Measuring relationships between self‐compassion, compassion fatigue, burnout and well‐being in student counsellors and student cognitive behavioural psychotherapists: a quantitative survey
Open accessAbstract
Background: Prolonged deficiency in self‐care strategies puts counsellors and psychotherapists at risk of burnout and compassion fatigue. Aim: To measure associations between self‐compassion, compassion fatigue, well‐being and burnout in student counsellors and student cognitive behavioural psychotherapists. Method: A quantitative survey using four validated data collection instruments: (1) Professional Quality of Life Scale; (2) Self‐Compassion Scale; (3) short Warwick and Edinburgh Mental Well‐being Scale; (4) Compassion For Others scale, was used to measure relationships between self‐compassion, compassion fatigue, well‐being and burnout. Participants: A mixed sample of student counsellors and student cognitive behavioural psychotherapists (n = 54) in their final year of study. Results: This preliminary study shows that student counsellors and student cognitive behavioural psychotherapists who reported high on measures of self‐compassion and well‐being also reported less compassion fatigue and burnout. Implications for practice: Compassion fatigue and burnout are found in many modern‐day, highly stressful healthcare professions. The practice of self‐compassion could help student practitioners manage these symptoms and subsequently improve their professional quality of life.
Integrity signals
Registry
Cites
Statistics
Claims the paper makes
Cites
The Development and Validation of a Scale to Measure Self-Compassion
NEFF, K. D. (2003) · Self and Identity · doi:10.1080/15298860309027 · Cited by 6,436 · see citing works
Gilbert, P., & Procter, S. (2006) · Clinical Psychology & Psychotherapy · doi:10.1002/cpp.507 · Cited by 1,822 · see citing works
Leary, M. R., Tate, E. B., Adams, C. E., Batts Allen, A., & Hancock, J. (2007) · Journal of Personality and Social Psychology · doi:10.1037/0022-3514.92.5.887 · Cited by 1,728 · see citing works
Compassion fatigue: Psychotherapists’ chronic lack of self care.
Figley, C. R. (2002) · Journal of Clinical Psychology · doi:10.1002/jclp.10090 · Cited by 1,614 · see citing works
Neff, K. D., Rude, S. S., & Kirkpatrick, K. L. (2007) · Journal of Research in Personality · doi:10.1016/j.jrp.2006.08.002 · Cited by 1,224 · see citing works
Self-compassion, Achievement Goals, and Coping with Academic Failure
Neff, K. D., Hsieh, Y.-P., & Dejitterat, K. (2005) · Self and Identity · doi:10.1080/13576500444000317 · Cited by 1,221 · see citing works
Shapiro, S. L., Brown, K. W., & Biegel, G. M. (2007) · Training and Education in Professional Psychology · doi:10.1037/1931-3918.1.2.105 · Cited by 1,134 · see citing works
Gilbert, P. (2010) · Routledge eBooks · doi:10.4324/9780203851197 · Cited by 957 · see citing works
Lutz, A., Brefczynski-Lewis, J., Johnstone, T., & Davidson, R. J. (2008) · PLoS ONE · doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0001897 · Cited by 942 · see citing works
Loving-kindness meditation increases social connectedness.
Hutcherson, C. A., Seppala, E. M., & Gross, J. J. (2008) · Emotion · doi:10.1037/a0013237 · Cited by 758 · see citing works
Psychotherapeutic benefits of compassion-focused therapy: an early systematic review
Leaviss, J., & Uttley, L. (2015) · Psychological Medicine · doi:10.1017/s0033291714002141 · Cited by 546 · see citing works
The evolution of social attractiveness and its role in shame, humiliation, guilt and therapy
Gilbert, P. (1997) · British Journal of Medical Psychology · doi:10.1111/j.2044-8341.1997.tb01893.x · Cited by 539 · see citing works
Raab, K. (2014) · Journal of Health Care Chaplaincy · doi:10.1080/08854726.2014.913876 · Cited by 395 · see citing works
Self-compassion and emotional intelligence in nurses
Heffernan, M., Quinn Griffin, M. T., McNulty, S. R., & Fitzpatrick, J. J. (2010) · International Journal of Nursing Practice · doi:10.1111/j.1440-172x.2010.01853.x · Cited by 313 · see citing works
Braehler, C., Gumley, A., Harper, J., Wallace, S., Norrie, J., & Gilbert, P. (2013) · British Journal of Clinical Psychology · doi:10.1111/bjc.12009 · Cited by 294 · see citing works
Compassionate mind training with people who hear malevolent voices: A case series report
Mayhew, S. L., & Gilbert, P. (2008) · Clinical Psychology & Psychotherapy · doi:10.1002/cpp.566 · Cited by 259 · see citing works
A pilot exploration of the use of compassionate images in a group of self‐critical people
Gilbert, P., & Irons, C. (2004) · Memory · doi:10.1080/09658210444000115 · Cited by 251 · see citing works
