Individual and Society Damage of Burnout Syndrome

Burnout syndrome affects our lives in any direction. Individual and society damage of burnout syndrome are destructive. This syndrome which very popular these days in the World started to spread in Turkey. The meaning of burnout syndrome is feeling emotionally inadequate and lack of motivation and insensitivity

We researched burnout syndrome how to affect our lives, what the problem is and how we can understand this problem. Our aims are understanding burnout syndrome is better and explain this syndrome with all aspects in this article. And in research, we receive help from psychologists. We examine the studies. We evaluate these scales. In our studies, we reach some results and reason. In this study, we worked with someone who has a burnout syndrome.

At the end of our studies, we tried to explain our procedure. Unfortunately, we could not our every interview, we added a summary. We paid attention to explain every important information. At the discussion, we explain the reason for these problems and we tried to explain why burnout syndrome is common in Turkey. We discuss the lack of studies about burnout syndrome. And how the scales of Maslach are using in diagnosis?

Word of psychology composed of psyche and logos. And it is meaning spirit science. Psychology is a dynamic science and psychology always develop with the research and the studies. Unfortunately, there are no definitive results in psychology.

Human behavior was explained in a more detailed way and scientific explanations were made on human behavior. Today:

'Behavior is the way organisms adapt to their environment. Behaviour is movement. Most of the subject of psychology is people and animals whose behavior can be observed. Smile, crying, running, hitting, talking and touching are examples of these behaviors that you can observe. Psychologists examine what an individual does, how he behaves by looking at a general social and cultural context.' (J.Gerrig, G. Zimbardo-Psychology, and Life,2016)

Human behavior is affected by variables like culture, gender, society, and generation. Every society has a different norm and culture. The society we live affected us from birth. Our behavior, our decision, and our life are directed by society. At the same time, every society has many psychological disorders. In our study, we chose burnout syndrome.

What is the burnout?

Many psychologists have research about burnout syndrome. A lot of people used to different terms for explaining this syndrome. They explained clearly what burnout syndrome is.

“Burnout is a psychological syndrome emotional exhaustion, depersonalization, and reduced personal accomplishment that can occur among individuals who work with other people in some capacity. There was actually an underlying consensus about three core dimensions of the burnout experience, and subsequent research on this issue led to the development of a multidimensional theory of burnout.” (Maslach C., Jackson E., Leiter M., 1981.)

Another description is; “A key aspect of the burnout syndrome is increased feelings of emotional exhaustion; as emotional resources are depleted, workers feel they are no longer able to give of themselves at a psychological level. Another aspect of the burnout syndrome is the development of depersonalization (i.e., negative, cynical attitudes and feelings about one’s clients.). This callous or even dehumanized perception of others can lead staff members to view their clients as somehow deserving of their troubles.” (Ryan,1971)

A lot of people used to different terms as we said, but the best-known studies by Maslach. There is not a certain explanation but we use Maslach's explanation which three dimension for understanding this syndrome. This three dimensionare; emotional exhaustion, depersonalization, and reduced personal accomplishment. The only measure for understanding this dimension is MBI (see Maslach et al 1996 for the most recent edition). Full name is” Maslach Burnout Inventory'. This scale designed for measuring burnout level. This scale has 9 questions for understanding emotional exhaustion, 8 questions for understanding reduced personal accomplishment, 5 questions for understanding depersonalization. In total, this scale has 22 questions. If someone getting a high point on this scale we can say that this person has burnout syndrome. Maslach and Jackson developed these scales by thinking of job groups which groups are serving to people. They believed these job groups have special burnout problems. So they designed new branch who's named Maslach Burnout Inventory-General Survey (MBI-GS). (Maslach,2003:190)

MBI has subtitles:

• MBI-Human Service Survey (MBI-HSS) it is about human service and health care.
• MBI-Educators Survey (MBI-ES)
• MBI-General Survey (MBI-GS).
• (Maslach, Schaufeli, Leiter 2001- Job Burnout,402)

These two forms focused where workers interacted extensively with other people (clients, patients, students, etc) The third MBI developed without people-oriented issue. First MBI designed for understanding human service occupations. Then the second version developed for using educational occupations.

