Role ambiguity
Role Clarity
Organizational factors associated with anxiety included: work overload, time pressures causing teachers to work during their free time, and role conflict. There were significant correlations between the reported anxiety and those stressors relating to pupils and parents [ 45 ]. In addition, interpersonal conflict, organizational constraints and workload were reported to result in depression through increasing job burnout [ 73 ]. Furthermore, depressive symptoms correlated with teaching special needs students and had a significant and robust relationship with the general burnout factor [ 50 ]. Self-perceived accomplishment was also positively associated with autonomy and negatively associated with low student motivation [ 18 ]. Personal accomplishment had a significant positive relationship with the number of teaching hours per week [ 40 ]. On the contrary, a cross-sectional study by Baka reported that increased work hours are usually accompanied by job demands, job burnout, and depression [ 73 ]. Job strain, job demand and job insecurity all showed positive associations with depressive symptoms [ 80 , 94 ]. Work-related factors, such as workload, were also correlated with stress, burnout, depression, and anxiety [ 42 , 73 ].
Furthermore, the educational level and teaching experience also predict depression. Depression was highest among teachers with a lower education followed by teachers with the most teaching experience [ 42 ]. Teacher stress was reported to be significantly associated with psychological distress, and social support could moderate the influence of stress; hence, the high-stress and the low-support group were most vulnerable to anxiety [ 74 ]. Studies have also reported that 55% of teachers without spousal support had depression [ 42 ]. In addition, stress was reported to be associated with missed work days, high anxiety and high role conflict [ 43 , 89 ] and 53.2% of teachers identified work as a source of long-term stress, leading to burnout [ 55 ]. According to Fei Liu et al. resilience significantly correlated with job burnout and turnover intention, and low resilience could result in a high job burnout [ 86 ]. The research also showed that personality trait neuroticism was the best predictor of burnout (28–34%) [ 67 ].
A significant overlap was reported between stress, burnout, anxiety and depression. Eighteen articles reported a correlation between burnout and depression, with differences in depressive symptomatology depending on the prevalence of burnout [ 3 , 18 , 25 , 41 , 42 , 48 , 50 , 52 , 54 , 60 , 64 , 69 , 84 , 86 , 92 , 95 ]. Three articles reported a correlation between burnout and anxiety symptoms [ 52 , 64 ]. Seven articles reported a correlation between stress and anxiety [ 28 , 58 , 65 , 71 ]. Six articles reported a correlation between stress and depression [ 28 , 31 , 43 , 61 , 68 , 71 ]. A correlation exists between moderate depressive disorder and anxiety disorder as well as stress [ 31 , 96 ]. Negative affectivity (a tendency to feel depression, anxiety, or stress) plays a role in the development of burnout among teachers. Teachers who developed a more markedly negative affectivity also felt more burnt out, and the opposite was true [ 41 ]. This may be related to rumination. According to Nolen-Hoeksema, rumination is a pain response which entails a recurrent and passive focus on the symptoms of pain and their likely causes and outcomes [ 97 ]. Ruminative responses may prolong depression by overly focusing on negative thinking and may affect one’s behaviour and problem-solving [ 97 ]. Liu et al. reported that rumination moderated the association between job burnout and depression and that burnout was a stronger predictor of depression in teachers who experienced low rumination rather than high rumination [ 98 ]. This was explained by the importance of rumination for depression; with an improvement in the rumination level, job burnout had less ability to predict depression for those with high rumination levels.
There is a strong association between burnout and depression, as reported in several studies. High frequencies of burnout symptoms were identified among clinically depressed teachers [ 92 ], with 86% to 90% of the teachers identified as burnt out meeting the diagnostic criteria for a depressive disorder [ 60 , 64 ], mainly for major depression (85%) [ 60 ]. In 25% to 85% of teachers with no burnout, depression ranged from 1% to 15% of the study sample. Specifically, only 1% to 3% of the participants in the no-burnout group were identified as having minor depression or depression not otherwise specified (2%) [ 60 , 64 ]. A history of depression was reported by about 63% of the teachers with burnout and 15% of the burnout-free teachers [ 60 ]. The high overlap between depression and burnout was emphasized in one study, which categorized depression as “low burnout-depression” (30%), “medium burnout-depression” (45%), and “high burnout-depression” (25%) [ 92 ]. Notably, the report suggests that although teacher burnout leads to subsequent depressive symptoms, it is not true vice versa [ 95 ]. Furthermore, burnout symptoms at ‘time one’ did not necessarily predict depressive symptoms at ‘time two’ [ 99 ]. Another study reported a positive relationship between burnout and depression [ 84 ]. This was confirmed by a study which suggested that depressive symptoms had a significant and robust association with the general burnout factor [ 50 ].
Anxiety disorder is also associated with higher perceived stress and major depression [ 65 ]. In one study, higher ongoing stressors were positively associated with higher anxiety levels. Continuous and episodic stressors were significantly and positively associated with anxiety and depression. They accounted for 28% (adjusted 25%) of the variability in anxiety and 27% (adjusted 24%) of the variability in depression. [ 71 ]. In contrast, higher levels of co-worker support were related to lower levels of anxiety and depression [ 71 ]. Teachers reported a high prevalence of depressive symptomatology relating to subjective and school-related stress [ 43 ].
This scoping review included 70 articles. The prevalences of stress, burnout, anxiety and depression reported in this scoping review are similar to those reported in two systematic reviews and meta-analysis conducted among teachers during the pandemic. For example, the prevalence of stress reported by Ma et al., from a meta-analysis of 54 studies was 62.6%, whereas the prevalence of anxiety was 36.3% and depression was 59.9% among teachers during the pandemic [ 100 ]. In another meta-analysis, the prevalence range of anxiety was 10% to 49.4%; depression was 15.9% to 28.9%; and stress was 12.6% to 50.6% [ 101 ], which all fall within the range reported in this scoping review for stress [ 28 , 40 ], anxiety [ 42 , 56 ], and depression [ 48 , 59 ]. However, the minimum in all cases was higher during the pandemic, suggesting an increase in psychological problems during the pandemic.
The varying prevalence for stress, burnout, anxiety and depression reported by different studies in this review may be attributable to heterogeneous study designs, including the sample size, location, period of data collection, diversity in the standardized scales used for the assessment, and other factors such as the class size and grade taught [ 102 , 103 ]. In this scoping review, the studies used combinations of terminologies such as “none,” “slightly,” “significant,” “much,” “extremely,” “considerably”, “almost unbearable”, “quite a bit” or “a great deal” to describe the level of stress experienced by teachers according to the measures utilized,, such as the Teachers Stress Inventory [ 44 , 77 ] or the Bruno Teachers Inventory [ 43 ]. The prevalence rates also varied with population, for example, in the case of Fimian, the teachers were teaching special needs students, and this may explain the relatively high prevalence (87.1%) recorded [ 44 ]. More recent studies which used other scales, such as the Perceived Stress Scale (PSS), and the Depression Anxiety Stress Scales (DASS), used terminologies such as “symptoms of stress”, ranging from “mild,” “moderate,” “mild to moderate” or “extremely severe”, to describe the stress levels. For burnout, although most studies used a combination of the three interrelated components of burnout reported by Maslach et al. [ 6 , 7 , 11 , 16 ], some studies focused on reporting the sub-dimensions of burnout, whilst others reported general burnout. Varying expressions such as “low burnout”, “high burnout, “severe burnout”, and moderate were used to describe burnout, making it difficult to make an effective comparison. It was also not clear whether the stress and burnout experienced by the participants were everyday existential life experiences that everyone faces or chronic ones that needed intervention, as these were not specifically stated in the studies. It is essential that future research clarifies this to estimate their prevalence rates more accurately. Secondly, as indicated in the review, the studies applied various scales to measure the prevalence of psychological disorders; however, there was a lack of consensus. This scoping review provides a comprehensive picture of the prevalence of the target outcomes and sets up a foundation for future systematic reviews and meta-analysis to accurately estimate the prevalence of these outcomes among teachers.
The essential correlates of stress, burnout, anxiety, and depression identified in this review include socio-demographic factors such as sex, age, gender, marital status, school (organizational) factors and work-related factors (years of teaching, class size, job satisfaction, subject taught and absenteeism). Most studies were published in the last fifteen years (2007–2022), indicating a recent increase in interest in this area of research.
Socio-demographic factors such as sex, age and marital status significantly influence teacher stress [ 54 ]. Sex correlates with stress although there are some conflicting reports [ 42 , 53 , 76 ], especially between the levels of stress experienced by males and females. Some studies suggest that female teachers experience more stress than their male counterparts [ 28 , 75 , 77 ]. Working women often have additional demands at home, and trying to accomplish both roles may increase their stress levels [ 104 ] compared to males who may have less demand from home. However, this may be context-dependent, as no sex difference in occupational stress was reported among police officers [ 105 ], for example. The demand from female teachers’ personal lives, including marital issues and home, may be a source of increased stress levels [ 104 ]. Among the general workforce, work–family conflict has been reported to be significantly associated with work stress [ 106 ], and this is not confined only to females. This argument is confirmed in three separate studies, which reported that gender, per se, was not a significant predictor of perceived stress [ 39 , 85 , 89 ]; thus, it is possible that these differences may, rather, be due to differences in the scales used or the effect of organizational factors. For example, the organisational effect experienced by female teachers in a female only elementary or high school may differ from that experienced in a male only or mixed sex teaching environment; however, further research is needed in this area of gender influencing stress factors. Findings from the Canadian Community Health Survey data nonetheless endorsed a difference between males and females regarding work stress, in particular supervisor support. Higher levels of supervisor support seemed to lower work stress amongst women but not men [ 107 ]. Among the general population, social support at work could be more strongly related to a stress reduction in women than in their male counterparts [ 108 ] Sex difference was also observed in relation to student behaviour, with women experiencing increased stress [ 42 , 77 ]. In particular, female teachers’ collective efficacy and beliefs about their school staff group capabilities may lower their stress from student behaviour. Findings from the study by Klassen support the hypothesis that teachers’ collective efficacy serves as a job resource that mediates the effect of stress from student behaviour [ 77 ]. Interventions addressing gender/sex differences may also be considered in supporting female educators’ mental health and work productivity.
A study among refugee teachers also endorsed sex differences in stress [ 42 , 57 ]; however this was in relation to self-care and the association was moderated by age [ 57 ]. Higher occupational stress scores were observed among teachers over 40 years [ 28 ]; nonetheless, among the general population, the published literature reports that the ageing process can worsen or counter the effects of stress [ 109 ], indicating that age does not necessarily increase stress. The cause of increased stress, hence, shifts to other factors such as the poor academic performance of students, or a lack of assistance [ 78 ], which may be influencing an increase in stress.
The class size, grade level taught, workload, poor student performance or lack of progress and other work and school-related factors contribute to teachers’ stress. According to Fimian et al., when stressful events or the perception of them are not ultimately resolved or improved, this may result in several physiological manifestations [ 44 ]. There is clear data indicating that teacher stress was intensified among primary school teachers, special needs teachers, and teachers in private schools who provided more support and input to students than other teachers [ 28 , 78 , 85 , 110 ]. The additional time and energy teachers may invest in primary school kids, who are usually much younger and may require more support, may explain the increased stress among primary school teachers. Again, teaching special needs students may require significant teacher input and assistance, depending on the nature and degree of the disabilities. There is also an increased expectation from teachers in private schools regarding the students’ performances, leading to increased stress [ 28 ]. A study conducted among primary and secondary school teachers in Pakistan concluded that government school teachers were more satisfied with their working conditions than private school teachers [ 110 ], and thus, may experience less stress. In addition, the school location (rural vs. urban), teacher role ambiguity and coherence further exacerbated teacher stress [ 3 , 75 , 89 , 111 ]. An excessive use of technological devices, such as mobile phones, has also been associated with social disruption [ 112 ] and may result in a lack of concentration or poor student performance at school [ 112 , 113 ], leading to teacher stress. Teachers experiencing more significant stress were also burnt out [ 68 ]. For example, during the pandemic, teachers had to adopt and adjust to teaching online, and virtual instruction teachers had the most increased anxiety [ 58 ]. Nonetheless, a rapid systematic review with a meta-analysis reported that teacher stress during the pandemic was still comparatively lower in school teachers with a prevalence of 13% ([95% CI: 7–22%]) in comparison to studies with university teachers as the participants of 35% ([95% CI: 12–66%]) [ 114 ].
While there are complex interactions among several factors which contribute to teacher stress, there have been limited evidence-based interventions to help teachers alleviate these stress sources despite some self-reported coping strategies. This research gap started to receive attention during the COVID-19 pandemic through the application of mindfulness-based interventions [ 115 ], warranting more advanced research on how to best address these challenges in education.
Burnout continues to pose problems within the teaching profession, and factors such as gender, sex, age, marital status and the number of years teaching correlated with the degree of burnout [ 40 , 47 , 51 , 52 , 53 , 54 , 55 , 63 , 67 , 68 , 72 , 73 ], although conflicting results were reported with potentially different explanations. Differences in the study design, particularly the scales used to assess burnout as well as geographical and organizational factors, may account for some of the conflicting results. In addition, there could be an interplay between some personal and professional factors. For example, younger teachers are more likely to be enthusiastic about their new teaching careers, whilst older teachers may experience boredom leading to increased exhaustion. Consistent with this hypothesis, one study reported that teachers who had taught for the fewest (0–5) years experienced the lowest burnout prevalence [ 54 ]. On the contrary, more experienced teachers were likely to have gained exposure, learnt students’ characteristics and classroom management skills and the necessary tools to help them prevent and address burnout. Additionally, teachers who lacked self-fulfilment may have been mostly younger and lacked personal accomplishments [ 47 ], leading to more burnout.
Significantly higher burnout scores, including for emotional exhaustion, depersonalization, and intellectual burnout were found among female teachers than among male teachers in some studies [ 51 , 52 , 53 ], whilst other studies reported that burnout was higher among male teachers. These results are contrary to findings reported among police officers, which indicated no significant difference in the levels of occupational burnout reported by male and female police officers [ 105 ]. Further studies are needed to investigate the contradictory gender differences in teachers’ burnout by different studies. In addition, research is needed on innovative gender-neutral ways of addressing burnout in teachers. Other structural factors, such as the number of children teachers have and class sizes which are associated with increased teacher burnout, require an increased investment in teachers and schools to address them. Governments providing teachers with affordable childcare and other supports for their own children, and building more schools to reduce the class sizes, may lead to a reduced burnout among teachers.
There is also a relationship between burnout and school or work-related factors. The subjects and grades taught and the medium of instruction all contribute to teachers’ burnout [ 7 , 51 ]. Teachers’ perceptions of the difficulty of a subject taught appears to determine their degree of burnout experienced; however, no particular subject seems to be the leading cause of burnout. High school teachers may perceive an increased workload in terms of the amount of time attributed to class preparation due to the difficulty of a subject taught. A cross-sectional study among nurses also found that role overload contributed to higher levels of emotional exhaustion [ 116 ] and this was also endorsed among healthcare managers where prolonged job strain resulted in burnout and an increased turnover intention [ 117 ]. This suggests there is a complex interaction between self-perception and burnout, which makes burnout in teachers a complex problem to address. Differences were also noted in the prevalence of burnout among teachers working in different countries [ 84 ]. For example, 58% of the variance in burnout in Cyprus could be explained by job satisfaction and anxiety, whereas 57.5% of the variance in burnout in Germany was explained by job satisfaction alone [ 84 ]. Different countries have different working conditions which may explain the differences in job satisfaction and associated burnout prevalence among teachers in different countries.
Resilience involves adapting well in the face of stress, difficulty, trauma, disaster, and threats. Resilient people use positive emotions to rebound and find positive meaning even in stressful circumstances [ 118 ]. Resilience had a significantinverse correlation with job burnout and turnover intention, and resilience could negatively predict job burnout [ 86 ]. Resilience was also reported to have an inverse association with burnout symptoms [ 119 ]; thus, increased resilience is linked to decreased burnout and, hence, the tendency for a teacher to remain in their job and thrive no matter what they encounter. Job burnout had a significant positive predictive effect and correlation with turnover intention, which suggests that the more severe the job burnout is, the higher the turnover intention [ 86 ]. Teachers require positive emotions and an increased resilience to remain in the profession and succeed without quitting. Conversely, among physicians, a survey indicated that the burnout prevalence was still significant even among the most resilient physicians; however, West et al. suggested that physicians exhibited higher levels of resilience than the general working population [ 119 ], including teachers. Additionally, resilience was also a significant predictor of depression and anxiety [ 88 ]; thus, the higher the resilience, the less likely teachers will experience depression or anxiety.
Socio-demographic, school and work-related factors are all associated with both anxiety and depression [ 42 , 50 , 51 , 80 ]. This association is consistent with what was reported in a systematic review and meta-analysis by Ma et al., which suggested that teachers’ experiences of psychological issues were associated with various socio-demographic factors such as gender, institutional factors, teaching experience, and workload volume [ 100 ]. In this scoping review, conflicting results were found in relation to the association between teacher gender and depression. Whilst some studies reported that female teachers have higher depression levels than male teachers [ 42 , 51 , 70 , 79 , 81 , 82 ], other studies have reported no gender differences in teacher depression levels [ 53 ]. Contradictory results were also reported for the association between the age of teachers and depression, with some studies reporting higher depression levels in younger teachers [ 42 ] and others reporting higher depression in older teachers [ 51 ]. As discussed previously, it is likely that the use of different scales, coupled with organizational factors, contributed to these contradictory findings among the different studies. The findings also indicated that most female teachers who suffered from depression had been working for about 11 to 15 years [ 120 ].
