Surviving the Workday

Simon of Bloggasm followed up on my brief post on Journalist Burnout. You’ll recall that a study by Scott Reinardy demonstrated that journalists have high levels of cynicism, and only moderate levels of efficacy, a combination that may lead to burn-out. And the most burnt-out of all were the small newspaper copyeditors.

Simon interviewed Reinardy about the origin of his work on burnout, which I found particularly interesting:

Dr. Scott Reinardy, a 43-year-old professor with Ball State University, was sitting in a doctoral seminar class in the fall of 2003 when he started thinking about the stresses sports writers experience.

“Because sports is so intense, sports journalists would hear it from fans, coaches, players and their sports editor,” Reinardy told me earlier this week. “They all wanted something, and sometimes it led to combative situations. I started thinking in terms of post-traumatic stress, but there was no trauma. And, it’s hard to argue that covering ball games and eating pressbox food creates a great deal of stress, although the high-fat, high-sodium food can have adverse physical effects.”

For 15 years he had worked as a sports writer and editor for five daily papers, so he knew the hardships of newspaper journalism. In 2005 the Center for Disease Control listed journalism as the seventh most stressful job in the US, but Reinardy wanted to know if this led to journalists falling victim to burnout, a trend that would cause many to leave the profession.

7th most stressful job? Oy. You can read the whole entire interview at Journalist Burnout is on the Rise, which includes answers about methodology, levels of cynicism and satisfaction, the future for journalists (and their opportunities outside of print journalism), and future studies to be conducted.