XV Международная студенческая научная конференция Студенческий научный форум - 2023

Claude Bernard, a French physiologist, said in the second half of the XIX century that the internal environment of a living organism should remain constant under any fluctuations of the external environment. Psychological health, as well as physical, can violate this constancy. Therefore, it is very important to monitor not only the physical condition, but also the mental one. The list of violators also includes the so-called professional burnout.

Many psychologists combine the syndromes of emotional and professional burnout. This is the so-called state of psychosomatic and emotional exhaustion, i.e. a person is dissatisfied with self-realization in all components of his life.

The spread of this syndrome has reached catastrophic proportions nowadays. Professional burnout occurs among workers in the fields of education, medicine, business, service, etc. Saving the health of an actively working category of people directly depends on solving this problem today. Professional burnout is called a form of competency deformation of personality.

Along with depression and anxiety, occupational stress is called the "disease of the twenty-first century", because this type of stress is found in any profession in the world. The World Health Organization recognizes that it has assumed the dimensions of a "global epidemic."

According to the International Labor Organization, occupational stress caused losses in the amount of $200,000.000.000. This includes: the payment of sick leave, the cost of hospitalizations and outpatient treatment, as well as costs due to a decrease in labor productivity, the cost of professional improvement.

Risk groups

People are susceptible to this disease to varying degrees. The main risk groups include: adults who do not live a sexual life; employees of government agencies; a category of professionals who regularly interact with people (teachers, psychologists, managers, etc.); neurotics; women aged about 45 years living in megacities. It is worth noting that neuroses and professional burnout are diseases of megacities, to which, after all, women are more affected.

Symptoms

The main symptoms of professional burnout can be divided into two large groups: physical and emotional.

Physical ones include:

• Chronic biased fatigue

• Broken state

• Insomnia.

Psychosomatics also joins here. Headaches, problems with the gastrointestinal tract, endocrine and cardiovascular system, etc. The body literally begins to "collapse". A person begins to "burn" at his job.

The emotional component:

• Unwillingness to go to work

• Worries, suffering about the fact that a person does not do what he wants, that this is not his vocation

• Depressed state

• Background depressive mood

• Dreariness

• Lack of initiative

• Unwillingness to learn something new

• Feeling hopeless.

Separately, it is worth noting the anxiety that many people suffer from. Now I also call it a disease of the 21st century.

Stages of professional burnout

The first stage. Nervous tension begins due to the difficulty of the contingent, a chronic psychoemotional atmosphere or a destabilizing situation.

The second stage. Trying to protect himself, a person begins to resist. This process is called resistance.

The third stage. Emotional detachment: almost nothing excites, almost nothing causes an emotional response – neither positive circumstances nor negative.

Causes and ways to solve the problem

Depending on the reason, the ways to deal with professional burnout will be different.

The main reason for burnout is an unloved job. This opinion is shared by many psychologists.

This problem is often found in neurotics. Work is not a way of self-realization, but a way to earn money for survival. People go to unloved jobs for money that brings them unloved things. Tasteless, but healthy food; ugly, but high-quality clothes, etc. That's the way neurotic brains work.

This should not be confused with workaholism, which is considered as a separate cause of professional burnout. The words of psychologist Mikhail Labkovsky are more appropriate here than ever: "Only those people who are not busy with their own business burn out."

How to fight? To begin with, it is important to realize your problem. Many people suffer from the fact that they are not doing their job, but they are looking for completely different reasons for their suffering: "the boss is a jerk, my colleagues are bastards, people around me don't understand me." Therefore, the aspect of accepting that the problem is present is very important here. It's not as easy as it seems. Mikhail Labkovsky suggests performing one exercise periodically. It's called "I ask myself 24 hours a day about what I want." For one day, you need to do whatever you want. Watch your favorite movies, read your favorite books, do not communicate with people who are unpleasant, etc. When you begin to base your desires on the level of everyday life, you will begin to realize yourself as a person, you will come to understand what you want from a professional point of view. Also, do not consider the profession as a free-standing closet, because this is your direct need for self-realization.

And now it's worth talking about workaholism. In principle, it is impossible to work hard, because it exhausts the body both physically and emotionally. Especially if the work is monotonous. It is necessary to distribute the mode of work and rest. The change of activity should be present during the day, at best if it is an alternation of mental and physical activity. Breaks should be made not only for lunch. Here we can recall Henry Ford, who actively struggled with the professional burnout of his employees, who spent whole days doing monotonous work standing at the machines. There were always rest rooms at the factories, as well as regular breaks.

As Steve Jobs said, "Work not for 12 hours, but with your head."

In the fight against workaholism, it is worth highlighting a separate category of people who work for themselves, and are not employees. Very often they refuse to delegate responsibilities, considering business the meaning of their life. In the end, this leads not only to professional burnout, but also to a nervous breakdown. Returning to Mikhail Labkovsky, we can recall another quote from him. "A healthy person, he lives." And workaholics forget about life outside of work. As a result, this leads to disastrous consequences.

The unclear distribution of roles and responsibilities among employees leads to professional burnout. With the same pay, people can perform work that is not the same in terms of workload. A person who finds himself in a similar situation, it makes sense to think: "should I stay in this place?".

Speaking about remuneration, it should be noted right away that the salary is one of the reasons under consideration. Here, each person determines for himself the level of adequacy of his remuneration for work.

Also, unconsciousness should be singled out separately. A person does not always understand what really worries him. Maybe it's not professional burnout at all, but it's not about work at all. The causes of stress can be problems at home, in relationships with loved ones, loneliness, etc.

Due to low self-esteem, a person can get stuck in his position like in a swamp. Here's another reason. You can often hear the phrase "I'm fine and so, but stable, full of social package". People consider themselves unworthy of a higher position, greater responsibility. As a result, stagnation or even regression occurs. In order not to "burn", it is necessary to grow. If there is no growth, there is a ground for burnout. We must constantly learn and develop.

The last reason is the inability to take into account individual characteristics, i.e. the peculiarities of physiology, namely nervous activity, are not taken into account. What one can do, the other can't. You always need to approach yourself individually. For example, everyone determines the amount of sleep for himself. Some feel cheerful after 7 o'clock, and someone needs to sleep all 11 hours.

In conclusion it is necessary to say that in modern realities there is a large percentage of people who consider psychology a pseudoscience. For some reason, everyone is watching their physical health, but they forget about the psychological. But mental instability is the cause of many problems. As a result, this leads to the same professional burnout, nervous breakdowns. And then there are problems with physical health. Unfortunately, every second person is now a neurotic. People do not know how to enjoy life and get pleasure from it. They don't know how to be happy. Therefore, it is necessary to take care of yourself and follow all the recommendations mentioned above. Remember that mental health is important!

Literature :

1. Veronika Stepanova. "Professional burnout. How not to lose interest in your business? Psychotherapy".  [electronic resource]. // URL: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nHNYC3THuLs

2. "Mikhail Labkovsky / What to do if work does not bring joy"  [electronic resource]. // URL: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1YnW23P-oBo

3. Vodopyanova N.E. Prevention and correction of burnout syndrome: methodology, theory, practice. – St. Petersburg: St. Petersburg University, 2011. – 160c.

4. Scientific and methodological educational Innovation Center "Health" Methodical manual "Professional burnout syndrome: prevention and correction" Kaluga 2013 Reviewer Melnitskaya T.B., Doctor of Psychology. sciences.

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