Effects of Secondary Traumatic Stress and Burnout in Special Education Teachers
Secondary traumatic stress and burnout have been well-documented in the psychological field. In recent years, these effects of occupational stress have started appearing in other professions, especially in helping fields such as mental health, social work, and even education. The purpose of the study was to explore teachers’ perspectives about their current levels of stress, including burnout and secondary traumatic stress along with their current methods of managing stress to determine whether secondary traumatic stress predicts burnout and whether secondary traumatic stress affected special education teachers at a higher rate than general education teachers. A survey was used to gather information from educators PK-12 to find their current levels of stress, burnout, secondary traumatic stress, job satisfaction, and coping strategies. A moderation was used to analyze demographics and factor analysis was also used to analyze responses. The results of the study indicated that teacher stress is an important predictor of secondary stress and burnout. The study did not find that compassion, age, experience moderated relationship between teacher stress and burnout in general ed or special ed teachers. Implications are discussed.
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