Effect of Rational-Emotive Behavior Intervention on Managing Burnout Symptoms among Postgraduate Students in Public Universities

Abstract

Burnout symptom is an emotional and psychological imbalance commonly experienced by students of tertiary institutions. This unhealthy state of existence is capable of undermining the quality of health and academic performances resulting in exhaustion and disengagement. The current study therefore aimed to investigate the effect of rational-emotive behavior intervention -REBI on managing burnout symptoms among postgraduate students in public universities. This research was based on experimental design involving treatment and control groups. Using a purposive sampling technique, 92 study participants were recruited from the public universities in Nigeria from July 2019 and January 2020. The treatment intervention was delivered to only the experimental group with an evidence-based REBI manual. Data collection process was completed using the Oldenburg Burnout Inventory-student version -OLBIS with internal consistency of 0.77 index. The complete data analysis was done using SPSS version 22. The results indicated that no significant difference existed between the participants in the experimental (23.17±2.71) and control groups (21.69±2.80) on OLBI-S pretest, F=0.147, P=.738, h2p =0.014, DR2=0.709, SE=1.52. Statistically significant difference was found to exist between the participants in the experimental (11.43±4.17) and control groups (22.02±5.66) on OLBI-S posttest scores, F=2.081, P=0.041, h2p=0.105, DR2=0.706, SE=1.40. This study showed that REBI was effective in managing burnout symptoms among postgraduate students in public universities in Nigeria. The REBI is considered very effective in managing diverse emotional and psychological problems existing among students. There is need for enlightenment and massive health education on burnout and prospective ways of managing it.

Psikoeğitim Programının Üniversite Öğrencilerinin Tükenmişlik Düzeyine Etkisi

“…Ogbuanya et al (2019) determined that the Rational-Emotional Behavior Therapy Program had a significant effect on reducing the burnout of students in the experimental group. Similar findings were obtained in another study by Igbokwe, Obande-Ogbuinya, Nwala, Ezugwu, and Ugwu (2020) which evaluated the effect of the Rational-Emotional Behavior Therapy Program on the reducing burnout symptoms, conducted with graduate students studying at state universities in Nigeria. In addition, a study evaluating the effect of burnout status and their attendance on the first-and second-year students at Erciyes University Faculty of Medicine determined that stress management education was effective in reducing burnout, especially the emotional exhaustion sub-dimension of medical students (Naçar, Baykan and Çetinkaya, 2012).…”

“…They determined that 88% of 23 studies meeting the criteria of the research were effective in reducing burnout. However, it is striking that there are few intervention studies aimed at reducing the burnout of university students (Igbokwe, Obande-Ogbuinya, Nwala, Ezugwu and Ugwu, 2020;Naçar, Baykan and Çetinkaya, 2012;Ogbuanya et al, 2019;Yedigöz Sönmez and Çapri, 2013). These results show the necessity and importance of intervention programs especially for reducing student burnout.…”

“…The literature includes results indicating that intervention studies aimed at reducing burnout are effective (Igbokwe, Obande-Ogbuinya, Nwala, Ezugwu and Ugwu, 2020;Ogbuanya et al, 2019). The meta-analysis study conducted by Awa, Plaumann, and Walter (2010) determined that 80% of 25 intervention programs were effective in reducing burnout for individuals and organizations from different occupational groups between 1995-2007.…”

Academic burnout among undergraduate history students

“…In terms of REBT's effectiveness in assisting students in managing burnout, our present finding supports several studies which found similar results in student population. [3][4][5]11,12,14,23] Heber et al [26] show that internet-based intervention effectively reduced symptoms of stress. The finding of Harrer et al [27] supports online intervention delivery for reducing patient symptoms.…”

“…In Nigerian studies of the university student population, internal consistency reliability tests show that Cronbach a score for the OLBI-S ranges from 0.77 to 0.90. [3][4][5]11,12,14,23] This online intervention was guided with an adapted electronic version of the manual of rational emotive behavioral therapy for the management of burnout [2] and was delivered using the telegram app. This online REBT intervention comprised cognitive restructuring strategies and re-education to alter students' burnout beliefs.…”