A. Emotional Exhaustion: In this dimension, people feel a lack of energy, exhaustion, and people feel emotionally wear down. This dimension the worst one of these three dimensions in the literature of burnout. Because this is the most critical one. This is the internal dimension of emotional exhaustion.

B. Depersonalization: In this dimension, a person usually does not feel anything about emotionally. We can see their behaviors or their attitude. The person becomes getting arrogance, mocking, emotionless. (Leiter ve Maslach,1988:297) Depersonalizatoin represents an interpersonal dimension of burnout syndrome. (Sürgevil,2005:96). People who have burnout syndrome generally do not want to share their social life or their emotions with other people. They draw sharp borders.

C. Reduced personal accomplishment: This concept refers to the tendency of a person to evaluate themselves negatively. (Maslach,2003:190). When a person's success is getting decrease person feel inadequate himself or herself. This effect badly their motivation. Think about a person who has a bad relationship with his colleagues, this event could cause reduced personal accomplishment. However this event cause success in the working at the same time. In another case business conditions can be tough, this event can be hard and back-breaking so a person could be feel reduced in his accomplishment. In addition, cannot find opened and certain ideas. (Maslach,2003:190)

Some kind of table related to Maslach’s opinion

• +Emotional exhaustion
• +Insensitivity
• - Personal Success

Explaining of this table is when emotional exhaustion and insensitivity level increasing at the same time level of personal success drops. These decreases affect all life of a human

The History of Burnout Syndrome

The first study happened by Herbert Freudenberger in 1974. According to Freudenberger's explanation burnout syndrome is: 'Get unseccessfulling, lack of energy, weakness emotions or state of exhaustion of internal sources because of the unfulfilled requests.” (Freudenberger, H. J., 1974,).

However, after the Freudenberger, many psychologists studied about burnout syndrome. They created tests about measuring burnout syndrome level, they created some kind of scales. The best known and accepted research is “Maslach Burnout Inventory (MBI)” by Christina Maslach.

Researches Of Burnout Syndrome:

The Pioneering Phase

Maslach had an interview with many people in her researches. And she worked about how people can coping with stress in the business environment. At the end of researches, she explained that burnout syndrome is connected with level of communication.

In the first article, researchers explained different perspectives in burnout syndrome and these perspectives affected the first step of researches.

In the clinical side, researchers focused on the symptom of burnout and mental health. On the social side, they focused on the relationship between provider and recipient. The most of researches used some techniques like interview or case studies. In the course of the pioneering phase, researchers worked on relations like family or colleague and researchers used prize for to coping with stress. After the 1970s, burnout syndrome started to be very popular and people started to apply to workers. So these workers used these patients as a test subject. (Maslach, Schaufeli, Leiter,2001)

The Empirical Phase

After the 1980s, researches started to be systematic. Researchers used quantitative values and survey. İn this researches was used society and popüler topics instead relation. Scales of MBI was developed by Maslach and Jackson. The industrial-organizational approach was united with studies of social psychology and clinical psychology which happened in past. Burnout syndrome has been having a varied perspective. In the 1990s, studies of burnout syndrome were expanded to professions instead of human relations. In researches, connect between business environment and a person was examined. Many research methods were developed for decreasing in burnout syndrome. (Maslach, Schaufeli, Leiter,2001)

Today, burnout syndrome often is seeing in the service sector. According to the researches, when working year increase, burnout and insensitivity increase. (Barutçu, Serinkan, 2008). In the health sector, nurses are living many problems with burnout syndrome. Especially, a person that work in hospitals, have a lot problem because of their working time. These problems affected their job. In researches about fixing these problems was progressed. Researches in today, Psychologist used scales of Maslach for diagnosis. And these scales ask patient some questions about what they are or how many years they are working. Outside these questions, they are trying to understand what you feel in your social life etc. After this scale, they diagnosis the level of burnout syndrome you have. Then, According to value, they pass to a level of treatment.