A poor workplace environment has also been associated with increased anxiety and depressive symptoms [ 121 ] and school-related stress may transition to depressive symptoms among teachers [ 80 , 94 ]. As teachers’ workloads increase, their working hours will invariably increase, resulting in a rise in job demand and ultimately a surge in stress, leading to anxiety and depression. A systematic review reported similar findings where the main risk factors associated with anxiety and depression included job overload and job demands. [ 122 ]. The research also shows that teachers are not the only exception regarding experiencing a poor workplace environment which may lead to increased anxiety and depression [ 122 , 123 ]. Improving teachers’ workplace environments may, therefore, reduce the prevalence of anxiety and depression among teachers. Anxiety has also been linked to stressors relating to pupils and parents. For example, the possibility of a parental complaint increased anxiety scores [ 45 ]. Generally, parents want their children to succeed academically, which sometimes creates friction between teachers and parents. The underperformance of students or failure may be blamed on teachers or construed as the responsibility of schools and teachers [ 124 ], which may result in increased stress and subsequently anxiety and depression for teachers.
Social support was also reported to predict anxiety and depression symptoms, with high support levels indicating fewer symptoms related to anxiety and severe depression [ 121 , 125 ]; thus, teachers who perceived social support at school (e.g., the personnel relation dimension) expressed a lower stress level than those who did not [ 75 ]. According to Peele and Wolf 2020, anxiety and depressive symptoms increase for all teachers over the school year, and poor social support plays a significant role in the development of anxiety and depression symptoms [ 121 ]. Organizational policies that include the provision of adequate social support for teachers may, therefore, be a useful strategy to prevent and mitigate anxiety and depressive symptoms among teachers.
The scoping review is not without limitations. This scoping review searched for articles in the English language only. Though every effort was made to identify all relevant studies for this review considering our eligibility criteria, we may have left out some relevant studies, particularly those published in other languages. Our search included six databases, yet the overall search strategy may have been biased toward health and sciences. Searching other bibliographic databases may have yielded additional published articles. Furthermore, different studies included in this scoping review used various screening tools and worldwide diagnostic classifications to determine stress, burnout, anxiety, and depression, leading to variations in the prevalence estimates. The scoping review included studies from 1974 till date; therefore, it is possible that the theoretical approaches to the concept of burnout may have changed. Notwithstanding these potential changes in the theoretical approaches to the concept of burnout, the burnout prevalence among teachers has appeared to have remained stable over the years. There was also no evaluation of the risk of bias for the included studies. Despite these limitations, this scoping review provides an excellent perspective on the prevalence and correlates of stress, burnout, anxiety and depression among teachers.
Teachers’ psychological and mental health is of utmost importance as it indirectly affects the students they teach. The stress associated with the teaching profession can be linked to three major overlapping issues: burnout, anxiety, and depression, which have a myriad of effects, including an impact on teachers’ health, well-being, and productivity. A wide range of prevalences and correlates were reported for stress, burnout, anxiety, and depression. Differences in the severity were observed in different articles resulting in the diverse prevalence reported among the various studies. The differences in the measurement instruments creates critical knowledge gaps, making it difficult for researchers to make effective comparisons between the different studies. Future research should focus on addressing these research gaps arising from methodological issues, especially the use of different scales to allow for a meaningful comparison. Researchers, educators, and policy makers could benefit from an international consensus meeting and agree on common scales to be used when assessing stress, burnout, anxiety, and depression in teachers. Such an international consensus meeting can also help to streamline the definition of stress and can be used as a forum for addressing other methodological issues related to research and innovations involving elementary and high school teachers. Future research can also focus on exploring the gender differences in these psychological issues further, especially, defining the various subsets of gender being referred to and the specific prevalence in each case. In addition, the high prevalence of stress, burnout, anxiety, and depression reported particularly by several high-quality studies suggests that these psychological problems are widespread among teachers and deserves special attention both at the level of policy and practice.
This scoping review also highlights the risk factors associated with stress, burnout, anxiety, and depression. Identifying these risk factors is a significant step toward addressing these issues among teachers. Schools need to prioritize and promote interventions aimed at teachers’ personal wellbeing. Testing and implementing the interventions aiming to improve teachers’ well-being and ability to cope are important to address stress and burnout, with the expectation that this will prevent or reduce anxiety and depression. This may include school-based awareness and intervention programs to detect the early signs of teacher stress and burnout, or programs that incorporate meditation techniques or text-based support. Meditation techniques have been proposed to be effective in improving psychological distress, fatigue and burnout [ 126 ]. For example, mindfulness practice has been suggested as beneficial in coping with job-related stress, improving the sense of efficacy and reducing burnout in the teaching profession [ 127 ]. Interventions such as mobile text technology are an evidence-based, unique, and innovative way that offers a convenient, low cost and easily accessible form of delivering psychological interventions to the public with mental health problems [ 128 , 129 , 130 ]. Mobile text-based programs can be easily implemented at the school level to support teachers’ psychological needs. Future studies need to explore the development, implementation, monitoring, and evaluation of intervention programs for improving mental health outcomes among teachers. For instance, the Wellness4Teachers program which is planned for implementation in Alberta and Nova Scotia, Canada [ 34 ], is expected to provide evidence of effectiveness for the use of daily supportive text messaging to combat stress, burnout, anxiety, and depression among teachers. Finally, governments, school boards and policymakers need to collaborate with researchers on the design and implementation of measures to enhance teachers’ mental health, productivity (teaching) and quality of life.
Summary of studies with prevalence and correlates of Burnout/Stress.
Authors/Year | Country | Study Design | Sample/Population Size (Response Rate %) | Teachers/Age Range | Scales Used | Key Findings | |
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
Correlates of Burnout/Stress | Prevalence of Burnout/Stress | ||||||
Okwaraji et al., 2015 | [ ] Nigeria | Cross-sectional | SS = 432 | Secondary 26–48 years | Maslach burnout inventory, The General health questionnaire (GHQ-12) and the Generic job satisfaction scale | DP: gender, marital status Reduced PA: age, gender, marital status. | 40% emotional exhaustion EE 39.4% for DP 36.8% for reduced PA. |
Kidger et al., 2016 [ ] | UK | Cross-sectional | 555/708/ (78.4%) | Secondary | Warwick Edinburgh Mental Wellbeing Scale-WEMWBS) | Stress at work: change in school governance. | Not Mentioned. |
Bianchi et al., 2015 [ ] | France | Survey | SS = 627 | Primary/Secondary | Maslach Burnout Inventory (MBI) | Burnout symptoms at time 1 (Tl) did not predict depressive symptoms at time 2 (T2). | Time 1 43%, mild burnout 49% moderate burnout, 8% severe burnout. |
Ramberg et al., 2021 [ ] | Sweden | Cross-sectional | Year 2014/16 3948/7147 (55.2%) SS Final = 2732 | Teachers | Stockholm Teacher Survey. The (Questionnaire) | Perceived stress: high job strain, high SOC. Stress: psychological demands at work. High SOC was linked with lower levels of stress and depressed mood. Variation of 4.8% for perceived stress and 2.1% for depressed mood. | Not mentioned. |
Shukla et al., 2008 [ ] | India | Survey | SS = 320 | Secondary | Maslach Burnout Inventory | Lack of PA: subject taught. Science teachers’ higher burnout than arts teachers. More burnout cases in English medium teachers than Hindi medium. Burnout: gender. | EE: 56.56% low burnout, 19.68% average, 23.75% high. DP: 20% high burnout, 16.56% average, and 63.43% low. Lack of PA: 28.43% high burnout. 13.43% average, and 58.12% low. Lack of PA: 28.43% 11.88% high burnout level in all 3 dimensions, 2.81% average burnout on all 3 sub-scales and 40% low burnout level in all dimensions. Burnout of SCIS teachers 26.26%, (AS, 13.76%. EE: 22.5% SCIS and 25% AS teachers’ high burnout category, 21.88% SCIS and 17.5% AS teachers’ average burnout level, 55.62% SCIS and 57.5% AS teachers’ low burnout. Approximately 56–64% in all dimensions of the sample is showing low burnout levels. |
Pohl et al., 2022 [ ] | Hungary | Cross-sectional | 1817/2500 (72.7%) | High school/18–65 | Maslach Burnout Inventory. | Severe burnout, EE and DP: Internet addiction Internet addiction was associated with severe burnout (10.5 vs. 2.7%, < 0.001), moderate (36.8 vs. 1.7%, < 0.001), and severe (6.3 vs. 0.1%, < 0.001). | 26.0% mild, 70.9% moderate, and 3.1% severe burnout. |
Papastylianou et al., 2009 [ ] | Greece | Cross-sectional | 562/985 (57.1%) | Primary/30–45 | Maslach and Jackson, MBI: Maslach Burnout Inventory. | EE: depressed affect, positive affect, degree of role clarity, role conflict and role ambiguity. | EE: 25.09%, PA 14.27% and DP: 8.65%. |
Hadi et al., 2009 [ ] | Malaysia | Cross-sectional | 565/580 (97.4%) | Female/male Mean age 40.5 | Depression, Anxiety and Stress Scale (DASS 21) and Job Content Questionnaire (JCQ). | Stress: age, duration of work and psychological job demands. | 34.0% stress, 17.4% of teachers experienced mild stress. |
Ratanasiripong et al., 2021 [ ] | Thailand | Cross-sectional | SS = 267 | Primary/secondary 44.4 | The Maslach Burnout Inventory for Educators Survey, Thai version (MBI-ES). | Stress: marital status negative relation with stress., Family economics status, gender, sleep and resilience. Burnout (EE): relationship quality and age. DD: relationship quality and drinking. PA: resilience and number of teaching hours. | 6.0% had severe to extremely severe stress. |
Szigeti et al., 2017 [ ] | Hungary | Cross-sectional | SS = 211 | Primary/secondary 42.8 | Hungarian version of the MBI–ES | General burnout/EE: overcommitment | General burnout 58%, 13% for EE 11% for DP, and 17% for PA. |
Hodge et al., 1974 [ ] | Wales, England | Cross-sectional | 107/145 (75%) | Secondary, 33 mean | Maslach Burnout Inventory (MBI) and General Health Questionnaire (GHQ-60). | EE: difficulty of subject taught and satisfaction, age. 58% of music teachers thought subject was the most difficult subject to teach, 29% of mathematics teachers. | Music teachers have significantly higher EE and DP (high burnt) scores than mathematics teachers. Music teachers. |
Baka 2015 [ ] | Poland | Cross-sectional | 316/400/ (79%) | Primary/secondary 22–60 | The Oldenburg Burnout Inventory. | Job burnout: age and job seniority, work hours, job demands. Job burnout decreases along with age and job seniority. Increased work hours were accompanied by job demands, general job burnout, depression and physical symptoms. | Not mentioned. |
Othman et al., 2019 [ ] | Malaysia | Cross-sectional | SS = 356 | Secondary <20->/= 50 | Malay Depression Anxiety Stress Scales (DASS). | Stress; gender, educational status, teaching experience, marital status. | 32.3% stress symptoms 25.3% were mild to moderate. 7.0% severe to the extremely severe stress. Female stress 32.7%, Indian/other ethnic 50.6%, lowest educational status 46.1%, longest teaching experience (34.6%), lowest income (33.9%), marriage duration 11–20 years (37.3%), 1–3 children (35.5%), |
Skaalvik et al., 2020 [ ] | Norway | Longitudinal | SS = 262 | High school | Maslach Burnout Inventory-Educators Survey. | EE: time pressure. Cynicism: low student motivation. Self-perceived accomplishment: autonomy and low student motivation. Burnout: motivation to quit, job satisfaction. | Not mentioned |
Li et al., 2020 [ ] | China | Cross-sectional | 1741/1795 (97%) | Kindergartens/preschool 18–48 | Chinese version Maslach Burnout Inventory and the Perceived Stress Scale-14. | Burnout rate: overweight/obesity, type of school, income satisfaction, depression. Burnout: age, higher perceived stress levels, shorter years of teaching. Perceived stress ( < 0.001, OR = 1.15, 95%CI: 1.13–1.18). | Burnout was 53.2%. 53.0% (851/1607) in female subjects and 56.0% (75/134) in male subjects. |
Gosnell et al., 2021 [ ] | Malaysia | Cross-sectional | 123/400(31%) | Primary/secondary | Depression Anxiety Stress Scales-21 self-care strategy questionnaire was adapted from a self-care scale in the Mental Health Handbook. | Stress: self-care. The association was moderated by age. Among refugee teachers, women were more stressed than men. Stress: negative correlation with age. Younger teachers experienced higher rates of stress than older teachers. | Refugee teachers 8.3% in the severe or extremely severe stress levels clinical ranges. |
Capone et al., 2020 [ ] | Italy | SS = 285 | High school 29–65 | Burnout Inventory- General Survey (MBI). | EE, and DP: flourishing participants languishing teachers. | 22.1% for EE and 9.5% for DP. | |
Chan et al., 2002 [ ] | China | Cross-sectional | SS = 83 | Secondary 22–42 | The shortened 20-item Teacher Stressor Scale (TSS). e 20-item Chinese shortened version of the General Health Questionnaire (GHQ-20). | Stress: psychological distress. Gender, age. Self-efficacy: psychological distress, social support. | Not mentioned. |
Zhang et al., 2014 [ ] | China | Survey | SS = 590 | Primary/secondary 34 ± 8.11 | Chinese Maslach Burnout Inventory. | Reduced PA and intellectual burnout: somatization EE, DP, and intellectual burnout: gender. Burnout: gender, level of mental health. EE, DP: best predictor anxiety. | EE accounted for 92.8% of the burnout cases, DP for 92.9%, reduced PA for 89.9%, and intellectual burnout for 95.0%). Burnout is more severe in female teachers than in male teachers. |
Vladut, et al., 2011 [ ] | Romania | Cross-sectional | SS = 177 | Primary/secondary/High 22–64 | Maslach Burnout Inventory (MBI). Teachers’ Sense of Efficacy Scale. | Burnout: rural or urban teaching, self-acceptance, classroom management, work-conditions and confidence. | 49.6% above moderate or severe EE 28.7% on DP 54.1% on inefficacy. |
Liu et al., 2021 [ ] | China | Cross-sectional | 449/500 (89.8%) | High 36.70 | Maslach Burnout Inventory (MBI). | Job burnout: turnover intention; resilience has negative correlation. EE was the most predictive factor for turnover intention with an explanatory variance of 29.2%, followed by DP with an explanatory variance of 1.9% Lest is low PA with 1.5%. | Not mentioned. |
Fimian et al., 1983 [ ] | US | Survey | 365/800(47%) | Special education | Teacher Stress Inventory (TSI) Survey. Sources of Stress (25 items); Emotional and Behavioral Manifestations of Stress (24 items); Physiological Manifestations of Stress (16 items). | Stress: lack of time to spend with individual pupils, teaching. Special needs, or mixed ability students. Increased workload, feeling isolated, and frustrated because of poor administration attitudes and behaviors. | 87.1% moderately-to-very stressful. (45.6%) much-to-very-much stress. 15.9% (58/365) identified as low-stress, (68.4% (250/365) as moderate-stress, and 15.6% (57/365) as high-stress teachers. |