Boellinghaus, I., Jones, F. W., & Hutton, J. (2014) · Mindfulness · doi:10.1007/s12671-012-0158-6 · Cited by 250 · see citing works
Integrating mindfulness as self‐care into counselling and psychotherapy training
Christopher, J. C., & Maris, J. A. (2010) · Counselling and Psychotherapy Research · doi:10.1080/14733141003750285 · Cited by 184 · see citing works
Judge, L., Cleghorn, A., McEwan, K., & Gilbert, P. (2012) · International Journal of Cognitive Therapy · doi:10.1521/ijct.2012.5.4.420 · Cited by 122 · see citing works
Flagged first, then by citations
Cited by
Sorted by citations
Self-compassion, trauma, and posttraumatic stress disorder: a systematic review
Winders, S., Murphy, O., Looney, K., & O'Reilly, G. (2020) · Clinical Psychology & Psychotherapy · doi:10.1002/cpp.2429 · Cited by 168 · see citing works
Mascaro, J. S., Florian, M. P., Ash, M. J., Palmer, P. K., Frazier, T., Condon, P., & Raison, C. (2020) · Frontiers in Psychology · doi:10.3389/fpsyg.2020.547241 · Cited by 118 · see citing works
Wasson, R. S., Barratt, C., & O’Brien, W. H. (2020) · Mindfulness · doi:10.1007/s12671-020-01342-5 · Cited by 109 · see citing works
Ondrejková, N., & Halamová, J. (2022) · Health & Social Care in the Community · doi:10.1111/hsc.13741 · Cited by 93 · see citing works
Prudenzi, A., D. Graham, C., Flaxman, P. E., & O’Connor, D. B. (2022) · Psychology, Health & Medicine · doi:10.1080/13548506.2021.1898651 · Cited by 58 · see citing works
Márquez, M. A., Galiana, L., Oliver, A., & Sansó, N. (2021) · Health & Social Care in the Community · doi:10.1111/hsc.13209 · Cited by 32 · see citing works
Self-compassion among social workers
Jay Miller, J., Lee, J., Shalash, N., & Poklembova, Z. (2020) · Journal of Social Work · doi:10.1177/1468017319829404 · Cited by 25 · see citing works
Jiménez-Gómez, L., Yela, J. R., Crego, A., Melero-Ventola, A. R., & Gómez-Martínez, M. Á. (2022) · Mindfulness · doi:10.1007/s12671-021-01814-2 · Cited by 24 · see citing works
Tai‐Seale, M., Walker, A., Cheng, Y., Yung, N., Webb, S., Lunde, O., Bazzo, D., Mandvi, A., Doran, N., Kallenberg, G., et al. (2025) · Learning Health Systems · doi:10.1002/lrh2.10444 · Cited by 1 · see citing works
- Authors
- Beaumont, E., Durkin, M., Hollins Martin, C. J., & Carson, J.
- Affiliations
- University of Salford (GB)
- University of Greater Manchester (GB)
- School of Nursing, Midwifery and Social Work Edinburgh Napier University Edinburgh UK
- Corresponding author
- Beaumont, Elaine
- Venue
- Counselling and Psychotherapy Research
- Publisher
- Wiley
- Published
- 2015-12-19
- Volume
- 16
- Issue
- 1
- Pages
- 15-23
- ISSN
- 1473-3145 (ISSN-L)
- 1746-1405
- OpenAlex
- W2336503625
- Cited by
- 149
- References
- 20
- Citations by year
- 2026: 13 · 2025: 16 · 2024: 13 · 2023: 20 · 2022: 18 · 2021: 20 · 2020: 21 · 2019: 12 · 2018: 10 · 2017: 2 · 2016: 3 · 2015: 1
- FWCI
- 8.72
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- bronze
- doi.org
- Locations
- Counselling and Psychotherapy Research (publishedVersion)
- UBIR (University of Greater Manchester) (acceptedVersion)
- University of Salford Institutional Repository (University of Salford) (submittedVersion, cc-by)
- UBIR (University of Greater Manchester) (submittedVersion)
- Edinburgh Napier Research Repository (Edinburgh Napier University) (submittedVersion, cc-by)
- Edinburgh Napier Research Repository (Edinburgh Napier University) (submittedVersion, other-oa)
- Topics
- Social Sciences › Psychology › Social Psychology › Stress and Burnout Research
- Health Sciences › Health Professions › General Health Professions › Healthcare professionals’ stress and burnout
- Social Sciences › Psychology › Clinical Psychology › Mindfulness and Compassion Interventions
- Keywords
- self-compassion, compassion fatigue, burnout, well-being, student counselors, professional quality of life, self-care, compassion for others
About these checks
Registry, retraction, Cites and statistics results are computed, not judged, with one exception: a printed reference that no index lists is read once by a model before it counts as a citation error. Claims are extracted by a model and kept only when their quote appears verbatim in the text; each cited source is then checked, with a model’s help, for whether it says what the claim relies on. Those verdicts can be wrong — read the claim’s quote and the cited source before relying on one.
Statistics and arithmetic are recomputed, not judged.
Confidence bands are shown only for fields calibrated on our annotated test set. None is calibrated yet, so no band is shown.
What counts as a claim ›How we measure confidence ›How we check this ›
Are you an author, or do you see a problem with this page? Request a review