Stages Of Burnout Syndrome

Burnout syndrome occurs 4 stages:

• İdealistlic Stage: The first stage of burnout syndrome is an idealistic stage. In this stage, when people feel desperate, they try to get rid of this emotion. People determine some goals that they could not reach.
• Stage of Stagnation: In this stage, a person starts to feel uncomfortable for some details that do not care before. It begins to fall emotionally.
• Prevention: In this stage, they feel frustrated and desperate against the difficulties. People cannot focus on their job when they try to focus. And they can not cope with the difficulties.
• Apati: The last stage is apati in burnout syndrome. People can not respond to stimulus from the environment. People start to be unresponsive and insensitive. They feel hopeless. İn this stage, indifference to work and resigning was increased

In the process of diagnosis, a psychologist is listening to the client. The feeling of the client is so important. Then, they focus on some special memory in the client’s life. After some meeting, psychologist diagnoses and start to treatment. In the results, people are coming to the psychologist at the last stage, a process of treatment can take a long time in this situation. In general, these stages and scales are using to workers that have a long working time. Especially, workers in the health sector suffer from burnout syndrome.

INTERVIEW WITH PSYCHOLOGIST OF CLIENT

Information Of Client:

• NAME: M.T.
• AGE: 47
• GENDER: MALE
• PROFFESİON: DİRECTOR OF A COMPANY

Beste: Hi Mrs. Aslantaş, how are you? I want to have an interview about M.T. that have a problem with burnout syndrome.

Mrs. Aslantaş: Hi, I am fine thank you. Yes, you can ask everything you want.

Melike: We researched burnout syndrome, and we want to get information about burnout syndrome. What is the burnout syndrome? How can we define burnout syndrome?

Mrs. Aslantaş: Firstly, I can not say symptoms of burnout syndrome is exactly true. People that come here do not know anything about burnout syndrome. They feel desperate and hopeless. Some people are coming here when they feel insufficient. Some people are coming here when they feel insufficient as a father or a boss. İn generally, we can see burnout syndrome in the health sector. Also, people that work the same place for 5 or a lot of years can have a problem with burnout syndrome.

Beste: what complaints do people come here?

Mrs. Aslantaş: In human nature, when you have some problems you should solve these problems. İf you can not solve this problem you can have some problems with burnout syndrome.

90% of clients that come here are coming in the last stage. They do not want to a psychologist until they feel desperate. When they can no longer escape this problem, they apply to the psychologist. For example, the time that his wife wants a divorce, or when his boss warned him. M.T(our client) comes to a psychologist when people in his environment start to warn him.

Melike: How long are you meeting with M. T.?

Mrs. Aslantaş: Our process of treatment is so new, just we have had 4 meeting. I wanted him to come every two weeks. In generally; meeting time is changeable according to clients and the process of treatment. Sometimes ı want to him come per a week. At the end of a process of treatment, they are coming here just for control once a time in 2 months.

Beste: How was his emotional situation? What kind of support he wanted? How was the process of treatment?

Mrs. Aslantaş: M. T. is a successful businessman. He is a director in his job. He is working with many people in a job. But when he came to me, he said:

“Yes, ı am successful in my job. I am working with many people in a job, but ı am so tired of trying to control everything. I can do them, but now ı do not want to do my responsibility. Being successful is not matter anymore. I'm tired of trying my job. I do not want to spend time with my family. I do not want to get out and do something.”

As we can easily understand, he is feeling responsibility. Although he loves his job, he does not want to do his job anymore. When he comes to me, he was feeling impatient, and he said me he was not impatient and angry in past. Now, he is feeling angry. He is starting to fight in any small event. His daughter and his wife started to warn him about his angriness. He attention to these problems. He was feeling happy and cheerful in past. He started to notice this change.

Melike: Hmmm, when we research to burnout syndrome, we saw some scales about burnout syndrome making by C. Maslach. Did you apply these scales your client?

Mrs. Aslantaş: C. Maslach has many important studies about burnout syndrome. Maslach's scales helps us in process of diagnosis, but ı could not apply these scales in my client. I chose understanding problems with talking. We can use these scales in crowded groups. For instance; workers in a company. These scales will be useful for workers. It is a short way to understand and diagnosis.