Katsantonis 2020 [ ] | * 15 Countries. | Survey | SS = 51,782 | Primary | Self-efficacy is domain-specific and three scales reflect the self-efficacy. 5 items scale was designed by OECD (2019) to measure factors that cause workload stress. | Workload stress: self-efficacy in instruction, student-behavior, workplace well-being, work satisfaction. Stress: perceived disciplinary climate. School climate negative effect. Increase work satisfaction results in perceived less stress. 16% (organizational constraints as a predictor of depression). | Japanese participants had greater levels of workload stress than Korean participants. Participants from Belgium perceived greater workload stress. |
Ratanasiripong et al., 2020 [ ] | Japan | Cross-sectional | 174/200 (87%) | Primary/secondary 41.65 | Japanese version of depression, Anxiety, and Stress scale (DASS-42). Japanese version of the Connor–Davidson Resilience Scale (CD-RISC). Japanese version of the Rosenberg Self-Esteem Scale (RSE). | Stress: resiliency and self-esteem. Strength Higher self-esteem and resilience were significantly correlated to less stress. | Not mentioned. |
Jurado et al., 2005 [ ] | Spain | Cross-sectional | 496/602/ (82.7%) | Primary/secondary (women, 45.3 ± 9.8; men, 44.7 ± 9.7). | Spanish version of Epidemiologic Studies Depression scale (CES-D). | Job stress: negative correlation with job satisfaction, desire to change job and appraisal by others. Teachers wishing to change jobs (25%; significantly higher score on job stress but low on job satisfaction and appraisal by others. | |
Bianchi et al., 2021 [ ] | France Spain Switzerland | Survey | France ( = 4395), Spain ( = 611), and Switzerland ( = 514) | Schoolteachers | Maslach Burnout Inventory for Educators. Job strain was measured with a shortened version of the Effort-Reward Imbalance Questionnaire. | Burnout: neuroticism prediction (28–34%), job strain (10–12%), skill development, security in daily life, and work–non-work conflict (about 15–18%), sex, age, unreasonable work tasks, workhours, job autonomy, sentimental accomplishment, leisure activities, personal life support. | Not mentioned. |
Bianchi et al., 2014 [ ] | France | Analytical | SS = 5575 | School teachers 41 years; | Maslach Burnout Inventory. Depression was measured with the 9-item depression scale of the Patient Health Questionnaire (PHQ-9). | EE: Strongly associated with depression than with DP and reduced PA. | No-burnout 13% (750) participants. |
Hammen et al., 1982 [ ] | US | Cross-sectional | SS = 75 | Secondary | DASS-21scale. Bruno’s Teacher stress Inventory | Stress: depressive symptomatology, days off work, school-related factors. | 76% moderate or greater stress 20% level of stress was “almost unbearable.” |
Méndez et al., 2020 [ ] | Spain | Cross-sectional | 210/300 (70%) | 30 to 65 | Maslach burnout inventory. | Burnout: correlates with EE, PA and DP resulting in three burnout profiles (high burnout); (moderate burnout) and (low burnout). Burnout: depressive symptomatology. The higher the burnout the greater the depressive symptomatology | 33.3% high burnout 39.1% low burnout and 27.6% moderate burnout. |
Jepson et al., 2006 [ ] | UK | Cross-sectional | 95/159 (60%) | Primary/secondary | Perceived Stress Scale (PSS). 10 scale item, occupational commitment 6 scale item. | Work-related stress, strongest predictor and negative relationship, was occupational commitment, achievement striving experience, level taught. Educational level taught. Occupational commitment increases, perceived stress decreases. | Significantly higher levels of perceived stress were reported from primary school teachers than secondary school. Higher achievement striving experience have higher levels of perceived stress. |
Al-Gelban 2008 [ ] | Saudi Arabia | Cross-sectional | 195/189 (96.9%) | Male 28–57 | Depression, Anxiety and stress DASS-42 scale. | Depression, anxiety and stress were strongly positively and significantly correlated. | 31% had stress. |
Lee et al., 2020 [ ] | Malaysia | Cross-sectional | SS = 150 | Secondary/primary | DASS-21 inventory. | Stress: number of years working. Majority of teachers with stress: either severe and extremely severe level are those working for 11 to 15 years. | 10.7% stress. |
Bounds et al., 2018 [ ] | US | Survey | 108/117 (92%) | Primary/secondary 42 | Teacher Stress Inventory (TSI). | Stress: violence against, urban, suburban, and rural setting. | Urban teachers had the highest levels of stress from violence rather than suburban teachers. |
Pressley et al., 2021 [ ] | US | Survey | SS = 329 | Elementary | The COVID Anxiety Scale. A teacher burnout subscale of stress. | Stress: anxiety factors in pandemic situations. | Not mentioned. |
Yaman 2015 [ ] | Turkey | Survey | SS = 436 | Elementary/branch 35.2 | Mobbing Scale and the Stress subscale of the Depression Anxiety Stress Scale. Turkish version of the Stress Subscale of DASS. | Stress: predicted positively by humiliation, discrimination, communication barriers, and mobbing scores. | Increment in mobbing will increase stress. |
Cook et al., 2019 [ ] | US | Cross-sectional | 180/105/58.5% | Middle 22 ± 37 | Teacher Stress Inventory. The Daily Spiritual Experience Scale. | Stress: teacher spirituality. As teachers’ spirituality increases, their time-management stress and their work-related stress increase. | Not mentioned. |
Okebukolal 1992 [ ] | Nigeria | Survey | SS = 368 | Science | The Occupational Stress Inventory for Science Teachers (OSIST). | Stress: school villages (personnel relation dimension) curriculum, facilities, student characteristics, administrative, and professional growth and self-satisfaction, subject taught, science budget. Science teachers in the rural schools mean stress score of 47.25 (SD = 4.89), urban schools mean stress score of 51.29 (SD = 6.95). | Urban teachers were found to be more stressed than those in rural areas. Female science teachers were more stressed than their male counterparts. |
Klassen 2010 [ ] | Canada | Survey | 951/- (Approximately 75%) | Elementary/secondary | Teacher Stress Inventory. Collective Teacher Efficacy Belief Scale (CTEBS Job satisfaction was measured with a one-factor, three-item, 9-point Likert-type scale. | Stress: collective efficacy, student behavior, gender, workload, class size. | 21.3% females rated the stress from workload “quite a bit” or “a great deal” of stress from workload factors. 13.4% of male teachers rated stress from workload at a mean of 7 or higher. More women (18.6%) than men (12.8%) reported feeling “quite a bit” or “a great deal” of stress from student behavior. |
Proctor et al., 1992 [ ] | UK | Survey | 256 (93%) | Primary 39.68 | Zigmond and Snaith’s 6 Hospital Anxiety and Depression (HAD) Scale and Moos and Insel’s7 Work Environment Scale (WES). | Stress: anxiety, work overload, time pressures, stressors relating to pupils and parents. | 67% found teaching ‘considerably’ or ‘extremely’ stressful, 79 (32%) ‘slightly’ stressful and 2 (1%) ‘not at all’ stressful. |
Akin 2019 [ ] | Turkey | Mixed research method | 460/3478 (13%) | Teachers | Turkish version of the Maslach and Jackson inventory. | DP: marital status. Reduced PA: number of children. | Not mentioned. |
Chan 1998 [ ] | Hong Kong | Cross-sectional | SS = 415 | Secondary 21–61 | Teacher stressor scale and the General Health Questionnaire. | Stress: high support—less anxiety symptoms, psychological symptoms. | 37.3% psychiatry morbidity. |
Adeniyi et al., 2010 [ ] | Nigeria | Cross-sectional | SS = 50 | Special Needs | Job Stress Inventory. | Stress: marital status, teaching special needs, lack of pupils’ progress in class work/academic achievement, societal attitudes/respect heavy workload and lack of help/assistance, degree and nature of disabilities of the special need children. | Not mentioned. |
Beer et al., 1992 [ ] | US | Cross-sectional | 86/92(93%) | Grade and high school | Beck’s Depression Scale, the Coopersmith Self-esteem Inventory—Adult Form, Stress Profile for Teachers, and the Staff Burnout Scale. | Burnout and stress: gender, level taught-high/grade school. Grade school teachers experienced more burnout than high school teachers. | Burnout scores higher for female high school teachers than for both male and female grade school teachers. Scores on stress were higher for male high school teachers than for both female high school teachers and male grade school teachers. |
Liu et al., 2021 [ ] | China | Cross-sectional | 907/1004 (90.3%) | Primary and secondary 20 ≥ 50 | Generic Scale of Phubbing, the Maslach Burnout Inventory—General Survey, Ruminative Response Scale, and the Center for Epidemiological Studies Depression Scale. | Job burnout: phubbing significant positive effect on job burnout, depression. The relation between job burnout and depression were moderated by rumination. | Not mentioned. |
Shin et al., 2013 [ ] | Korea | Survey | SS = 499 | Middle and high school | Maslach Burnout Inventory–Educator Survey Center for Epidemiological Studies Depression Scale. | Burnout: depression; baseline status of depression. Teacher’s burnout leads to subsequent depression symptoms, not vice versa. | Not mentioned. |
Genoud et al., 2021 [ ] | Switzerland | Cross- sectional | SS = 470 | Secondary 24–63 | Maslach’s burnout scale version validated by Dion and Tessier twenty-seven items French; Depression Anxiety Stress Scales (DASS). | Burnout: negative affectivity (tendency to feel depression, anxiety, or stress), personal fulfillment. Greater tendency to feel depressed result in teachers experiencing a lower level of personal accomplishment. | Two-thirds of the sample (N = 308) 66% of teachers below average for the three dimensions (stress, depression, and anxiety). |
Steinhardt et al., 2011 [ ] | US | Cross-sectional | /267 (26%) | High/Elementary/middle Mean 45 | Maslach Burnout Inventory-Educators Survey (MBI-ES) Modified version of the Teacher Stress Inventory. | Burnout: gender, experienced. Stress: depressive symptoms. Females reported greater chronic work stress and emotional exhaustion. Total effect of stress on depressive symptoms, taking together the direct and indirect effects via burnout, accounted for 43% of the total variance. | Increased stress leads to increased burned out. |
Pressley 2021 [ ] | US | Survey | SS = 359 | Primary/secondary | Teacher burnout scales. | Burnout-stress: COVID-19 anxiety, current teaching anxiety, anxiety communicating with parents, and administrative support. | High level of average teacher burnout stress score of 24.85. |
Schonfeld et al., 2016 [ ] | US | Survey | SS + 1386 | School teachers mean = 43 | The Shirom-Melamed Burnout Measure, Depression module of the Patient Health Questionnaire. | Burnout and depressive symptoms were strongly correlated. Burnout and depressive symptoms: stressful life events, job adversity, and workplace support. Burnout: anxiety. 86% of the teachers identified as burned out met criteria for a provisional diagnosis of depression. Fewer than 1% in the no-burnout group. | Not mentioned |
Bianchi et al., 2016 [ ] | New Zealand | Cross-sectional | SS = 184 | School teachers Mean 43 | Shirom–Melamed Burnout Measure (SMBM) Depression was assessed with the PHQ-9. | Burnout: strongly correlation. Depressive symptoms, moderately correlated with dysfunctional attitudes, ruminative responses, and pessimistic attributions. | Depression “low burnout-depression”, ( = 56; 30%), “Medium burnout-depression” ( = 82; 45%), “High burnout-depression” ( = 46; 25%). (About 8%) reported burnout symptoms at high frequencies and were identified as clinically depressed. |
Desouky and Allam 2017 [ ] | Egypt | Cross-sectional | SS = 568 | High 39.4 ± 8.7 | Arabic version of the Occupational Stress Index (OSI), the Arabic validated versions of Taylor manifest anxiety scale and the Beck Depression Inventory. | OS: Anxiety and depression scores, age, gender, higher qualifications and higher workload. OS, anxiety and depression scores were significantly higher among teachers with an age more than 40 years, female teachers, primary school teachers, higher teaching experience. | OS, anxiety and depression, respectively. 100%, 67.5% and 23.2%, Private schools show a significantly higher prevalence of moderate and severe OS compared to governmental schools (31.6% and 68.4% vs. 22.4% and 67.1%). |
Jones-Rincon et al., 2019 [ ] | US | Cross-sectional | 3003/3361(89%) | Elementary, middle/junior high or high | Patient Health Questionnaire. Job satisfaction was measured with 10 items. | Perceived stress levels: anxiety disorder. Teachers with anxiety disorder reported having higher perceived stress levels. | Not mentioned. |
Kinnunen et al., 1994 [ ] | Finland | Survey | 1012/1308/ (77%) | High/vocational/special/Physical/secondary 45–59 | Maslach and Jackson’s inventory. | EE: gender. Poor work ability. Women exhibit higher scores for EE. | Not Mentioned |
Martínez et al., 2020 [ ] | Spain | Random Sampling | 215/300 (71.7%) | Primary 30 to 65 years = 44.89 | The Maslach Burnout Inventory (MBI), Zung Self-Rating Depression Scale (SDS), Coping with Stress Questionnaire. | Burnout: depressive symptomatology, and quality of interpersonal relationships. | 48.37% low levels of EE, 25.12% high levels of PA, (b) high levels of EE and DP, and (c) 26.51% low levels of DE and PA. |
Capone et al., 2019 [ ] | Italy | Cross-sectional | SS = 609 | High school, middle school, elementary and primary school. 27 to 65, mean = 48.35 | The Center for Epidemiologic Studies Depression Scale (Italian version. The Italian version of the Maslach Burnout Inventory-General Scale. The Teacher Self-Efficacy Scale. | Burnout: collective efficacy, school climate, and organizational justice and relationship. EE and cynicism functioned as significant mediators between the three predictors (opportunities, organizational relationships, and organizational justice) and depression. | Not mentioned. |
Aydogan 2009 [ ] | Turkey N = 83 Germany N = 78 Cyprus N = 74 | Cross-sectional | 255/306 (83%) | High M = 38 ± 6.96, 37.9 ± 6.74, 45.8 ± 10.42 | Shirom–Melamed Burnout Measure. Turkish version of Minnesota Job satisfaction scale. | Burnout: country working, job satisfaction, depression. Cyprus teachers 57% of the variance in burnout explained by depression. 58% of the variance in burnout explained by job satisfaction and anxiety. Germany 575% variance in burnout explained by job satisfaction. | Not mentioned. |
Belcastro et al., 1983 [ ] | US | Cross-sectional | 428/359 (84%) | Public | The Maslach Burnout Inventory and the Teacher Somatic Complaints and Illness Inventory. | burned-out: somatic complaints | More than 11% burned out. 246 (68.5%) not burned-out. |
Capel 1992 [ ] | UK | Cross-sectional | 640/405/63.3% | Middle, upper, high school | The Maslach Burnout Inventory. The Taylor Manifest. | Stress and burnout: role conflict, and role ambiguity, High anxiety. Highest stress level: high workload demands after-school time, lack of recognition for extra work, too much paperwork. Students’ behavior. Burnout: anxiety. | Not mentioned. |
Ptacek et al., 2019 [ ] | Czech Republic | Cross-sectional | SS = 2394 | Primary 18–72 | Questionnaire survey: anamnestic part and Standardized questionnaires: SVF 78, SMBM, ENRICHD SSI, BDI II, USE. | Burnout: length of teaching/employment, healthy lifestyle. Cognitive burnout: age and length of teaching employment. Those with healthy lifestyle (work–life balance) have significantly lower burnout rates. Males–higher emotional burnout, females–higher physical burnout rates). | 18.3% of participants felt definitely threatened by burnout syndrome, 34.9% may be, 9.9% definitely not threatened by burnout syndrome. Long-term stress 21.8%, compared to the (7.5%) do not experience long-term stress. |
* Katsantonis 2020 (15 countries)—Japan and Korea form the East-Asian model. France and Spain form the Latin model. Denmark and Sweden form the Northern model. Australia and the United Kingdom represent the Anglo-Saxon model and finally, Belgium and the Netherlands form the Germanic model. Sample Size: SS; Emotional Exhaustion: EE; Personal Accomplishment: PA; Depersonalization: DP; Occupational Stress: OS; Sense of Coherence: SOC; Science Stream: SCIS; Art Stream: AS.
Summary of studies with prevalence and correlates of Depression/Anxiety.
