Researchers, employers and health care providers are increasingly focused on the importance of perceived stress and employee burnout (Gutman, 2020). People who report more perceived stress have lower measured sleep quality and are less productive at work. Experiencing stress and symptoms of burnout at work can cause home and family relationships to worsen, create tension with coworkers and increase vulnerability to disease (Timotius et al, 2022). Accordingly, Global Health Metrics has created both perceived stress and burnout modules.
There are many versions of measures, items and scales and subdimensions in the research literature which measure burnout and perceived stress (Cohen, 1990; Lee, 2012; Karam, 2012; Wartig, 2013). Historically, perceived stress has been measured using variants of Cohen’s Perceived Stress Scale (1983). In GHM assessments and software tools, burnout is measured using items adapted from the Burnout Assessment Tool (BAT; Schaufeli et al, 2019). The GHM approach minimizes participant burden, has been utilized extensively in multiple large populations of employees, and is extremely useful for ascertaining employee perceptions and complaints about burnout. Questions cover exhaustion, mental distance, emotional impairment, cognitive impairment and other secondary domains critical for understanding the extent to which burnout is affecting an individual and their task performance at work or at school.
The burnout and perceived stress modules each include three components:
- Questions and Scoring
- Algorithm
- Report Messaging
For both the perceived stress and burnout modules, the algorithm and scoring are derived directly from the published scientific literature, and messaging was reviewed by GHM’s network of clinical experts. Please feel free to contact our team for a demonstration of how your organization can better support your health assessment needs.
Measuring perceived stress and burnout provides several critical benefits in health risk assessments:
- Insightful Reporting: The modules provide detailed reports on how employees and organizations are doing.
- Enhanced Productivity: Monitoring and reducing perceived stress and burnout can lead to increased productivity at work, as stressed employees tend to be less effective.
- Better Relationships: Addressing stress and burnout can improve home and family relationships, as well as reduce tensions with coworkers.
- Health Protection: Lowering stress and burnout reduces vulnerability to diseases, safeguarding overall employee health.
- Comprehensive Assessment: The Global Health Metrics (GHM) modules are delivered in combination with a full assessment of cardiovascular and preventive health risks allowing for prioritization of health promoting activities.
- Minimized Participant Burden: GHM’s approach ensures that assessments are efficient and not overly burdensome for participants, making it easier to gather useful data.
By accurately assessing perceived stress and burnout, organizations can implement strategies to support well-being.
References
Cohen S, Lichtenstein E. Perceived stress, quitting smoking, and smoking relapse. Health Psychology. 1990;9(4):466.
Gutman K. An Exploration of the Relationship Between Heart Rate Variability, Sleep Quality, Perceived Stress, and Workplace Productivity in an Employee Population. Alliant International University; 2020.
Karam F, Bérard A, Sheehy O, Huneau MC, Briggs G, Chambers C, Einarson A, Johnson D, Kao K, Koren G, Martin B. Reliability and validity of the 4‐item Perceived Stress Scale among pregnant women: Results from the OTIS antidepressants study. Research in nursing & health. 2012 Aug;35(4):363-75.
Lee EH. Review of the psychometric evidence of the perceived stress scale. Asian nursing research. 2012 Dec 1;6(4):121-7.
Leung DY, Lam TH, Chan SS. Three versions of Perceived Stress Scale: validation in a sample of Chinese cardiac patients who smoke. BMC public health. 2010 Dec;10(1):513.
Schaufeli, W.B., De Witte, H. & Desart, S. (2019). Burnout Assessment Tool (BAT) – Test Manual. KU Leuven, Belgium: Internal report.
Timotius E, Octavius GS. Stress at the workplace and its impacts on productivity: A systematic review from industrial engineering, management, and medical perspective. Industrial Engineering & Management Systems. 2022 Jun;21(2):192-205.
Warttig SL, Forshaw MJ, South J, White AK. New, normative, English-sample data for the short form perceived stress scale (PSS-4). Journal of health psychology. 2013 Dec;18(12):1617-28.