Beste: Which method did you use in this interview?

Mrs. Aslantaş: Firstly I used “timeline” method. I learned some information about M. T’s past, exactly is childhood. For example, he had a brother normally. However, his brother died when he was 5 years old by falling from the balcony. The client was influenced so much. Once a seance he said that he feels guilty about this event. M.T. was 3 years old when this poor event happen. However, he found guilty himself and he can not forget. In the other seance, he said: 'I was 16 years old, I had many once on my face but my parents did not take me to the doctor. I lived my teenage years like this. I did not like myself.” I said: “Why did you go to the hospital alone? You were 16 years old and, you were not little for this.” He said: “Yes, actually you are right.” He is 47 years old now but he still can not forget this memory that about 16 years old skin problem. Just I showed him these realities.

I learned these kinds of information about the past. After I gathered round to him solving problems that could not be solved in the past. He felt under pressure. Look like must do it every work. I said that he should break his responsibility a little bit. He did not meet his friends. When his friends invited to him he said immediately ‘no'. However, he did not know too why he said no. After we learned why he started saying no. He said ‘Yes' everything for years even he did not want to do. He did everything that his family or friends want but still, he felt burnout. He scared about he could not do it. I gave some homework. I wanted to do these homework for next week.

Melike: Have you ever meet any difficulty when you applying this method?

Mrs. Aslantaş: Actually M.T. knew this problem very well too. He came for changing by willingly. He knew he did not like this in the past. He does not want to do his work which he was love anymore. He starts to thinking about he is failed although he was very successful. For this reason, he was open to help. However, of course, I met some difficulties. For example, he found right himself all the time. He accused other people all the time when he was telling me his past problems. He looked emotionally to himself. He could not break his past problems. Mostly he was accusing his parents. Firstly we tried to solve this. I said him if you want to change this position first you should change yourself. After a while he gave up to the searching problem causes in other people. Consequently, I did not slog on so much.

Beste: Have you ever make contact with M.T family? If you did what did you talk to them?

Mrs. Aslantaş: Yes I spoke to his wife. His wife loves M.T. and she knows his past behaviors so she is sorry for his now behaviors. She wanted the M.T. to be as ambitious as he used to be. She said he gave up to spend time with his children. He got angry more than past to his children. She said M.T. does not want to get up from a bed. 'He started to sleep 12 hours a day. Before he was happy about going to work but now he is rationalizing for not going to work,' she said. I did not speak other M.T. ‘s family or friends.

Melike: So did this therapy work?

Mrs. Aslantaş: This therapy yet not to be finished. However, he gave up to accusing other people. When he met a problem he tries to not running from this problem. At the same time, he does not to be perfect about solving problems anymore. He gave up to saying I must do it everything. He has a new hobby now, he is going to salsa with his wife. He meets with friends times a week and he goes out with his children times a week. The most important thing is I did not say these. He saw and he choosed his own way. I just led. He realized by himself.

Beste: Did you get feedback from the M.T.?

Mrs. Aslantaş: Yes, this part that makes me the happiest part. He came to me and said: 'I thought different in the past but now I can see my faults. I am not regretful for this because I can still change this. Thank you for your good opinions.'

Melike&Beste: Thank you for your talking.

Mrs. Aslantaş: You are welcome.

METHOD

PARTİCİPANTS

Our participant name is M.T. it is male. He is 47 years old now. He had one brother but his brother died when he was 5 years old. He is married to C.T., she is 46 years old. He is boss of a big company. He has 2 children. He graduated from university degree of engineering. Approximately he is doing this job for 20 years. He has a good marriage. He has intense working. However, he is free on weekends. He had not any hobbies in the beginning but now he is going to salsa with his wife. He said that he was loving her job and special life but these days he could not happy. We say ‘anhedonia' in psychology.

Our helpers are Dr. S. Gürkan, Dr. A. Aslantaş.