Authors/Year | Country | Study Design | Sample Size/Population Size (Response Rate) | Teachers/Age Range | Scales Used | Key Findings | |
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
Correlates of Depression/Anxiety | Prevalence of Depression/Anxiety | ||||||
Jurado et al., 2005 [ ] | Spain | Cross-sectional | 498/602/ (82.7%) | Primary/secondary (women, 45.3 ± 9.8; men, 44.7 ± 9.7). | Spanish version of Epidemiologic Studies Depression scale (CES-D). | Depressive symptoms: female gender, age, low job satisfaction, high job stress, desire to change jobs, working at a public school, personality dimensions of harm avoidance (high), novelty seeking (high) and verbal insults from pupils. | Depressive symptoms 35.3% of the teachers. |
Al-Gelban 2008 [ ] | Saudi Arabia. | Cross-sectional | 189/195 (96.9) | Male 28–57 | Depression, Anxiety and stress DASS-42 scale. | Depression, anxiety, and stress were strongly, positively, and significantly correlated. | 25% percent had depression 43% had anxiety. |
Fimian et al., 1983 [ ] | US | Survey | 365/800 (47%) | Special education | Emotional and Behavioral Manifestations of Stress (24 items); and Physiological Manifestations of Stress (16 items). | Depressed/anxious: teaching special needs. | Not mentioned. |
Lee et al., 2020 [ ] | Malaysia | Cross-sectional | SS = 150 | Female primary/secondary | DASS-21 inventory. | Depression: gender, years of work. Female teachers who suffered depression are those who have been working about 11–15 years. | 15.3% depression; 30.7% anxiety. |
Ratanasiripong et al., 2020 [ ] | Japan | Cross-sectional | 174/200 (87%) | Primary/secondary 41.65 | Japanese version of depression, Anxiety, and Stress scale (DASS-42. Japanese version of the Connor-Davidson Resilience Scale (CD-RISC). Japanese version of the Rosenberg Self-Esteem Scale (RSE). | Depression and anxiety: resiliency and self-esteem, grade taught. Strength significantly predicted anxiety. | Anxiety in secondary school teachers significantly lower than elementary school teachers. |
Schonfeld 1992 [ ] | New York, US | Longitudinal | SS = 255 | Women 27 | Center for Epidemiologic Studies– Depression Scale (CES-D). | Depressive symptoms: work-environment, job satisfaction. Whites but not among principally Black and Hispanic subsample, motivation has negative affectivity. | Not mentioned. |
Vladut, et al., 2011 [ ] | Romania | Cross-sectional | SS = 177 | Primary/secondary/high | The Depression, Anxiety and Stress Scale. | Anxiety/depression: burnout dimensions, demographic variables, mismatches between work-conditions gender, perception of reward and community. | Higher levels of emotional exhaustion. EE or DP and PA had significantly higher levels of depression, anxiety, and stress. |
Bianchi et al., 2014 [ ] | France | Analytical | SS = 5575 | Teacher, mean 41 | Depression was measured with the 9-item depression scale of the Patient Health Questionnaire (PHQ-9). | Depression: burnout: | 90% of the teachers identified as burned out met diagnostic criteria for depression, mainly major depression (85%). 3% ( = 19) of the no-burnout group were identified as depressed, mainly minor depression or depression not otherwise specified (2%). |
Hammen et al., 1982 [ ] | US | Cross-sectional | SS = 75 | Secondary | The Center for Epidemiological Studies-Depression (CES-D) scale. | Depressive symptomatology: stress, stress-related, cognitions regarding the consequences of the stressful circumstances, days off work. | 8% reported major depression. 12% teachers met criteria for possible minor depression. 20% debilitating array of symptoms approximating a clinically significant depression syndrome. |
Baka 2015 [ ] | Poland | Survey | 316/400 (79%) | Elementary/secondary 22–60 | Depression (the Beck Hopelessness Scale). | Depression: 16% high organizational constraints predict depression. Interpersonal conflict, organizational constraints and 2% workload predicts depression. | Not mentioned. |
Lee et al., 2020 [ ] | Malaysia | Cross-sectional | SS = 150 | female primary/secondary | DASS-21 inventory. | Depression: gender, years of work. Female teachers who suffered depression are those who have been working about 11 -15 years. | 15.3% depression; 30.7% anxiety. |
Pressley et al., 2021 [ ] | US | Survey | SS = 329 | Elementary | The COVID Anxiety Scale. A teacher burnout subscale of stress. | Anxiety: stress and communication within the school, and with parents, providing instruction in a virtual environment. Anxiety: COVID-19 pandemic. online teaching was positively related to anxiety in communications. | 56.2% no change in anxiety. 38.9% of participants reported reduced anxiety, 4.9% of teachers felt more anxiety than their baseline at the 1st week of school. Almost 40% had a decrease in anxiety during the 1st month of the 2020–2021 school year. |
Besse et al., 2015 [ ] | US | Survey single-stage sample cluster | 3003/3361 (89%) | Elementary, middle, or high school, mean = 43.9 years | Occupational health survey and Patient Health Questionnaire. | MDD: Hispanic, divorced, years of experience, taught at elementary level, low job satisfaction and higher absenteeism and increased likelihood of leaving the profession, perceived stress, anxiety. | Teachers with MDD had higher levels of perceived stress, anxiety. |
Peele et al., 2020 [ ] | Ghana | Randomized control trial | SS = 444 | Kindergarten | Goldberg Anxiety and Depression Questionnaire. | Anxiety and depressive symptoms: poor workplace environment, social support, lack of parental support was associated with more anxiety (b = 0.12, = 0.002), new to the local community. Depressive symptom: household food insecurity. | Poor workplace environment led to increased anxiety and depressive symptoms. |
Beer and Beer 1992 [ ] | US | Survey | 86/92 (93) | Grade and high school | Beck’s Depression Scale, the Coopersmith Self-esteem Inventory—Adult Form, Stress Profile for Teachers, and the Staff Burnout Scale. | Depression: self-esteem, negative association. Teachers in an institutional setting, there is no significant difference for teaching level or sex on depression. | Not mentioned. |
Proctor et al., 1992 [ ] | UK | Survey | 256 (93%) | Primary 39.68 | Zigmond and Snaith’s 6 Hospital Anxiety and Depression (HAD) Scale and Moos and Insel’s7 Work Environment Scale (WES). | Anxiety/depression: stressors intrinsic to teaching and related to organizational factors within schools, ensuring pupil progress, work overload, time pressures, role conflict. | 79% low or normal level of depression. 44 (17%) borderline scores and 10 (4%) clinical depression. Anxiety: 92 (36%) had normal scores and 67 (26%) borderline, 97 (38%) scored at a clinical level. |
Liu et al., 2021 [ ] | China. | Survey convenient sampling method | 907/1004 (90.3%) | Primary and secondary 20 ± 50 | Generic Scale of Phubbing, Ruminative Response Scale, and the Center for Epidemiological Studies Depression Scale. | Depression: phubbing. Combination of phubbing and rumination had no significant effect on depression. | Not mentioned. |
Shin et al., 2013 [ ] | Korea | Survey | SS = 499 | Middle and high school | Maslach Burnout Inventory–Educator Survey Center for Epidemiological Studies Depression Scale. | Depression: burnout. Positive relationship between baseline status of teacher burnout and depression. | Not mentioned. |
Genoud and Waroux 2021 [ ] | Switzerland | Cross-sectional | SS = 470 | Secondary 24–63 | French: Depression Anxiety Stress Scales (DASS). | Anxious profile: emotional exhaustion. Depressive profile: sense of personal accomplishment, no negative affective trait. | 66% (two-thirds) (N = 308) below average for the three dimensions (depression, anxiety, and stress). |
Pohl et al., 2022 [ ] | Hungary | Cross-sectional | 1817//2500 (72.7%) | High 18–65 | Beck Depression Inventory (BDI-SF). Problematic Internet Use Questionnaire. | Depression: internet addiction. | No depression 37.1% (673/1817), 58.9% (1070/1817) had mild, 3.5% (65/1817) had moderate and 0.6% (9/1817) had severe depression. |
Steinhardt et al., 2011 [ ] | US | Cross-sectional | /267 (26%) | High/elementary/middle, mean 45 | The Center for Epidemiological Studies Depression Scale (CES-D). | Depressive symptoms: EE. Positive relationships with DP and reduced PA. Chronic work stress, experienced. | High school teachers reported greater depressive symptoms. |
Pressley 2021 [ ] | US | Survey | 359 | Primary/secondary | COVID Anxiety Scale. | Anxiety: stress, COVID-19, communicating with parents, administrative support, providing instruction in a virtual environment. Anxiety about online teaching was positively related to anxiety in communications. | Virtual instruction teachers have the most increase in anxiety. |
Ratanasiripong et al., 2020 [ ] | Japan | Cross-sectional | 174/200 (87%) | Primary/secondary 41.65 | Japanese version of depression, Anxiety, and Stress scale (DASS-42). Japanese version of the Connor-Davidson Resilience Scale (CD-RISC). Japanese version of the Rosenberg Self-Esteem Scale (RSE). | Resilience and self-esteem significantly predicted depression and anxiety. | Not mentioned. |
Ptacek et al., 2019 [ ] | Czech Republic | Survey | SS = 2394 | Primary 18–72 | Beck Depression Inventory II (BDI II). | Depression: burnout. There is a strong and significant correlation between burnout and depressive symptomatology. | 15.2% mild to severe depression. |
Bianchi et al., 2016 [ ] | New Zealand | Cross-sectional | SS = 184 | School teacher, mean 43 | Depression was assessed with the PHQ-9. | Depressive symptoms: burnout, dysfunctional attitudes, ruminative responses, and pessimistic attributions. | Depression” low burnout-depression,” ( = 56; 30%), “medium burnout-depression” ( = 82; 45%), and “high burnout-depression” ( = 46; 25%). 14/184 (about 8%) reported. |
Mahan et al., 2010 [ ] | US | Cross-sectional | 168/756 (23.9%) | High, mean 42.6 | Ongoing Stressor Scale (OSS) and the Episodic Stressor Scale (ESS), the Co-worker and Supervisor Contents of Communication Scales (COCS), the State Anxiety inventory (S-Anxiety), and the Center for Epidemiological Studies Depression Scale (CES-D). | Anxiety and depression: ongoing and episodic stressors and support, 28% (adjusted 25%) of the variability in anxiety and 27% (adjusted 24%) of the variability in depression. Co-worker support had an inverse relationship to anxiety and depression, work environment stressor. | Higher levels of ongoing stressors, leads to higher levels of anxiety and depression, higher levels of co-worker support related to lower levels of anxiety and depression. |
Desouky et al., 2017 [ ] | Egypt | Cros-sectional | SS = 568 | High | Arabic version of the Occupational Stress Index (OSI), the Arabic validated versions of Taylor manifest anxiety scale and the Beck Depression Inventory. | Anxiety and depression: occupational stress, OS), age, female teachers, primary school teachers, higher teaching experience, higher qualifications and higher workload. | OS anxiety and depression (100%, 67.5% and 23.2%), respectively. Mild, moderate and severe depressive symptoms among teachers was (19.7%, 2.8% and 0.7%), respectively, and little, mild, severe and very severe anxiety was (17.6%, 23.2%, 7.0% and 19.7%), respectively. |
Jones-Rincon et al., 2019 [ ] | US | Cross-sectional | 3003/3361 (89.3%) | Elementary, middle/junior high or high | Patient Health Questionnaire. Job satisfaction was measured with 10 items. | Anxiety disorder: absenteeism, MDD, panic disorder, and somatization disorder and higher intent to quit, Hispanic, subject taught, job satisfaction and job control, years taught. teaching ( = 0.009). | 65.8% major depression in the anxiety group and 11.2% major depression in the no anxiety group. Other depressive disorder among anxiety disorder group 8.4% and no-anxiety group 7.2%. |
Borrelli et al., 2014 [ ] | Italy | Cross-sectional | 113/180 (63%) | Primary/middle | The Karasek Job Content Questionnaire, the Self-Rating Anxiety Scale (SAS) and the Center for Epidemiologic Studies Depression Scale (CES-D). | Depression and anxiety: Job demand and low social support. | About 50% scored above the threshold for depression and for anxiety on self-rating questionnaires. |
Kinnunen et al., 1994 [ ] | Finland | Survey | 1012/1308/ (77%) | High/vocational/special/physical/secondary 45–59 | Anxiety-contentment and depression-enthusiasm; six-item, six-point scales. | Job-related anxiety and depression: subject taught, age, job competence, and job aspiration, lack of PA. Physical education teachers, sex, poor work ability. | Not mentioned. |
Martínez et al., 2020 [ ] | Spain | Random Sampling | 215/300 (71.7%) | Primary 30 to 65 years, = 44.89 | Zung Self-Rating Depression Scale (SDS), Coping with Stress Questionnaire. | Depressive symptomatology: quality of interpersonal relationships at school, dimensions of burnout. | Not mentioned. |
Hadi et al., 2008 [ ] | Malaysia | Cross-sectional | 565/580 (97.4%) | Secondary M = 40.5 | Depression, Anxiety and Stress Scale (DASS 21) and Job Content Questionnaire (JCQ). | Depression: decision latitude, psychological job demand and job insecurity. | The prevalence of depression was 49.1% (45.0, 53.2). Mild level of depression (21.0%). |
Ali et al., 2021 [ ] | Fiji. | Cross-sectional | SS = 375 | Physical education 20 to 55 years | The Stress with COVID-19 Scale (SCS). The Coronavirus Anxiety Scale (CAS). | Anxiety: social support, and sexual satisfaction during the COVID-19 lockdown, marital status. Married physical education teachers experience more stress. | Married couples scored higher on stress. Anxiety and social support, single teachers scored high. |
Capone et al., 2019 [ ] | Italy | Cros-sectional | SS = 609 | High school, middle school, elementary and primary school. 27 to 65, mean = 48.35 | The Center for Epidemiologic Studies Depression Scale (Italian version. The Teacher Self-Efficacy Scale. | Depression: collective efficacy, all the dimensions of school climate were negatively related to depression, sex. | Women displayed higher depression and exhaustion than men. |
Aydogan 2009 [ ] | Turkey N = 83 Germany N = 78 Cyprus N = 74 | Cross-sectional | SS = 235 | High M = 38 ± 6.96, 37.9 ± 6.74, 45.8 ± 10.42 | Depression, Anxiety stressTurkish version scale DASS-42. | Depression: burnout, country of origin, job satisfaction. | Not mentioned. |
Kidger et al., 2016 [ ] | Bristol, England | Cross-sectional | 555/708/ (78.4%) | Secondary | Warwick Edinburgh Mental Wellbeing Scale-WEMWBS) Depressive symptoms (Patient Health Questionnaire-PHQ-9). Copenhagen Psychosocial Questionnaire and the Bristol Stress and Health at Work. | Depressive symptoms: sickness absence, student attendance, dissatisfaction with work and high presenteeism, gender, supporting a colleague. Teachers’ wellbeing. | 19.4% moderate to severe depressive symptoms. |
Bianchi et al., 2015 [ ] | France | Survey | SS=627 | Primary/secondary | Depression was assessed with the 9-item depression module. | Baseline depressive symptoms predicted cases of major depression. | T1 baseline MDD 14% T 2 MDD 7%. |
Soria-Saucedo et al., 2018 [ ] | Mexico | Cross-sectional | SS = 43,845 | Female 25–74 | Patient Health Questionnaire (PHQ9). | Severe depression: family and work stress, physical activity, alcohol consumption, and smoking, rural/urban residents. | 7026 teachers (16%) severe depression. |
Gluschkoff et al., 2016 [ ] | Finland | Randomized selection | SS = 76 | Primary/25–63 | PHQ9. | Depressive symptoms: positive associations with effort–reward imbalance and job strain showed with depressive symptoms. Non-restorative sleep. | Not mentioned. |
Ramberg et al., 2021 [ ] | Sweden | Cross-sectional | Year 2014/16 3948/7147 (55.2%) Final SS = 2732 | Teachers | Stockholm Teacher Survey. | Depressed mood: high SOC among colleagues and stress. High SOC was linked with lower levels of stress and depressed mood variation of 4.8% for perceived stress and 2.1% for depressed mood. | Not mentioned. |
Pohl et al., 2022 [ ] | Hungary | Cross-sectional | 1817/2500 (72.7%) | High school/18–65 | BDI. | Moderate and severe depression: internet addiction. | 37.1%: no depression, 58.9% mild, 3.5% moderate and 0.6% severe depression. |
Papastylianou et al., 2009 [ ] | Greece | Cross-sectional | 562/985 (57.1%) | Primary/30–45 | The Centre for Epidemiologic Studies Depression scales. | Depressed affect: (positive) correlation emotional exhaustion (EE). | Depressed affect: 17.86%. |
Ratanasiripong et al., 2021 [ ] | Thailand | Cross-sectional | SS = 267 | Primary/secondary | Depression, Anxiety and Stress Scale Thai Version (DASS). | Depression: family economics status, marital status, classroom size, relationship quality and resilience. Anxiety: family economics status, classroom size and resilience. | 3.2% of teachers had severe to extremely severe depression, 11.2% had severe to extremely severe anxiety. |
Szigeti et al., 2017 [ ] | Hungary | Cross-sectional | SS = 211 | Primary/secondary | Epidemiological Studies-Depression scale. | Depressive symptoms: teaching children with special needs, general burnout factor. | Not mentioned. |
Baka 2015 [ ] | Poland | Cross-sectional | 316/400 (79%) | Primary/secondary 22–60 | The Beck Hopelessness Scale. | Depression: work hours, job demands, general job burnout. High level of depression: interpersonal conflicts, organizational constraints and quantitative workload. | Not mentioned. |
Othman et al., 2019 [ ] | Malaysia | Cross-sectional | SS = 356 | Secondary | Malay Depression Anxiety Stress Scales (DASS). | Depression, anxiety, and stress: socio-demographic and work-related characteristics such as female, spousal help, educational status, having 1–3 children. | Depression (43.0%), anxiety (68.0%), severe to extremely severe depression 9.9%, anxiety 23.3%. 84.6% depression among those educated up to secondary or diploma level. 45% and 47.6% teachers with longest teaching experience and highest income, respectively. Lack of spousal help (55%) depressed. |
Skaalvik et al., 2020 [ ] | Norway | Longitudinal | SS = 262 | High school | Depressed mood was measured by means of a five-item scale. | Depressed mood: positively associated with emotional exhaustion. | Not mentioned. |
Li et al., 2020 [ ] | China | Cross-sectional | 1741/1795 (97%) | Preschool 18 to 48 | Epidemiologic Studies Depression Scale (CES-D) and the Perceived Stress Scale-14. | Depression: teacher weight. Depression ( < 0.001, OR = 3.08, 95% CI: 2.34–4.05) is significantly associated with burnout. | Depression was 39.9%. |
Gosnell et al., 2021 [ ] | Malaysia | Cross-sectional | 124/400 (31%) | Primary/secondary | Depression Anxiety Stress Scales-21 self-care strategy questionnaire. | Depression/anxiety—self-care, being a refugee. Depression and anxiety: negative correlation with age. Younger teachers experienced higher rates of depression and anxiety than older teachers. | 14.4% depression in the severe or extremely severe clinical ranges. 41.2% anxiety levels in the severe or extremely severe clinical ranges. 10.5% nonrefugees reported anxiety at this level. |
Capone et al., 2020 [ ] | Italy | Cross-sectional | SS = 285 | High school 29–65 | The Center for Epidemiologic Studies Depression Scale (CES-D; Italian version. | Depression: flourishing or languishing. | 23.9% depression “flourishing” group, 38.7% low depression and burnout, 85.7% “languishing” had severe rating of depression. |
Chan et al., 2002 [ ] | China | Survey | SS = 83 | Secondary 22–42 | The shortened 20-item Teacher Stressor Scale (TSS). Chinese shortened version of the General Health Questionnaire (GHQ-20). | Anxiety: support, stress. | New teachers’ highest levels of symptoms in anxiety. |
Zhang et al., 2014 [ ] | China | Survey | SS = 590 | Primary/secondary 34 ±8.11 | Self-reported mental health was measured by the Symptom Checklist-90 (SCL-90). | Anxiety: burnout (EE and DP). | Not mentioned. |
Nakada et al., 2016 [ ] | Japan | Cross-sectional | 1006 (66.7%) | School teachers 39.7 ± 11.6 | The Japanese version of Zung’s Self-Rating Depression Scale (SDS), Job Stress Questionnaire. | Depressive symptoms: role ambiguity, role conflict, high quantitative workload, and social support from family or friends. | (20.1%) in depressive group. (79.9%) in non-depressive group. |
Georgas et al., 1984 [ ] | Greece | Cross-sectional | SS = 129 | Elementary school teachers 28–46 | Greek adaptation of the Schedule of Recent Experiences (SRE) Life Events Scale. The Manifest Anxiety Scale. | Anxiety: women only; psychosocial stress, sex differences, high correlations between psychosocial stress and anxiety, were found only for females. | Females reported more symptoms and had higher manifest anxiety than males. |
Sample Size: SS; Major Depressive Disorder: MDD.
