Burnout, Control Coping, and Health Beliefs among Professional Caregivers for the Elderly in Japan: A prevention perspective

Abstract

Very little attention has been paid to the mental health of professional caregivers for the elderly in Japan despite the increasing importance of their role in this rapidly aging society. This study identified burnout as the most imminent mental health problem for which caregivers are at risk and investigated the burnout-preventive aspects of control coping, and further attempted to predict the use of control coping from health beliefs. A self-report survey was administered to 180 professional caregivers for the elderly in Tokyo, Japan. Measures included in the survey were (a) the translated and revised version of the Maslach Burnout Inventory (Kubo & Tao, 1994), (b) control coping (Latack, 1986), and (c) health beliefs about burnout and control coping (cf., Stretcher, Champion, & Rosenstock, 1997). Hierarchical multiple regression analyses showed that greater use of control coping predicted decreased levels of burnout, and that certain health beliefs predicted the use of control coping. Significant age-related differences in these relationships were found. The findings were also discussed in terms of the “threshold” concept of burnout resiliency. In addition to individual-level interventions, the importance of organization-level prevention efforts was emphasized to the extent that interventions could be developed and implemented to foster health beliefs that promote control coping and also to be responsive to the caregivers’ control coping attempts.