PROCEDURE

In the beginning, we chose burnout syndrome. We had a timeline for our study. According to the timeline we researched about burnout syndrome. We examined, read books in a library, and studies on the internet. Then, we chose studies that necessary for us, and with these results, we started to our study. Firstly we added researches that necessary for us then we got information. After we separated this information for adding to our research. We went to ‘Empati Psychological Advice Center' at 14:00 pm for talk to Ps. Sema Gürkan on 21 December 2018. We got help her for regulating our study about burnout syndrome. Then we met Dr. Ayla Aslantaş who is working in ‘Uzman Bilgim Psychology Center'. We talked 3 times with Ms. Aslantaş. The first day we talked her to learning about burnout syndrome. The second day we talked about M.T. who has burnout syndrome and Ms. Aslantaş's client. Last day we talked about M.T. again we asked some questions about that. Our last meeting happened on 27 December 2018. After finished our interviews we start to regulating our results and information. We did not speak directly with M.T. but Ms. Aslantaş gave us enough information about him.

RESULTS

At the end of this research we got much information about burnout syndrome. We researched what is burnout syndrome and history of burnout syndrome. According to this research, the most subscriber person is C. Maslach. Maslach scale generally using for crowded workers who are working in a big company or hospitals. However, Ms. Aslantaş did not use this scale on the M.T. because this scale not chosen in one-to-one interviews. We wrote symptoms of burnout syndrome in the introduction part. It is some kind of a similarity between these symptoms and M.T.' problems. He had anhedonia and he felt tired all the time. Although he is very successful in his work he started to find himself an unsuccessful person. This is similar to a symptom of burnout. We did not use Maslach scale to M.T. but when we met Ms. Gürkan we learned that she usually use this scale to many companies and hospital workers. Because there have many personnel and time is short for talking everyone to understanding these symptoms. So the best method is using the Maslach scale test. This burnout problem does not have crinical problems but it affects our social and personal relationships.

According to this research, many people can easily live these problems and get burnout. However getting over this syndrome is not big deal than other crinical problems. At the same time solving this syndrome usually get a short time in therapy process when we saw this report.

DISCUSSION

We decided burnout syndrome and that's a reason is that burnout syndrome is common in Turkey. According to the results of the researches we had, living in Turkey is so hard. Because of political events, lack of education, working time, shortage of money et cetera. These problems cause of burnout syndrome. Unfortunately, when we researched, we saw a lack of study in burnout syndrome. In a field of psychology, there are a few studies about burnout syndrome, and they are not enough to understand, diagnosis and treatment in burnout syndrome. Most of the research was done by Maslach, and the scales used to diagnose burnout syndrome were created by Maslach. So most of the psychologist use scales of Maslach, but some psychologists diagnose as a result of interviews. They do not use these scales. Mrs.Aslantaş (a psychologist in uzman bilgim) said us she does not need to use these scales too. İnterviews with a client is enough to understand to diagnosis. Maslach scales are using in group therapy, because in this scales, finding an average of the level of burnout syndrome is easy. Similar problems occur between clients in similar working places and lifestyles. Burnout syndrome is very common, especially in the service and health sector. That's why some of the similar behaviors in clients make it easier to diagnose. According to a research of Lee and Ashforth:

“Demonstrate negative attitudes towards customers or serviced persons, deterioration in relations with people… not coming to work, a reduction in job satisfaction and organizational commitment. At the end of all this, the tendency to leave the job and job change request exhaustion can be determined as results of organizations” (LEE, ASHFORTH,1993)

Today, the burnout syndrome has become a more common problem. Accordingly, studies have increased, and the areas of research are expanding every day. And people do not avoid getting help with burnout syndrome when they are having a problem.

Conclusion

In conclusion, the presented research provides a comprehensive exploration of burnout syndrome, shedding light on its prevalence, symptoms, and the impact it has on individuals, particularly within the context of Turkey. The study incorporates insights from renowned psychologist C. Maslach and her Burnout Inventory, offering a detailed examination of the psychological dimensions of this phenomenon. The historical progression of burnout research is outlined, illustrating the evolution of methodologies and perspectives over time. While the text lacks a distinct conclusion section, the gathered information contributes to a nuanced understanding of burnout, its diagnosis, and the therapeutic approaches employed, emphasizing the need for further research in the field.

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