This study was supported by the Mental Health Foundation and the Douglas Harden Trust Fund.
Conceptualization, B.A; software, and validation, B.A., G.O.-D. and L.B.; methodology and formal analysis, B.A.; data curation, B.A. and G.O.-D.; investigation and resources, B.A. and Y.W.; writing—original draft preparation, B.A.; writing—review and editing, B.A, G.O.-D., L.B. and Y.W.; supervision, L.B. and Y.W. All authors have read and agreed to the published version of the manuscript.
Informed consent statement, data availability statement, conflicts of interest.
The authors declare no conflict of interest. The funder had no role in the design and conduct of the study; collection, management, analysis, the interpretation of the data; preparation, review, or approval of the manuscript; or the decision to submit the results for publication.
Publisher’s Note: MDPI stays neutral with regard to jurisdictional claims in published maps and institutional affiliations.
Eyesha Sadiq , Entertainment Editor | September 23, 2022
Eyesha Sadiq
Many students get overwhelmed with the amount of homework they receive, which can cause mental health issues. Around 65% of high school students deal with severe anxiety and 52% are diagnosed with depression.
That’s what the clock said. I was used to it by now.
I only had one assignment left. I wrote my essays as my eyelids began to blink slower. I was so close to getting those two hours of sleep I knew I needed to survive the next day. I checked my grades: A’s. That was the motivation I needed to feel good. It didn’t matter that my body wasn’t getting the rest it truly needed and it didn’t matter that I didn’t get any social interaction outside of school. It didn’t matter to me to make those essential high school memories. What mattered was that my homework was done and I had my A’s. But was it really worth it?
Many students, such as myself, have after school activities that consist of sports, jobs, clubs and volunteering. Some of those same students also take AP and honors classes. The American education system has made it normal for students to go to school for eight hours, have extracurricular activities and do hours of homework afterward when it should be a time to relax from the day’s activities. On top of that, some students have to take care of their family members when they come home. When will we finally have some time for ourselves?
“I assign about 30 minutes of homework a night,” AP human geography teacher Kelley Ferguson said. “Where students wind up having more than 30 minutes is if they procrastinate or have tons of extracurricular activities. They are unable to do work one night, [and] then that work gets doubled the next night.”
I understand that homework is given to students to help them retain daily lessons, and is meant to be beneficial. However, in AP classes, the curriculum can be rigorous, and teachers aren’t able to teach the students everything they need to know before the test. This leads to students getting more homework to compensate for lost teaching time.
Based on a survey given to approximately 60 Hebron students asking how long they spend on homework a day, 53% said that they spend one hour and 30 minutes or longer on homework. In addition, 53% of students also said that they lose two hours or more of sleep everyday from homework.
Is this supposed to be the normal expectation for students? I understand students want to earn A’s and an impressive transcript so that they can get into Ivy League colleges, but to what extent should students go to get them? It shouldn’t be at the risk of not sleeping, eating or socializing because it can cause many mental and physical health issues.
“I believe in homework because that is the opportunity for practice,” chemistry teacher Rachmad Tjachyadi said. “The reason I give homeworks with a lot of problems is because some students may need more and [homework is] trying to meet the different needs of students. Homework should take about 20 to 30 minutes for chemistry and, to me, that is actually what they are going to have to do in college for chemistry.”
A lot of students struggle with having a social life when all they do is homework. The same survey showed 83% of Hebron students said they do homework on the weekend, and 78% said it stresses them out. Students can miss out on memorable school activities such as football games or dances because they have a test the next day or their homework is due that night.
Only doing homework in students’ free time can lead to them becoming quickly burnt out and losing motivation for school. According to The Scholarship System , “Academic burnout is a surprisingly common problem, especially among high school seniors.” Having to go to school, write college applications and get ready for graduation makes those seniors burn out in the end.
Not being able to make these high school memories or have a social life can lead to anxiety, depression or other mental health issues. In high school, around 65% of students deal with severe anxiety and 52% are diagnosed with depression as those students don’t get to have time to be a kid anymore before having to enter adulthood in college.
Personally, I think homework should not be given on the weekends and be given in more limited amounts on the weekdays through offering more than enough time in class to complete it, simply because that is the time for students to relax and have their own time. They should be able to hangout with their friends, go to football games and do other activities.
Students shouldn’t need to be worried about what homework is due that night or if they have enough time to study for their next test. Being a kid while you still can is more important than doing homework.
Senior Eyesha Sadiq is the entertainment editor and this is her second year on the staff. When she’s not in the newsroom, she’s either playing with...
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Alexandra • Apr 25, 2024 at 11:18 AM
It’s true though…
Layla • Mar 14, 2024 at 4:05 PM
I cannot relate to this as much as you think
Ashwin J • Sep 11, 2023 at 11:15 AM
I agree, many students put in so many hours in their homework including me. One suggestion I find helpful, is to spend time researching effective methods on the network (YouTube, Instagram, TikTok) to find what boosts my productivity and be better at time management. This helps in the long term since it benefits me to finish homework quickly and to also understand the context of the homework’s topic like textbook reading.
nope g beans • May 28, 2023 at 6:14 PM
pls help me im dying from procrastination
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Objective: To investigate associations of adolescents' time spent on homework/studying with nocturnal time for sleep and depression symptoms, in a competitive academic environment.
Design: Cross-sectional, anonymous survey of sleep habits, school life, and health-related measures.
Setting: Eight schools in Singapore.
Participants: Total 1225 adolescents aged 13-19 years.
Measurements: Self-reported sleep behavior and time use data were collected separately for school days and weekends. Multiple regression models were used to test covariation of time spent on homework/studying with other activities, and associations of homework/studying duration with depression symptoms.
Results: Time in bed for sleep and media use were inversely related with homework/studying duration on both school days and weekends, adjusting for time spent on other activities and demographic variables. Face-to-face family time and hanging out with friends were also reciprocally related with homework/studying duration on weekends. Depression scores were higher in adolescents who spent long hours on homework/studying. On school days, this was mediated by reduced time in bed for sleep. On weekends, homework/studying duration associated with depression symptoms, adjusting for time in bed and other covariates. Adolescents who spent ≥5 hours on homework/studying per day on weekends had greater symptoms of anhedonia and anxiety.
Conclusions: In a competitive academic setting, adolescents who spent more time on homework/studying spent less time on sleep, media use, and social activities. Independent of effects on sleep, long hours on homework/studying on weekends may be a risk factor for depression. Reducing adolescents' workload outside of class may benefit their sleep, schoolwork-life balance, and mental well-being.
Keywords: Adolescent; Bedtime; Depression; Homework; Sleep deprivation; Time use.
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August 16, 2021
by Sara M Moniuszko
It's no secret that kids hate homework. And as students grapple with an ongoing pandemic that has had a wide-range of mental health impacts, is it time schools start listening to their pleas over workloads?
Some teachers are turning to social media to take a stand against homework .
Tiktok user @misguided.teacher says he doesn't assign it because the "whole premise of homework is flawed."
For starters, he says he can't grade work on "even playing fields" when students' home environments can be vastly different.
"Even students who go home to a peaceful house, do they really want to spend their time on busy work? Because typically that's what a lot of homework is, it's busy work," he says in the video that has garnered 1.6 million likes. "You only get one year to be 7, you only got one year to be 10, you only get one year to be 16, 18."
Mental health experts agree heavy work loads have the potential do more harm than good for students, especially when taking into account the impacts of the pandemic. But they also say the answer may not be to eliminate homework altogether.
Emmy Kang, mental health counselor at Humantold, says studies have shown heavy workloads can be "detrimental" for students and cause a "big impact on their mental, physical and emotional health."
"More than half of students say that homework is their primary source of stress, and we know what stress can do on our bodies," she says, adding that staying up late to finish assignments also leads to disrupted sleep and exhaustion.
Cynthia Catchings, a licensed clinical social worker and therapist at Talkspace, says heavy workloads can also cause serious mental health problems in the long run, like anxiety and depression.
And for all the distress homework causes, it's not as useful as many may think, says Dr. Nicholas Kardaras, a psychologist and CEO of Omega Recovery treatment center.
"The research shows that there's really limited benefit of homework for elementary age students, that really the school work should be contained in the classroom," he says.
For older students, Kang says homework benefits plateau at about two hours per night.
"Most students, especially at these high-achieving schools, they're doing a minimum of three hours, and it's taking away time from their friends from their families, their extracurricular activities. And these are all very important things for a person's mental and emotional health."
Catchings, who also taught third to 12th graders for 12 years, says she's seen the positive effects of a no homework policy while working with students abroad.
"Not having homework was something that I always admired from the French students (and) the French schools, because that was helping the students to really have the time off and really disconnect from school ," she says.
The answer may not be to eliminate homework completely, but to be more mindful of the type of work students go home with, suggests Kang, who was a high-school teacher for 10 years.
"I don't think (we) should scrap homework, I think we should scrap meaningless, purposeless busy work-type homework. That's something that needs to be scrapped entirely," she says, encouraging teachers to be thoughtful and consider the amount of time it would take for students to complete assignments.
Mindfulness surrounding homework is especially important in the context of the last two years. Many students will be struggling with mental health issues that were brought on or worsened by the pandemic, making heavy workloads even harder to balance.
"COVID was just a disaster in terms of the lack of structure. Everything just deteriorated," Kardaras says, pointing to an increase in cognitive issues and decrease in attention spans among students. "School acts as an anchor for a lot of children, as a stabilizing force, and that disappeared."
But even if students transition back to the structure of in-person classes, Kardaras suspects students may still struggle after two school years of shifted schedules and disrupted sleeping habits.
"We've seen adults struggling to go back to in-person work environments from remote work environments. That effect is amplified with children because children have less resources to be able to cope with those transitions than adults do," he explains.
In order to make the transition back to in-person school easier, Kang encourages students to "get good sleep, exercise regularly (and) eat a healthy diet."
To help manage workloads, she suggests students "get organized."
"There's so much mental clutter up there when you're disorganized... sitting down and planning out their study schedules can really help manage their time," she says.
Breaking assignments up can also make things easier to tackle.
"I know that heavy workloads can be stressful, but if you sit down and you break down that studying into smaller chunks, they're much more manageable."
If workloads are still too much, Kang encourages students to advocate for themselves.
"They should tell their teachers when a homework assignment just took too much time or if it was too difficult for them to do on their own," she says. "It's good to speak up and ask those questions. Respectfully, of course, because these are your teachers. But still, I think sometimes teachers themselves need this feedback from their students."
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Hong kong art exhibition highlights perspectives from the ‘margins’ of the city, your voice: paper may not be the best alternative to plastic, the lens: the ethical bells are ‘oinking’ loudly, abyan irkiz, 5, is youngest singaporean to reach foot of mount everest, geek girl is honest, heart-warming portrayal of modern teen girls, your voice: rise of gendered hate speech on social media.
It’s no secret that homework can be a pain. And as students grapple with an ongoing pandemic that has had a wide-range of mental health impacts, is it time schools start listening to their pleas about their workloads?
Some teachers are turning to social media to take a stand against homework.
Tiktok user @misguided.teacher says he doesn’t assign it because the “whole premise of homework is flawed.”
Do students need homework to learn?
For starters, he says he can’t grade work on “even playing fields” when students’ home environments can be vastly different.
“Even students who go home to a peaceful house, do they really want to spend their time on busy work? Because typically that’s what a lot of homework is, it’s busy work,” he says in the video that has garnered 1.6 million likes. “You only get one year to be 7, you only got one year to be 10, you only get one year to be 16, 18.”
Mental health experts agree heavy work loads have the potential do more harm than good for students, especially when taking into account the impacts of the pandemic. But they also say the answer may not be to eliminate homework altogether.
Chinese schoolgirl uses robot to do her homework
Emmy Kang, mental health counselor at Humantold, says studies have shown heavy workloads can be “detrimental” for students and cause a “big impact on their mental, physical and emotional health.”
“More than half of students say that homework is their primary source of stress, and we know what stress can do on our bodies,” she says, adding that staying up late to finish assignments also leads to disrupted sleep and exhaustion.
Cynthia Catchings, a licensed clinical social worker and therapist at Talkspace, says heavy workloads can also cause serious mental health problems in the long run, like anxiety and depression.
And for all the distress homework causes, it’s not as useful as many may think, says Dr. Nicholas Kardaras, a psychologist and CEO of Omega Recovery treatment center.
“The research shows that there’s really limited benefit of homework for elementary age students, that really the school work should be contained in the classroom,” he says.
For older students, Kang says homework benefits plateau at about two hours per night.
Should Hong Kong introduce a zero-homework policy?
“Most students, especially at these high-achieving schools, they’re doing a minimum of three hours, and it’s taking away time from their friends from their families, their extracurricular activities. And these are all very important things for a person’s mental and emotional health.”
Catchings, who taught Primary Three to Secondary 6 for 12 years, says she’s seen the positive effects of a no homework policy while working with students abroad.
“Not having homework was something that I always admired from French students (and) French schools, because that helped students really have time off and disconnect from school,” she says.
The answer may not be to eliminate homework completely, but to be more mindful of the type of work students go home with, suggests Kang, who was a secondary school teacher for 10 years.
“I don’t think (we) should scrap homework, I think we should scrap meaningless, purposeless, busy work-type homework. That’s something that needs to be scrapped entirely,” she says, encouraging teachers to be thoughtful and consider the amount of time it would take for students to complete assignments.
You or a loved one may currently be struggling with excessive amounts of homework and are wondering if can homework cause depression. The short answer is that depression can absolutely lead to depression for a variety of reasons. Identifying the cause of your homework-related depression below is the first step toward bettering your mental health. Excessive homework, lack of social support, and perfectionism are just a few of the reasons homework can lead to depression.
1) multiple hours of homework.
Starting in high school, or sometimes even middle school, students begin to slowly receive more and more hours of homework. There are various reasons why multiple hours of homework per week might lead students to depression, with stress and procrastination being at the top. Certain subjects, such as mathematics or science-related classes (i.e. chemistry) might also be challenging for some students to comprehend, leading them to feel drowned in stress and procrastination. Many hours of homework on a subject that one does not understand may start as stress and procrastination, but across multiple weeks or months may gradually turn into strong feelings of inadequacy and ultimately depression.
Only some people in high school are distinguished academics capable of effortlessly finishing hours of homework each week. Other students are naturally gifted in different areas, such as athletics, arts (such as music or drawing), or even gaming! However, these activities can also get in the way of valuable time each student needs to complete homework and be successful in school. If the student prioritizes extracurricular activities significantly more than homework, this certainly can have negative mental health consequences. Ultimately, a school/leisure balance is key when it comes to avoiding student depression and maintaining overall happiness and success!
Certain subjects or teachers might also be prone to assign excessive homework that might initially be daunting. For example, mathematics, chemistry, and physics are examples of classes that high school students find both challenging and overwhelming. If these classes are not already difficult enough, a bad professor might add excessive homework that is clearly not necessary for the student’s growth. The combination of excessive homework and poor teachers can easily lead students to mild depression over time.
Mental health issues in the United States and across the world are higher now than at any point in much of human history. This means that many students already have mild to severe forms of depression, anxiety, PTSD, and other mental health issues. When students receive homework that they feel incapable of completing with little to no support outside school, this may only worsen their mental health. Unfortunately, depression is only one of many mental health issues students may face when confronted with challenging homework.
Many students, especially in high school and college, naturally prefer to stay up late and wake up late. These individuals are commonly referred to as “night owls” since they mostly thrive at night. Being a “night owl” is not an inherent problem until the student’s sleep begins to fall below the recommended range of 7-9 hours per night. Sleep deprivation is defined as “a state caused by inadequate quality or quantity of sleep.”
Although side effects of sleep deprivation depend on a few factors, depression is one of the most common. Students might feel stressed during the day and procrastinate until night when they make the logical decision to stay up and finally complete the homework for the following day. This is the day-to-day reality for many students since they have yet to break the sleep deprivation-depression cycle.
Although getting good grades is applauded by almost everyone ranging from students and parents to teachers and principals, some students take it to the extreme. Perfectionism is the need to appear perfect, which might be reflected by extremely good grades or high GPAs (that are often unrealistic or unnecessary). Most colleges do not require students to have anywhere near perfect good grades or GPAs, meaning students should set realistic goals while still making it possible to achieve long-term goals. Setting realistic goals for good grades can also lead students to minimize stress, depression, and other negative effects that come with perfectionism.
