Razi Journal of Medical Sciences

Background: Job burnout syndrome includes emotional exhaustion, depersonalization and personal accomplishment. It has been shown that 40% of individuals in industrial societies suffer from this syndrome. The aim of this study was to investigate the relation between basic psychological needs (BPNs) satisfaction and job burnout among basic and clinical sciences’ faculty members of Iran University of Medical Sciences.

Methods: This is a practical survey. The population includes all basic and clinical sciences’ faculty members of Iran University of Medical Sciences (n=449) in 2014. In this study, 100 subjects were selected using cluster random sampling. The instruments were Maslach and Jackson’s Burnout Inventory and Deci and Rayan’s Basic Psychological Needs (BPNs) Satisfaction with confirmed validity and reliability from previous studies.

Results: The findings showed that satisfaction of BPNs had significant negative relationship with emotional exhaustion (p<0.01, r=-0.378) and depersonalization (p<0.01, r=-0.359), and significant positive relationship with personal accomplishment (p<0.01, r=0.586). Thus, satisfaction of BPNs increases with decrease of emotional exhaustion and depersonalization, and BPNs increases as personal accomplishment increases. There were no significant difference between job burnout of subjects and their marital status, academic degree, department (basic or clinical sciences), type of employment (tenured or contractual employment), type of job (full or part time), and academic ranking, though it was significant with their gender (p=0.49).

Conclusion: This study showed satisfaction of BPNs of faculty members has a significant effect on reducing general job burnout. Besides, it became clear that as autonomy increases, emotional exhaustion and depersonalization decreases, and personal accomplishment increases, though competency increases with the increase of personal accomplishment and job burnout.