Special Edition article: The protective effects of mindfulness against burnout among educators

Abstract

Because many educators experience stress and burnout, identifying factors that promote health and wellbeing among teachers and school staff is critical. Educators’ mindfulness is one aspect of social-emotional competence that may protect them from experiencing burnout and its negative consequences. In the current study, 64 educators completed self-report measures of mindfulness, burnout, affect, sleep-related impairment, daily physical symptoms, stress, and ambition. Results of cross-sectional analyses indicated that educators’ mindfulness had strong, consistent negative associations with three widely-studied components of burnout: emotional exhaustion, depersonalisation, and low personal accomplishment. The link between mindfulness and burnout was partially explained by affect, sleep-related impairment, and daily physical symptoms. In addition, the protective effect of mindfulness was most pronounced among more stressed and more ambitious educators. This study adds to accumulating evidence that mindfulness promotes resilience in educators and may foster healthy educators, classrooms, and students.