Some students might also suffer from physical health problems that are either genetic (such as Type I Diabetes) or behavioral health problems (such as obesity). In the case of a young student with obesity, his or her most difficult class might be the physical exercise (PE) class. This student might look at other students performing the daily physical activity for class and feel a sense of inadequacy that can grow over time and lead to depression, especially if not properly addressed or guided.
There is also a slew of other physical health problems that might contribute to a student’s struggle and depression when in school. These health problems might also make it difficult for students to complete homework when away from school, due to a variety of factors.
Weight loss may occur when students are overly focused on school and have little to no time to eat a highly nutritious meal. Since food gives energy to the brain and is responsible for many vital functions of the human body, it is no wonder why depression might arise out of weight loss. In addition, many students, particularly young female students, go through a time that challenges their self-image. Other students and social media might pressure these students into conforming to non-realistic beauty standards via weight loss.
High schoolers and college students are still very young in the grand scheme of life, with many lacking the crucial ability to balance school and homework with other parts of their lives. Especially with the amount of homework some classes assign, students might not balance enough time that is necessary to complete the assigned work. Students might spend much time procrastinating homework and doing fun, but less productive activities, such as playing sports or video games. Mental health counselors (either at school or in a clinical setting) can be extremely effective at helping students manage school work and ultimately avoid depression.
High schoolers and older students must find enough time to complete homework and study to get optimal test scores. Although this does vary from class to class, most individuals will have at least a few classes where balancing homework and testing is critical for success. Test anxiety is a big factor that might lead students to heavily prioritize studying for an exam instead of completing homework. If students are overly concerned with test scores and neglect to complete assigned homework, depressive symptoms may occur.
As mentioned earlier, young children or young people, in general, might often struggle to effectively complete a lot of homework. Building daily habits around homework completion for just 30 minutes per day can add up to make a massive difference (that is 4.5 hours by the end of the school week!). Not only does effective time management make it easier to complete homework, but it also removes much of the stress, procrastination, and even depression that might come as a result of little to no time management.
For younger children or even high schoolers, an adult role model can significantly help develop these necessary habits sooner rather than later.
High schoolers looking to get accepted into prestigious colleges like Stanford University, or college students already in prestigious schools likely have higher chances to suffer from homework-related depression. High schoolers that are accepted into Stanford University have an average GPA of 3.95 out of 4.00.
This means students trying to get into ivy league schools hold themselves to an extreme standard. This extreme standard will inevitably cause a lack of sleep, depression, and a variety of other negative effects. This does not mean that it is impossible to successfully be accepted into Stanford University, it just means it will be very challenging.
Sometimes teachers (mostly in high school) assign work that is repetitive, not super challenging, and time-consuming to complete. These types of assignments are generally referred to as “busy work,” and can be the bane of some high schoolers’ existence. The problem with busy work is that students begin to focus on the completion of the homework due to the sheer amount of time they know it will take to complete it. This takes away from the overall learning experience of the student and will lead many high school students to procrastinate. Procrastination can lead to piled-up homework and can have a negative impact on the student’s depression levels. Ultimately, teachers that assign busy homework cause depression.
Sometimes the cause of depression is much deeper than meets the eye, with homework simply exacerbating these untouched issues. One deeper issue revolves around family members and the lack of much-needed social support from parents, siblings, and other family members in the household. These family members might simply be unwilling to provide homework support to young adults, or the issue might be as bad as mental or physical abuse. If you know someone that is being abused, please seek help immediately to help them in the long run. It is clear that these issues could easily lead one to depression.
Being isolated at school and/or at home might be one of the risk factors for developing depression from homework. Friendships can be mutually beneficial when completing tasks such as homework since students are able to check each others’ work and reduce the overall stress of heavy workloads. Students that always seem to be alone or are even bullied might be at an increased risk of serious mental health problems. It is true that some young people and older students work best alone, but this is definitely a warning sign to keep an eye out for if you are a parent.
Putting isolated students into a club or sport they have an initial interest in might be a fantastic way to help them create valuable bonds with those around them and prevent depression!
Social media is something that has had clear negative effects on the mental health of many age groups in the United States but also across the world. Social media often promotes the action of comparing one’s self to others, which might be academic success in this case. Individuals that are constantly watching other students succeed online may feel like they are the only one that does not understand the course material.
The amount of time spent on social media can also often take away from time that high schoolers could be spent completing homework and other important things. Ultimately, social media is best, like many things, when consumed in moderation and is not used to negatively compare oneself with others.
Stomach problems include, but are not limited to celiac disease, inflammatory bowel disease (IBD), lactose intolerance, and constipation or gas. Most of these stomach problems have nausea and even vomiting as some of their primary negative effects. Attempting to do homework or even come to school when having severe nausea is challenging, to say the least. Students with these issues will often have less time as a result, and may even feel as though homework cause depression.
From the list above, there are many clear reasons why excessive homework assignments might lead a student of any age to depression. If you or someone you know struggles with severe depression, please seek professional help. Although there are many ways homework can cause depression, we are strong and capable of overcoming the depression and still achieving success. Ultimately, social support from family and friends, academic guidance, and a consistent homework routine are just a few of the things that might help reduce depression caused by homework.
Wowwww!! This is extremely insightful ❤️🔥Can’t wait for your next post !
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Opinion Editor Jula Utzschneider writes on the overwhelming chip on every student’s shoulder: homework.
Jula Utzschneider , Opinion Editor November 10, 2021
When the bell rings to end last period every day, I feel a sense of relief. However, this feeling soon wears off as I realize just how much work I have to do after the already-stressful school day ends.
While homework can be beneficial, more often than not, it is assigned excessively and unnecessarily. Teachers give a significant amount of homework, often due the next day. This causes students to spend far too much time doing such assignments and can be detrimental.
A 2013 study conducted at Stanford University found that students in top-performing school districts who spend too much time on homework experience more stress, physical health problems, a lack of balance in their lives and alienation from society. That study, published in The Journal of Experimental Education , suggested that any more than two hours of homework per night is counterproductive. However, students who participated in the study reported doing slightly more than three hours of homework every night.
And, yes, the amount of homework given to students depends on the course level they take. But, with increasingly competitive college acceptance rates (demanding more extracurriculars and college-level classes), many students feel forced to take these more challenging courses. This is a huge problem, especially as teachers give homework only thinking about their own class, not the five or six others students have.
Additionally, when it came to stress, more than 70% of students in the Stanford study said they were “often or always stressed over schoolwork,” with 56% listing homework as a primary stressor. More than 80% of students reported having at least one stress-related symptom (such as headaches, exhaustion, sleep deprivation, weight loss, stomach problems and more) in the past month, and 44% said they had experienced three or more symptoms.
Less than 1% of the students said homework was not a stressor, demonstrating that the vast majority feel overwhelmed and pressured by the amount of work they receive.
Not to mention, the time spent on these assignments could easily be spent doing something enjoyable. Many students feel forced or obligated to choose homework over practicing other talents or skills, which should never be the case. Teachers should be encouraging these extracurriculars, rather than making it impossible for students to partake in them.
In terms of what teachers can do, it’s quite simple, really. Homework is intended for students to either practice a subject further or to cover topics teachers couldn’t during the allotted class time. It should not be busywork that just wastes a student’s time.
Teachers should be giving students work that is absolutely necessary (not busy work), and eliminate it altogether where they can. It is extremely important that students not only get through high school but thrive and enjoy it too.
How much time do you spend doing homework on an average school night?
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High school students have a lot of responsibilities and expectations. They always have, but, nowadays, the amount of time students have to devote to homework has increased . This is why we’re talking about the question, “does homework cause depression?”
This leaves students with less time for hanging out with friends, managing physical symptoms of stress , and understanding that better grades don’t equal better life.
And, yet, students still have to deal with too much homework that makes it impossible for them to take care of their mental health. Here are 10 reasons why homework is associated with depression.
Homework and depression:, 1. the benefits of homework don’t always outweigh the stress it causes .
At the end of the day, homework is all about cementing the learning the students have done in class. However, a lot of students complete busy work that does not promote the active learning they need for a class to help them in the future.
Instead, homework assignments, especially for high school students, are now designed to give students heavy workloads instead of providing only the amount necessary to process the information they’re learning in class.
By their junior year, high schoolers have to start applying to college. They have to handle both excessive homework that may or may not help their learning and individual essays for every college.
They have to do this while cultivating relationships with encouraging teachers for future letters of recommendation.
Therefore, they have to dedicate time to excessive amounts of homework while having enough time to plan out which universities they want to apply to, complete applications, and write multiple essays.
As much as parents want students to turn to them for support, lots of students are individuating and becoming independent from their family members.
They take on rigorous courses that require high academic performance without communicating with their families about the lack of sleep and excessive stress. Students may theoretically have enough time to complete assignments.
But, they struggle with a lack of balance because they’re taking on extra stress at the same time they’re learning critical life skills. Oftentimes, high schoolers don’t ask for help because they don’t want to admit they can’t do it all.
High school students often think that they can maintain unhealthy habits, like limiting their hours of sleep and eating unsatisfying foods, long enough to get into a good college.
Once they graduate from high school, they think that they will be college students with a new and improved homework routine and a better quality of life.
However, high schoolers don’t realize the negative impact that unsatisfying, non-nutritious foods have on their mental health when they rely on poor eating habits during times of stress.
When we think of high school students abusing substances, we probably think of alcohol. What we don’t think about is caffeine or energy drinks.
While high schoolers certainly drink underage, the far more dangerous substances are the ones they’re allowed to consume before their bodies are developed.
High schoolers can consume caffeine to pull-nighters before a test or during the day when they need to stay awake during classes. This substance abuse leads to sleep deprivation and sporadic sleep schedules that disrupt their learning process and brain development .
People value mental health more now than ever before . We’re talking about it more and sharing our experiences despite the stigma that still exists around mental health. So, we expose students to resources and tools that can help them fight anxiety and depression.
But, they don’t take them seriously because we’re also telling them that they have to get into a four-year university, pick the major that will determine their future career, and, if they fail at any of this, their future is doomed.
In other words, we give them the tools and resources, but we haven’t given them the infrastructure to take it seriously. They don’t have the safety to take care of themselves because they have so many assignments, expectations, and future problems to manage.
As obvious as it is, social media must be addressed when we talk about students and the hours of homework they have to complete.
Regardless of how much we encourage and motivate students to complete their homework assignments, we still can’t change the effect of social media on their lives.
Students who want good grades will most likely find a way to do that, even if they lose hours of sleep from going through social media. Social media is complicated, but it harms young people and we have to state that.
It distracts students, gives them a false sense of reality they can’t live up to, and provides them with a distraction from the stress and pain they’re feeling.
Society has way too many expectations on young people for young people to be able to meet all of them and avoid mental illness. Extracurricular activities are no different.
Whether a student signs up for band, volunteering outside of school, or sports, that’s one more commitment they make. Sometimes, students do these activities because they choose to, but, far more often, they make these commitments because they are pleasing someone else.
That someone else might be college admissions or parents, but it usually isn’t them. Unfortunately, that means they don’t have as much time for the amount of homework they need to finish.
On top of thinking ahead to college applications and staying ahead of homework assignments, students need time to hang out with friends.
Most students will find a way to spend time with friends and complete large amounts of homework, but they won’t do so without serious mental health problems.
The problem with high school students is not that they will avoid people or become depressed because they don’t see their friends. Unfortunately, they instead experience burnout and lose sleep to do everything they want to do.
Before their brains are fully developed, high schoolers are already attempting to function like adults. They try to form good study habits, complete a lot of homework, and spend time with friends and family. High school students do all of this with a lack of balance.
Whatever is not crucial to their existence is not a part of their life. When young adults have too many responsibilities and needs to meet, they choose the ones they think are most important and let the rest of them deteriorate.
For example, a student is much more likely to ignore their physical health problems and mental health issues if their grades are good and they get to spend time with friends.
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However, when a depressed mood or unbearable sadness is present for a long time – a couple of weeks or months – then it might meet the criteria for depression.
Depression affects over 264 million people worldwide. Between 76% and 85% of those experiencing depression do not seek or receive treatment for their disorder (World Health Organization, 2020a).
This article provides a starting point to understand depressive symptoms and also offers helping professionals resources to assist their patients with recovery.
Please note that the resources provided in this article are not a substitute for treatment from a medical professional. If you are suffering from depression or know someone who is, we recommend you seek help. Guidance is provided at the end of this article.
Before you continue, we thought you might like to download our three Stress & Burnout Prevention Exercises (PDF) for free . These science-based exercises will equip you and those you work with, with tools to manage stress better and find a healthier balance in your life.
2 worksheets to help combat depression, handouts for cbt sessions, 2 group therapy worksheets, depression worksheets for teens and youth, 4 worksheets on coping skills, positivepsychology.com’s toolkit resources, a take-home message.
Individuals who experience depression often deal with difficult emotions and engage in unhelpful thought patterns that worsen their depression. One of those responses that is widely recognized is excessive guilt .
Excessive guilt is one of the distinctive symptoms of depression, as it is often exaggerated and experienced out of context (Pulcu, Zahn, & Elliott, 2013).
Typically, individuals with major depressive disorder feel guilty for their emotions and are often upset at themselves for being affected by depression, as they feel they are worthless for being in a depressive state.
One of the most common types of guilt experienced by individuals who have depression is called omnipotent responsibility guilt , which is defined as “taking responsibility for events which may be out of one’s control and feeling guilty about their consequences” (Pulcu et al., 2013, p. 312).
Often, individuals with depression take responsibility for situations they have little or no control over, causing them to feel a sense of overwhelming guilt, even when they had nothing to do with the outcome.
Understanding what parts of a situation you can control or influence is an essential part of seeking treatment for depression. The Control–Influence–Accept Model (Thompson & Thompson, 2008) originated as a means to help people be more productive at work.
However, the basic principles of the model aim to identify pieces of a situation that you can control or influence, as well as aspects of a situation you may have to adapt to or accept.
If these sound like issues you are struggling with, feel free to consult the following worksheets:
This is a good activity for individuals with depression to help break down situations. The model allows better visualization of different aspects of a situation and what specifically can be controlled, instead of worrying about all the possible outcomes.
Guilt and shame are two emotions that drive your emotions when depression manifests. This exercise will help you identify guilt and shame that drives your depression and provides suggestions for channeling those emotions to facilitate more positive thinking patterns.
CBT operates on the principle that emotional reactions and behaviors are influenced by cognitions (Westbrook, Kennerley, & Kirk, 2011).
Our behavior is governed by these cognitions, meaning that someone with anxiety might display more anxious behavior or engage in negative thinking patterns.
When an individual is affected by depression, they can experience cognitive distortions that are negatively biased errors in thinking. When individuals experience automatic thoughts, they are typically consistent with their core beliefs about aspects of themselves, others, and the world (Rnic, Dozois, & Martin, 2016).
Therefore, individuals who are experiencing depressive thoughts or symptomatology tend to have negatively charged core beliefs, which activate negative automatic thoughts. The cycle of negative thinking causes the symptoms of depression to continue and consolidate negative thoughts as part of an individual’s emotional response.
Our worksheet on Unhelpful Thinking Patterns categorizes the unhelpful thinking patterns that are present when someone is experiencing depression. It also provides strategies for individuals to reconstruct their thinking and identify the negative thinking patterns they might engage in.
Because of negative thinking patterns or cognitions, individuals often develop negative beliefs about everyday situations. This may cause them to change their behavior.
This worksheet on Behavioral Experiments to Test Beliefs encourages you to challenge your negative thoughts or beliefs. You are assisted to develop a hypothesis from your beliefs and test whether your negative core beliefs actually come true.
It is a useful worksheet if you are trying to confront negative beliefs about a specific situation, such as going out in social situations, or struggling to leave home. Having a concrete situation will allow you to better challenge the negative thinking patterns you might experience.
These detailed, science-based exercises will equip you or your clients with tools to manage stress better and find a healthier balance in their life.
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Delivering CBT in a group therapy format is sometimes recommended for those who may benefit from a group to relate to when dealing with symptoms and situations specific to depression.
Individuals may also benefit from group cohesion and can potentially use the group as an arena for challenging their negative thoughts and behavior (Thimm & Antonsen, 2014).
One of the most important goals in group therapy is for participants to get comfortable telling their story and learning about themselves. I Am is an introductory activity for people doing group therapy. Filling out the prompts helps them define themselves, specifically their boundaries and strengths.
The ultimate goal of the ‘I Am’ exercise is for the individual to gain an awareness of their own mind. They can then share this activity with other participants so they can all get to know each other better, form a trusting bond, and promote a safe space to discuss their depression.
Often, people with depression can identify a series of events that may have contributed to the development or worsening of their condition.
My Depression Story is designed for individuals taking part in group therapy. It encourages participants to make a timeline of their lives, highlighting key moments that have shaped their individual perceptions. It then asks them to do the same thing with their depression so they can better understand what the contributing factors may have been.
By sharing these events with the group, they can determine how depression has affected their perceptions and figure out a healthier way to map out their goals from now on.
According to the World Health Organization (2020b), one in six youths between the ages of 10 and 19 are affected by a mental illness. Moreover, depression is one of the leading causes of illness and disability among adolescents.
Therefore, it is essential to have resources and information for teens and their parents so they can identify the symptoms of depression. If you suspect your teen is experiencing depressive symptoms or you simply want to learn more, read on for resources you could use.
Recognizing the warning signs of depression is one of the most important preventative measures a parent or guardian can take to ensure that their teenager gets the help they need.
