其发展的关键阶段应对生活挑战。这是一个复杂且要求颇高的角色，而影响青年工作者职业压力的因素鲜有研究。本研究考察了具有更高同情心满意度、自我关怀实践和自我关怀能力的青年酒精及其他药物工作者是否经历不同程度的职业压力，包括倦怠和继发性创伤压力。
对258名澳大利亚青年酒精及其他药物工作者进行便利抽样，他们完成了一套在线问卷。采用多变量方差分析、双变量相关性分析、线性多元回归模型和中介模型进行了四阶段数据分析。
倦怠和继发性创伤压力与同情心满意度、自我关怀实践以及不同形式的自我关怀能力呈中度负相关。此外，自我关怀能力的一种形式，即缺乏自我关怀的能力的降低，是倦怠和继发性创伤压力的最强影响因素。研究发现了一条中介路径，即自我关怀能力导致更多的自我关怀实践，进而提高同情心满意度，降低倦怠和继发性创伤压力。
研究结果表明，将自我关怀能力作为青年工作者培训和专业发展项目的关键重点将大有裨益。
