Early Career Burnout Trajectories among Child Protective Services Workers

Details

• Journal Article:
  Work and Stress
• Personal Author:
  Radey, Melissa ; Wilke, Dina J.
• Description:
  Burnout, or physical, emotional, and mental exhaustion resulting from chronic workplace stress, is highly prevalent and of high consequence. Most U.S. workers (60%) report experiencing at least one symptom of burnout, and symptoms pose a significant threat to worker performance, worker wellbeing, and workplace operation. Despite burnout's detrimental effects, limited research considers the development of burnout over the early career stage. Applying time-stress exposure and initial impact models, this study uses the Florida Study of Professionals for Safe Families (FSPSF; n = 1,019 individuals, n = 3,424 observations), a statewide, longitudinal cohort study of newly-hired child protective services (CPS) workers, to consider burnout symptoms from 6 months to 3 years on the job. Multi-level mixed effects regression analyses indicated the curvilinear nature of both work - and client-related burnout symptoms over time; the two-year, protective benefit of changing child welfare jobs; and the importance of job attributes in explaining protective effects of job change for work-related, but not client-related, burnout. Findings suggest the importance of targeted strategies to lower burnout (e.g. supervisory support, within-agency job change) particularly after 12-24 months on the job at the peak of burnout symptoms.
• Subjects:
  Burnout, Professional Child Care Cohort Studies Occupational Health Safety
• Keywords:
  Author Keywords: Workplace Burnout; Frontline Workers; Child Welfare; Longitudinal Burnout; Job Stress; Wellbeing; Longitudinal Study; Cohort Studies; Occupational Psychology; Children;
• Source:
  Work Stress 2025 Oct; 39(4):416-433
• ISSN:
  0267-8373
• Document Type:
  Text
• Funding:
  Grant
• Genre:
  Journal Article
• Place as Subject:
  Florida ; Birmingham Region [OSHA] ; Atlanta Region [OSHA]
• CIO:
  National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health (NIOSH)
• Topic:
  Workplace Safety & Health
• Location:
  North America
• Pages in Document:
  19 pdf pages
• Volume:
  39
• Issue:
  4
• NIOSHTIC Number:
  nn:20071209
• Email:
  mradey@fsu.edu
• Federal Fiscal Year:
  2026
• Performing Organization:
  Florida State University
• Peer Reviewed:
  True
• Start Date:
  20220901
• End Date:
  20240831
• Collection(s):
  National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health
• Main Document Checksum:
  urn:sha-512:d54021ff5cf35a130c931faa38031bbbb767e2c3cbe65a5e91beb1cc1ad63fbf3694dee0e5540d30c4f75f4e9910eaf1dfb2cf6849786bea958db80b45e78e6e
• Download URL:
  https://stacks.cdc.gov/view/cdc/258688/cdc_258688_DS1.pdf
• File Type:
  [PDF - 935.43 KB ]