Our Depression Fact Sheet for Teenagers is designed to break down the symptoms and behaviors that characterize depression specific to teenagers. It also provides resources for teenagers to consult if they have a friend who is experiencing these symptoms and don’t know what to do.
Teenagers in particular may struggle to put their emotions into words, specifically when they are experiencing depression. This Letter to a Loved One About My Depression activity provides ideas for teenagers to help express their feelings. It even has a template that they can fill in and print if they are having trouble finding the right way to tell a parent or another loved one about their depression.
As discussed in the previous section, confronting negative thoughts is a central part of dealing with depression. The Depressive Thoughts for Teens worksheet acts as a companion to the Unhelpful Thinking Styles worksheet.
It has specific activities for teenagers to break down their responses to various situations and an example to follow when confronting their negative thoughts. We encourage parents to complete this alongside their teenager to help them identify trigger situations and provide more productive problem-solving solutions.
An important part of facilitating long-term recovery from depression is to encourage coping skills that individuals can implement in their everyday lives when they feel overwhelmed or upset.
Coping strategies “consist of behaviors, primarily management and problem-solving techniques that are implemented to manage stressful situations” (Bautista & Erwin, 2013, p. 687).
Coping skills can either focus on targeting the problem (problem-based) or seek to make yourself feel better when the circumstances are out of your control (emotion-based).
The point of introducing these coping skills is not only to give individuals strategies to fight off depression, but also to discourage the use of unhealthy coping strategies (e.g., drugs, alcohol, avoidance, overeating, or overspending). These are strategies that provide instant gratification but could have negative consequences if the unhealthy patterns continue.
If you are looking for a technique that is easy to do and free of charge, consider exploring deep breathing. Three Steps to Deep Breathing gives you a quick overview of how to use deep breathing when you are feeling stressed, upset, or overwhelmed.
Our Power of Deep Breathing article also provides more details about how deep breathing can help you overcome stress and anxiety, and introduces practices where deep breathing is commonly used (e.g., yoga, meditation).
Part of knowing how to implement coping skills into your daily routine is to understand what your coping style is and what strategies might work best for you. This Coping Styles Formulation activity helps individuals work with their therapist to identify the problem that is causing them distress.
By delving deeper into the events and actions that caused the problem, they may be able to better understand what coping style or skills they need to implement, especially if this is a recurring issue that causes distress.
Another important part of coping is to implement self-care. Self-care is any activity that involves taking care of our mental, emotional, or physical health. Self-care not only leads to improved mood and reduced anxiety, but can also improve your self-esteem (Michael, 2016).
This Self-Care Checkup gives ideas for self-care and allows you to rate how often you engage in each activity. This worksheet also divides self-care into emotional, physical, social, professional, and spiritual self-care. It will reveal which area of your life needs the most attention and help you implement the strategies as needed.
Additionally, this Self-Love Journal is helpful for daily self-care, as it gives you an opportunity to think about the moments and aspects of yourself that are positive, rather than focusing on more difficult things that are happening.
Help your clients prevent burnout, handle stressors, and achieve a healthy, sustainable work-life balance with these 17 Stress & Burnout Prevention Exercises [PDF].
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We have an excellent selection of resources that can assist those battling depression. For therapists, the following masterclasses and worksheets will equip you to be better able to support your clients.
The Science of Self-Acceptance Masterclass© is an excellent tool for practitioners and individuals who are struggling with accepting themselves. Often, a strong driver of depression is an individual’s difficulty with loving and accepting themselves for who they are.
This course focuses on building a healthy relationship with yourself first by using science-based activities to help build your self-esteem. This is also an excellent resource for practitioners who have a client who is struggling with depression and low self-esteem.
This masterclass on Meaning and Valued Living aims to help individuals find meaning in everyday life. People with depression often struggle to find meaning or value in themselves or their everyday actions, as they are caught in a cycle of negative thought patterns and experiences.
This course aims to help them regain a sense of purpose and find value in the contributions they are making, no matter how small or insignificant they may seem.
If you’re looking for more science-based ways to help others manage stress without spending hours on research and session prep, this collection contains 17 validated stress management tools for practitioners. Use them to help others identify signs of burnout and create more balance in their lives.
Depression can be a difficult condition to overcome, especially when you feel lonely or isolated. Changing your thinking and behavior can be a daunting task, as it is often less intimidating to stick with something you are familiar with, even if it has a negative impact on your daily living.
Reading this article is a great first step to understand depression and struggles with negative thoughts. Be kind to yourself, and remember that every small step you take along your self-improvement journey is an important one and should be celebrated.
Reach out to a professional, close friend, or family member to help you with the next steps. Getting out of the hole is a challenging journey, so asking for help and someone to be on your side is the best decision you can take. You don’t have to do this alone.
If you are struggling with severe symptoms of depression or suicidal thoughts, please call the following number in your respective country:
For a list of other suicide prevention websites, phone numbers, and resources, see this website or consult Open Counseling’s list of International Suicide and Emergency Hotlines . Resources are listed by country, and you can click on the ‘more hotlines’ and ‘in-person counseling’ tabs to get further help.
Please know that there are people who care and treatments that can help.
We hope you enjoyed reading this article. Don’t forget to download our three Stress & Burnout Prevention Exercises (PDF) for free .
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happy & easy way to tackle homework
Homework is an after-school task that nobody bargained or asked for. It is simply that extra work that every student has to put in over a specific period every day after school. Kids in first grade are known to spend at least 10 minutes on their homework every day; those in high school (particularly the seniors) spend at least two hours on their homework every night. This is not conclusive; the amount of time spent could be higher or lesser, depending on the school, teacher, and the students’ abilities.
According to Sierra’s Homework Policy recommendation, students shouldn’t get more than ten minutes of homework every night and a maximum of fifty minutes of homework per term. While this recommendation is not binding or absolute, it mostly serves as a conceptual guide for teachers and tutors alike. Spending this amount of time on homework every night after a hectic day at school is not in any way fun for students, no matter the age or class. No student enjoys doing homework, especially when it has become a daily routine, and now that homework score is calculated as part of their cumulative score for the term. To ease the homework burden, students can ask for help at 123 Homework service and get it at an affordable price.
Whether homework can lead to or cause depression is an age-long question, and this article aims to explain the ‘if’ and ‘how’ too much homework can cause depression.
Studies have shown that the more time spent on homework means that students are not meeting their developmental needs or imbibing other critical life skills. While focusing on their homework, students are likely to forgo other activities such as participating in hobbies, seeing friends and family, and having meaningful and heart-to-heart conversations with people. Homework steals all the attention and spare time. Eventually, it puts students on the path of social reclusiveness, which would sooner or later tell on their mental and emotional balance.
Also, when a group of Harvard Health researchers asked students whether they experience any physical symptoms of stress like exhaustion, sleep deprivation, headache, weight loss, and stomach ache, over two-thirds of the participating students claim that they cope with anxiety thanks to their use of drugs, alcohol, and marijuana.
A Stanford University study showed that homework affects students’ physical and mental health because at least 56% of students attribute homework to be their primary source of stress. According to the study, too much homework is also a leading cause of weight loss, headache, sleep deprivation, and poor eating habits.
As beneficial as homework is to the students’ academic development, the fact remains that an additional two hours spent on homework after spending around 8 hours in school is too much and could lead to a massive mental breakdown.
Even though research has shown that homework can lead to depression, that doesn’t take away the fact that assignment is the only way to ensure and ascertain that students fully understood what they have learned in class; however, the question remains, is two hours on homework every night not too much?
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How new technologies in school help students study & do homework, tips for students on how to improve experience in higher education, why school education is the key to success in the future discover here, pros and cons of homework.
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The science of psychiatry is gaining on the daunting complexity of the brain..
Updated June 20, 2024 | Reviewed by Hara Estroff Marano
According to the World Health Organization (WHO), clinical depression affects nearly 300 million people worldwide. The Centers for Disease Control (CDC) estimates that 20 million or more people in the U.S. have depression at any given time, while more than 18 percent of U.S. adults report depression at some point in their lives and .more than 12 percent of adults report significant feelings of anxiety .
Treatment for depression is of limited effectiveness; only 30-40 percent of those initially treated experience full resolution of symptoms, or remission. What's more, studies show, successive efforts to achieve remission are less and less effective.
Understanding the underlying biology of depression, anxiety, and related conditions such as post- traumatic stress disorder ( PTSD ) is necessary for making correct diagnosis and planning effective treatment. But especially in psychiatry, given the complexities of the brain, diagnosis and treatment are not yet well-grounded in biological understanding.
Medical treatment is ideally based on a number of factors, including knowledge of the disease process, the ability to make accurate diagnoses, and an understanding of how individual factors affect treatment planning and outcome. The National Institutes of Health started the BRAIN Initiative (Brain Research Through Advancing Innovative Neurotechnologies) in 2013, calling for neuroscience -based models of disease and health. Understanding the causal factors of disease suggests the levers clinicians can manipulate to provide the most effective treatment possible.
Psychiatric diagnosis in the United States is currently based on the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM-5). Although efforts have been made to improve its approach with more specific criteria for mental illness based on statistics and available data, the DSM is not firmly scientifically based. For the vast majority of illnesses described, the diagnostic criteria say little to nothing about the cause of the disease; instead, they primarily reflect long-observed clinical patterns, rendering the DSM a work in progress and of less-than-desirable utility for diagnosis and treatment.
Not all causes of psychiatric disease are strictly biological. For example, inheriting a genetic predisposition to depression—and many genes contribute–does not invariably lead to depression. It’s highly likely that social and family factors can also bring on depression—not being productive or social, for example. Current treatments for depression often address biological and social factors, but there is as yet no standard biological testing for depression nor any clear framework for scientifically based treatment.
DSM 5 identifies several subtypes of depression, all based on clinical observation and statistical analysis. With unipolar depression (as contrasted with bipolar disorder ), subtypes include atypical and melancholic, and specifiers include severity of symptoms as well as presence or absence of psychotic features. Diagnosis is made by reviewing clinical presentation and history, whether informally through clinical interview or formally via structured, guided interview and review of accompanying information. The same approach applies to anxiety disorders, including generalized anxiety, social anxiety , panic disorder, and obsessive-compulsive disorder, as well as to stress-related disorders such as PTSD. The disorders may be divided into subtypes by specifiers, but a true medical-scientific framework is lacking.
A recent study of brain networks in depression and anxiety reported in Nature Medicine (2024) is an important step toward establishing an empirical model of "biotypes",; it echoes prior work on depression 3 and brain-based personality research 4 . Researchers Tozzi and colleagues used functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) to look at brain activity in more than 1,000 people with depression and anxiety, measuring “task-free” brain activity. They repeated imaging in a subset of patients who received psychotherapy or pharmacotherapy or underwent a variety of activities. During the imaging, subjects were shown a variety of stimuli—such as sad, threatening, or happy faces—and were asked to perform a variety of cognitive and attention tasks. Cluster analysis was used to identify underlying biotypes based on brain circuit dysfunction, sometimes referred to as “dysconnectivity” in brain networks. Treatment would, therefore, restore "euconnectivity".
Notably, the study was transdiagnostic: Given how much depression an anxiety overlap, the study didn't assume they are separate disorders. The analysis was unbiased by preconceived diagnostic models. Participants included those diagnosed with various conventional disorders, including major depression, generalized anxiety, panic disorder, social anxiety, PTSD, obsessive-compulsive disorder,. Some patients met criteria for more than one diagnosis.
Six underlying biotypes of depression and anxiety were identified among participants with clinically-significant symptoms. Their labels are complicated, based on activity levels in key brain networks: default mode, or resting state (D); salience, or what stands out as important (S); and attentional (A). In addition to connectivity patterns, research looked at such key factors as negative emotional circuitry in response to sadness and threat (conscious and unconscious ), positive emotion circuits, and cognitive circuits. There were no sex differences in response patterns, and minimal differences in age.
While not ready for standard clinical use, the study results build on prior work demonstrating that brain network analysis holds promise for developing biologically based diagnostic testing for depression, anxiety, and stress-related disorders. The study also provides initial proof of concept that psychiatric biotyping could be used in the selection of treatments, with some biotypes responding better to medication and others to psychotherapeutic interventions.
Clearly, more work is needed before such models of illness can underpin diagnosis and treatment. Given the complexity of the human experience, it's important to recognize that many of the causes of mental illness are likely to be social or circumstantial, external to the individual. More debatable is how to distinguish psychology from neuroscience, mind from brain, without becoming neuroreductionistic. Personalized scientific approaches to psychiatry on a par with other medical disciplines remain largely aspirational, but current approaches are likely to move the needle.
1. An important clarification about how the word “causal” is being used here–it is being used to refer to the causes of the problems in the present moment, the precise factors in the complex system which maintain the status quo of health and illness. Notably, we are not necessarily talking about the historical causes–what started the process in motion may not be what is currently causing it to persist. This is a mathematic definition of causality.
2. Causal discovery has been used to look at PTSD among police officers using a process called Protocol for Computation Causal Discovery in Psychiatry (PCCDP). Saxe and colleagues (2020) reviewed a large data set from over 200 police officers. They identified 83 causal pathways with 5 causes: changes (single-nucleotide polymorphisms–SNPs) in histidine decarboxylase and mineralocorticoid receptor genes involved with stress-response, acoustic startle to low perceived threat during training, peritraumatic distress to incident exposure in the first year of service, and general symptom severity during training after one year of service. This study is a proof-of-concept for using causal discovery to identify points for intervention, and clearly could be used preventively–for example, identifying trainees with those features and responding accordingly.
3. Four Biotypes of Depression
4. Brainprint of Basic Mental Activity
WHO Depression Fact Sheet
CDC Depression Prevalence 2020
CDC Anxiety
NIH Brain Initiative
Saxe GN, Bickman L, Ma S, Aliferis C. Mental health progress requires causal diagnostic nosology and scalable causal discovery. Front Psychiatry. 2022 Nov 15;13:898789. doi: 10.3389/fpsyt.2022.898789. PMID: 36458123; PMCID: PMC9705733.
Saxe GN, Ma S, Morales LJ, Galatzer-Levy IR, Aliferis C, Marmar CR. Computational causal discovery for post-traumatic stress in police officers. Transl Psychiatry. 2020 Aug 11;10(1):233. doi: 10.1038/s41398-020-00910-6. PMID: 32778671; PMCID: PMC7417525.
Tozzi, L., Zhang, X., Pines, A. et al. Personalized brain circuit scores identify clinically distinct biotypes in depression and anxiety. Nat Med (2024). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41591-024-03057-9
Grant Hilary Brenner, M.D., a psychiatrist and psychoanalyst, helps adults with mood and anxiety conditions, and works on many levels to help unleash their full capacities and live and love well.
At any moment, someone’s aggravating behavior or our own bad luck can set us off on an emotional spiral that threatens to derail our entire day. Here’s how we can face our triggers with less reactivity so that we can get on with our lives.
One of the worst things your company can do for your mental health is talk about it too much.
Gen Z wants to talk about mental health . And these days, they want to talk about it at the office.
In a 2023 survey of nearly 3,000 people, Gen Z was almost twice as likely as other generations to say they struggled with their mental health . And nearly half said they're fine talking about it at work — 20% more than other generations. Anecdotally, managers have said their youngest employees confront anxiety and have no qualms about openly discussing it .
This comfort with vulnerability shouldn't be a surprise. Gen Zers grew up amid a movement to destigmatize mental illness and encourage people to get treatment. They witnessed suicide rates tick up, especially among their peers. They watched celebrities like Selena Gomez , Simone Biles , and Demi Lovato speak out about once taboo subjects such as bipolar disorder, depression, and ADHD. And over the past few years, they've watched rates of depression and anxiety climb through the roof. They've felt increasingly empowered to be open about their struggles, support their coworkers, and lobby management for better benefits.
In a recent survey of US businesses conducted by the consultancy group Mercer and published by the US Chamber of Commerce, companies reported an overwhelming increase in demand for mental-health care over the past few years. In response, 94% of companies employing more than 500 people have added mental-health benefits — from expanded access to therapy to in-office programs for mental-health training . Across corporate America, talking about mental health is all the rage.
There's just one problem. While destigmatizing mental illness is important, a workplace overly focused on mental health isn't always a recipe for better mental-health outcomes. Recent articles about " therapy speak " and being " overtherapized " point to a growing sense that all the mental-health talk might be a bit much. In fact, researchers studying the issue think that talking about your psychological struggles too much can make your problems worse.
Related stories
A healthy work environment is one where people feel supported and encouraged to do meaningful work — not one that fixates on their mental health.
Americans are overwhelmingly worried about a mental-health crisis . In a 2022 poll of American adults conducted by the American Psychiatric Association, 79% said they viewed mental health as a public-health emergency in the US. When asked in a December KFF poll about crucial issues for the 2024 presidential candidates to discuss, far more people said access to mental-health care was most important compared with those who listed immigration, gun violence, abortion, or the climate crisis as the top issue.
The concern is well placed. Gallup found that between 2015 and 2023, the share of Americans who said they had been diagnosed with depression increased from about 20% to almost 30%. In just two decades, the number of Americans who received mental-health treatment shot up from 27 million in 2002 to nearly 56 million in 2022. Half of US physicians in a CVS Health/Harris Poll survey last year reported that their patients' mental health was declining.
Among young people, the problem is worse: A 2022 KFF/CNN survey found that adults under 30 were far more likely than those in older age groups to report that they often or always felt depressed or anxious. In a recent survey from the Archbridge Institute's Human Flourishing Lab, where I serve as the director, only 64% of Americans between the ages of 18 and 29 said their mental health was good — less than any other age group and a stark contrast from the roughly 90% of people over 45 who said the same.
These trends have important implications for the workplace. Poor mental health reduces labor-force participation , work engagement, and job performance, costing the economy an estimated $50 billion in lost productivity each year. And companies are noticing the impact: In a 2023 survey of 152 large American employers, 77% of companies reported an increase in mental-health concerns among their employees.
Some psychologists believe that efforts to increase public awareness of mental-health problems in the Western world have actually made the problem worse.
To address this problem, human-resources departments have flooded the workplace with resources and programs: everything from online resources through partnerships with wellness and therapy apps like Calm and BetterHelp to in-house resources such as office peer support groups, mental-health seminars, and spaces specifically for meditation and yoga. Many companies are also facing a push for cultural change. In a recent survey by the National Alliance on Mental Illness, three-quarters of workers polled said it was appropriate to discuss mental health at work, and even more said that supervisors and senior leadership were responsible for helping employees feel comfortable discussing their mental health.
On TikTok, people are recording their on-the-job breakdowns. Across social media, Gen Zers swap tips on avoiding toxic workplaces . And in work-based TV shows like "Severance," "Industry," and "The Bear," mental health is front and center. Everyone seems to agree that companies need to do something.
Breaking through the mental-health stigma is important: Many people struggling with depression or anxiety do not seek help because of their fear that it could harm their reputation, social relationships, and professional aspirations. In that sense, it's a good thing when workplaces become supportive environments where colleagues and supervisors view mental-health issues humanely.
But there's a limit. Too much mental-health talk can be counterproductive. Take concept creep, for example — the idea that the meanings of things like abuse, trauma, anxiety, and depression have expanded over time. Over the years, negative emotional experiences that were once considered a normal part of life have increasingly been viewed as signs of psychological disorders. Trauma , for example, once referred to the severe psychological distress that came from rare, life-threatening experiences. Now, it's used to describe less-severe distress caused by a wider variety of adverse events, such as exposure to offensive speech or violent media.
Some psychologists believe that efforts to increase public awareness of mental-health problems in the Western world have actually made the problem worse — they have encouraged people to fixate on negative psychological experiences and interpret normal levels of emotional discomfort as abnormal. This misinterpretation can lead to a self-fulfilling prophecy, they argue, whereby people begin to think and behave as if they truly have a mental disorder, ultimately increasing their risk of developing one.
Well-intentioned efforts to get people to think and talk more about mental health may inadvertently promote excessive dwelling on negative emotions and personal insecurities — known in psychology as rumination — which can exacerbate psychological distress. Research indicates that rumination can make depression and anxiety disorders worse, which is why helping other people is an especially effective way to reduce symptoms of anxiety and depression — it takes people's minds off their own problems.
The more people view their lives — and work — as meaningful, the lower their risk for depression, anxiety, substance abuse, and suicide is.
So when employers encourage workers to spend time focused on their mental states with "emotional check-ins" or by including more mental-health language in office communications, they may well push staff to ruminate on their problems — and make them worse. And while workplace leaders can lend a sympathetic ear, most are not trained psychologists or psychiatrists and thus lack the expertise required to properly identify and address mental illness.
There's also a professional risk. Sharing your personal health information with colleagues and supervisors can blur professional boundaries and result in discrimination due to an altered perception of your competence that could affect your career advancement. When managers share too much about their psychological struggles, researchers have found, it can undermine how their employees see them.
In other words, the office isn't equipped to treat mental-health issues — but it can help in other ways.
What does have a tangible impact on people's well-being at work is whether they find their work meaningful . The more people view their lives — and work — as meaningful, the lower their risk for depression, anxiety, substance abuse, and suicide is. And when people experience mental-health problems, the things in life they find meaningful can play an important role in their recovery. At work, finding meaning also improves the overall organization. Workers are more likely to report high levels of job satisfaction and low intentions of quitting if they view their work as meaningful.
I've spent two decades of my career as an existential psychologist studying the need for meaning in life. The most important lesson employers can learn is that meaning is about social significance . People feel the most meaningful when they believe that they're making important contributions to the lives of others. Research has found that people are more likely to derive meaning from their work when they focus on how it serves a greater good, rather than how it advances their career. Other research has found that work feels the most meaningful when workers have a strong sense of autonomy at work and believe their efforts significantly and positively influence the lives of others.
Prioritizing positive mental health in the workplace is crucial — most of us spend the majority of our time on the job, after all. But the solution, ultimately, isn't as straightforward as raising awareness and fostering open conversations. Instead, employers should ensure their staff have access to mental-health care while building a positive culture that promotes meaningful work.
Clay Routledge is vice president of research and director of the Human Flourishing Lab at the Archbridge Institute.
Through our Discourse journalism, Business Insider seeks to explore and illuminate the day’s most fascinating issues and ideas. Our writers provide thought-provoking perspectives, informed by analysis, reporting, and expertise. Read more Discourse stories here .
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Weight changes as a potential side effect
Antidepressants that can cause weight gain, how do antidepressants affect weight.
Weight changes are not uncommon while taking certain antidepressants. Some cause weight gain, while others may cause weight loss.
If your healthcare provider prescribes an antidepressant for you, you may want to know which ones can cause weight loss as a side effect.
Antidepressants that can cause weight loss may include certain selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors (SSRIs) and serotonin-norepinephrine reuptake inhibitors (SNRIs) .
Usually, antidepressants that cause weight loss may do so indirectly by decreasing appetite. Typically, this side effect is temporary.
This article will describe how antidepressants affect weight and which are more likely to cause weight loss or weight gain. It will also discuss how depression may affect your weight and give a few tips for healthy ways to manage your weight while taking an antidepressant.
Getty Images / SEBASTIEN BOZON / Contributor
Many antidepressants can cause weight changes as a side effect. Although antidepressants are more likely to increase weight than decrease it, a few can cause weight loss. In many cases, the weight loss is temporary.
Antidepressants that cause weight loss typically do so because they decrease appetite as a side effect. Some examples are:
Though Zoloft (sertraline) does not seem to cause weight loss in adults, studies of children taking the same drug reported decreased appetite and weight loss as common side effects.
The manufacturer of Zoloft recommends monitoring children who take it for signs of weight loss and problems with growth. If your child takes Zoloft, let their healthcare provider know if you have concerns about your child's weight or growth during their treatment.
Antidepressants that have caused some weight loss in studies include Wellbutrin, Prozac, and Cymbalta. Of the three, Wellbutrin was associated with the most significant weight loss.
Keep in mind that study results may differ from your individual results. Talk with your healthcare provider if you have questions about weight loss caused by antidepressants.
Some antidepressants have been associated with weight gain. In studies, weight gain was more likely to happen during the second and third years of taking an antidepressant.
The following antidepressants can cause some weight gain:
Antidepressants may affect weight in several ways. Sometimes, weight gain or loss is a result of a side effect of the medication. Other times, antidepressants affect weight indirectly by improving the symptoms of your condition.
The following explanations may help you better understand the link between antidepressant therapy and weight changes.
One way antidepressants can affect weight is indirectly by improving your depression symptoms .
Changes in appetite can be a symptom of depression.
Depression can affect your weight in several ways. Some researchers believe that depression can be divided into two categories:
For some people, depression may cause weight loss due to a decrease in appetite. Others may gain weight because of an increased appetite. Decreased physical activity due to excessive sleepiness or feelings of heaviness in your body may also lead to weight gain.
As your antidepressant starts to work, your appetite may return to normal. In time, your weight may also return to what it was before your depression symptoms began.
Some antidepressants may affect weight by increasing your appetite. They do this by blocking histamine receptors in your brain.
Histamine is a chemical in your body typically associated with allergic reactions. However, histamine in your brain is also responsible for regulating your appetite. It's released when you eat and plays a part in letting you know when you are full.
Tricyclic antidepressants, such as amitriptyline, block the action of histamine. This may prevent you from feeling full after eating and contribute to overeating.
Other antidepressants, such as SSRIs, may affect weight through their action on serotonin.
SSRIs increase the amount of serotonin available for your brain to use. They do this by downregulating (decreasing the action of) serotonin receptors in your body.
Serotonin is a chemical found in your brain and throughout your body that helps regulate mood.
However, serotonin also has other functions, including regulating your appetite. Researchers believe the downregulation of serotonin receptors by SSRIs over time may affect how serotonin affects appetite.
Commonly prescribed antidepressants can have other side effects besides weight changes.
These can include:
A lot of times, side effects with antidepressants are mild and resolve over time. Seeing noticeable benefits from the medication can also take some time.
However, your provider can work with you to better optimize your treatment if side effects become too disruptive. Finding the right drug can sometimes take some trial and error.
If you're worried about weight changes due to antidepressant therapy, there are a few steps you can take to manage this potential side effect.
You can also speak to your provider about your concerns. They'll likely consider your preferences when choosing an antidepressant to prescribe and can work with you to find one that helps you feel the best.
Whether you're experiencing weight loss or weight gain during your antidepressant treatment, it's important to stick to a healthy, well-balanced diet to maintain your weight at a healthy level.
The following are tips for a healthy eating plan from the Dietary Guidelines for Americans 2020-2025 :
Increasing your physical activity can help with both your weight management and depression symptoms.
Exercising regularly can have a positive impact on your physical as well as mental health. And studies show that you can benefit from just a moderate amount of regular physical activity.
The good news is that many ways to increase your physical activity don't require extra expenses or equipment. You can even incorporate some of these activities into your daily routine.
For example, you can try:
Other activities that can help increase your physical activity include:
Most antidepressants are not approved by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) for weight loss. However, healthcare providers may use certain antidepressants off-label for weight management.
Off-label use is when a medication is prescribed to treat a condition or at doses that differ from the drug's approved dosage.
For example, fluoxetine and bupropion may sometimes be taken off-label for weight loss.
A different drug called Contrave (bupropion/naltrexone) is approved for weight management in certain adults. This medication contains a combination of the antidepressant bupropion and the opioid antagonist naltrexone.
Keep in mind that bupropion should not be prescribed for people who have a history of eating disorders , such as bulimia or anorexia nervosa.
If you are interested in losing weight, talk with your healthcare provider. They can discuss the many options now available for weight management. Together, you can decide which is best for you.
If you or someone you know are having suicidal thoughts, call or text 988 to contact the 988 Suicide & Crisis Lifeline and connect with a trained counselor.
If you or a loved one is in immediate danger, call 911 . For more mental health resources, see the National Helpline Database .
Changes in weight can be a common side effect of antidepressants. Although weight gain is more likely to happen with antidepressants, weight loss is also possible.
Examples of antidepressants that may cause some weight loss include Cymbalta, Prozac, and Wellbutrin. Of the three, Wellbutrin is the most likely to cause weight loss. Antidepressants more likely to cause weight gain include amitriptyline, Paxil, and Remeron.
Keep in mind that depression can also affect your weight. Often, taking an antidepressant may cause changes in your weight as it starts to work and improve your symptoms.
While taking an antidepressant, It's important to maintain a healthy lifestyle, including a well-balanced diet and exercise. This can greatly help you manage a healthy weight while improving your mental well-being.
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By Rosanna Sutherby, PharmD Sutherby is a community pharmacist with over 20 years of experience in medication review, counseling, and immunization.
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Cynthia Catchings, a licensed clinical social worker and therapist at Talkspace, says heavy workloads can also cause serious mental health problems in the long run, like anxiety and depression.
This list is hardly comprehensive. ADHD, autism spectrum disorder, social anxiety, generalized anxiety, panic disorder, depression, dysregulation, and a range of other neurodevelopmental and ...
A Stanford researcher found that too much homework can negatively affect kids, especially their lives away from school, where family, friends and activities matter. "Our findings on the effects ...
Use a calm voice. When kids feel anxious about homework, they might get angry, yell, or cry. Avoid matching their tone of voice. Take a deep breath and keep your voice steady and calm. Let them know you're there for them. Sometimes kids just don't want to do homework. They complain, procrastinate, or rush through the work so they can do ...
You may be experiencing depression if you've had some of the below symptoms most of the time for the last 2 weeks: ongoing feelings of sadness. being on-edge or snapping at people. low self ...
problems in the long run, like anxiety and depression. 2/5. And for all the distress homework causes, it's not as useful as many may think, says Dr. Nicholas Kardaras, a psychologist and CEO of ...
Symptoms of depression can include: Anxiety and panic. Difficulty with schoolwork. Changes in eating or sleeping patterns. Emotional outbursts, such as tearfulness, anger or irritability. Lack of energy or fatigue. Loss of interest in activities, such as clubs, sports or other social commitments. Poor self-esteem.
Unfair treatment by teachers causes academic depression in students. 3.12: 1.620: Depression has negatively affected my learning capabilities. 2.99: 1.280: Depression has negatively affected my academic grades. ... long-term untreated depression, anxiety, or stress can have a negative influence on people's ability to operate and produce, posing ...
How to cope with anxiety and depression. Here are some tips for coping with both anxiety and depression: 1. Practice mindfulness and relaxation techniques. Mindfulness techniques help reduce ...
Homework over a certain time limit can cause stress, depression, anxiety, lack of sleep, and more. Homework distracts from extracurriculars and sports as well, something colleges often look for. Homework is ultimately leading students to resent school as a whole. According to a study done by Stanford University, 56 percent of students ...
The cause of increased stress, hence, shifts to other factors such as the poor academic performance of students, or a lack of assistance ... Anxiety/depression: stressors intrinsic to teaching and related to organizational factors within schools, ensuring pupil progress, work overload, time pressures, role conflict.
Eyesha Sadiq. Many students get overwhelmed with the amount of homework they receive, which can cause mental health issues. Around 65% of high school students deal with severe anxiety and 52% are diagnosed with depression. 1:30 a.m. That's what the clock said. I was used to it by now. I only had one assignment left.
On school days, this was mediated by reduced time in bed for sleep. On weekends, homework/studying duration associated with depression symptoms, adjusting for time in bed and other covariates. Adolescents who spent ≥5 hours on homework/studying per day on weekends had greater symptoms of anhedonia and anxiety.
Cynthia Catchings, a licensed clinical social worker and therapist at Talkspace, says heavy workloads can also cause serious mental health problems in the long run, like anxiety and depression.
Chinese schoolgirl uses robot to do her homework. Emmy Kang, mental health counselor at Humantold, says studies have shown heavy workloads can be "detrimental" for students and cause a "big ...
The short answer is that depression can absolutely lead to depression for a variety of reasons. Identifying the cause of your homework-related depression below is the first step toward bettering your mental health. Excessive homework, lack of social support, and perfectionism are just a few of the reasons homework can lead to depression.
This causes students to spend far too much time doing such assignments and can be detrimental. A 2013 study conducted at Stanford University found that students in top-performing school districts who spend too much time on homework experience more stress, physical health problems, a lack of balance in their lives and alienation from society.
HOMEWORK AND DEPRESSION: 1. The benefits of homework don't always outweigh the stress it causes. At the end of the day, homework is all about cementing the learning the students have done in class. However, a lot of students complete busy work that does not promote the active learning they need for a class to help them in the future.
1. Control-Influence-Accept Model. This is a good activity for individuals with depression to help break down situations. The model allows better visualization of different aspects of a situation and what specifically can be controlled, instead of worrying about all the possible outcomes. 2.
Whether homework can lead to or cause depression is an age-long question, and this article aims to explain the 'if' and 'how' too much homework can cause depression. ... over two-thirds of the participating students claim that they cope with anxiety thanks to their use of drugs, alcohol, and marijuana.
Cognitive Distortions. worksheet. Cognitive distortions are irrational thoughts that influence how you see the world, how you feel, and how you act. It's normal to have cognitive distortions occasionally, but they can be harmful when frequent or extreme. The Cognitive Distortions worksheet identifies and explains some of the most common ...
A recent study of brain networks in depression and anxiety reported in Nature Medicine (2024) is an important step toward establishing an empirical model of "biotypes",; it echoes prior work on ...
"There's a heritability and genetic predisposition to both anxiety and depression," explains Dr. Srijan Sen, director of the Frances and Kenneth Eisenberg and Family Depression Center, explaining ...
The more people view their lives — and work — as meaningful, the lower their risk for depression, anxiety, substance abuse, and suicide is. And when people experience mental-health problems ...
Overview. Anxiety is a common reaction to stressful situations and experiences. An estimated 40 million adults in this country live with generalized anxiety disorder, which can cause emotions like fear, worry, panic, and different types of stress.Anxiety can cause physical symptoms, too, like queasiness, butterflies in your stomach, or even stomach pain, and research has identified a link ...
Cymbalta (duloxetine): In an analysis of 10 studies that took place during Cymbalta's approval process, people with depression who took duloxetine lost an average of about 1 pound in the short term (eight to nine weeks).However, in the long term (26 to 52 weeks), people who took duloxetine tended to gain an average of about 2 pounds. Prozac (fluoxetine): A review of studies in 2022 found that ...
Nori-Sarma said the visits were linked with a wide range of mental health disorders, including mood disorders, anxiety and stress disorders, self-harm, schizophrenia and substance use disorders.