Exploring Resilience and Mindfulness as Preventative Factors for Psychological Distress Burnout and Secondary Traumatic Stress Among Human Service Professional

This paper critically appraises a research paper by Harker et al., (2016) that aims to address the clinical question of “Do higher levels of resilience prevent burnout in health science students?” The paper critiques the authorship, research questions, research design, research methods and results of the study. The next part of the paper identifies the barriers to the application of evidence to practice, generic and specific.

Running head: NURSING
Nursing
Name of student:
Name of university:
Author note:

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Harker, R., Pidgeon, A., Klaassen, F., & King, S. (2016). Exploring resilience and mindfulness
as preventative factors for psychological distress burnout and secondary traumatic stress
among human service professional. Work, 54(3), 631-637. Retrieved from
http://ezproxy.acu.edu.au/login?url=http://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?
direct=true&db=c cm&AN=117046339&site=ehost-live&scope=site
Introduction
Evidence based practice in nursing is the integration available research with patient’s
values and clinical expertise to achieve improved patient health outcomes. Such a practice is
crucial for informing person-centered delivery of treatment services. Professionals are to engage
in critical assessment of available research papers to understand their applicability to different
clinical scenarios. The present paper is a critical appraisal of a research paper by Harker et al.,
(2016) that aims to address the clinical question of “Do higher levels of resilience prevent
burnout in health science students?” The first section of the paper critiques the authorship,
research questions, research design, research methods and results of the study. The next part of
the paper identifies the barriers to the application of evidence to practice, generic and specific. A
conclusion is provided at the end of the paper.
Part A
Authorship
The research paper has been authored by four professionals from the QLD, Australia. The
first and the second authors of the paper belong to the Department of Psychology, Bond
University, QLD, while the third and the fourth authors are from Mercy Family Services of two
cities in QLD. It is to be noted that the qualifications of the authors have not been mentioned in

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the paper. According to Nieswiadomy and Bailey (2017) qualifications of the authors of a
research paper is essential to understand the credibility of the researchers. The expertise level of
the authors are thus under question. The authors did not have any conflict of interest to report.
Research questions
The objective of the research paper was connected to gaining an understanding of the
relationship between resilience, burnout, mindfulness, psychological distress and secondary
traumatic stress among human service professionals. The authors provided a suitable justification
on the need of the study. As per the authors, human service professionals face the concern
regarding the empowerment of vulnerable social populations. Interactions that are emotionally
demanding and stressors are the cause of adverse effects like burnout and secondary traumatic
stress. It is noteworthy that limited research has been undertaken to understand what might
enable individuals to thrive. Resilience has been thought to have a positive impact on human
service professionals (Harker et al., 2016).
Research design
The researchers considered a qualitative research design for the study with an exploratory
research approach. Since the aim of the paper was to understand the views and perspectives of
human participants in relation to the association between resilience, burnout, mindfulness and
distress, the research design was justified. Exploratory research design helps in providing a
detailed and rich picture of why individuals show particular behavior and have certain feelings.
Attitudes, feelings and viewpoints of human subjects can be best understood through qualitative
research (Moule et al., 2016).

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Research methods
The study recruited 133 individuals working as human service professionals from the
field of youth and foster care work, social work, counseling and psychology. The participants
were aged between 20 and 64 years, of which only 27 were male and 106 were female. The
scales that were to be filled in the participants were General Well-Being Schedule (GWBS) for
measuring psychological distress and wellbeing; the Professional Quality of Life Scale – Version
5 (ProQOL-5) with the burnout sub-scale and the secondary traumatic stress subscale; the
Resilience Factor Inventory (RFI) to measure the current level of resilience and the Frieburg
Mindfulness Inventory (FMI) for measuring mindfulness. The outcome measures were
psychological distress, burnout, secondary traumatic stress, mindfulness, and resilience.
Correlation analysis was done to attain the results. The research methods had certain limitations.
Firstly, there was selection bias in the population recruitment as the number of male participants
was considerably less than that of female participants (Holloway & Galvin, 2016). The sampling
method was inappropriate as participation was voluntary, and chances are there that those with
higher level of distress were included in the study (LoBiondo-Wood & Haber, 2017). Further,
the validity of data is also under debate as the same was self-reported, leading to social
desirability bias and demand characteristics (Moule et al., 2016).
Results
The results of the study were in alignment with the research question that aimed to
highlight the relationship between resilience and negative outcomes such as stress and burnout.
The main finding of the study was that higher levels of resilience and mindfulness were a
predictor of lower levels of burnout, psychological distress and secondary traumatic stress.

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Further, higher levels of mindfulness acted as a predictor of lower levels of burnout and
psychological distress. Previous research had suggested that employees with higher level of
resilience possess the capability of regulating their emotions and maintaining focus on their
work. Individuals with resilience also are better able to manage stressful events. It is therefore
indicative that one must consider acquiring skills to show resilience for addressing stressful
events. Findings from the study contribute to the pool of knowledge on how human service
professionals can better reduce stress and burnout. Development of programs is necessary for
cultivation of mindfulness and resilience among human service professionals for reduction in
psychological distress, secondary traumatic stress and risk of burnout.
Part B
Students from the domain of healthcare are often subjected to changing environment as
they need to maintain a balance between work life and academic life. The increased pressure to
deliver more in both professional and academic life puts increased burden on individuals. The
need for enhanced physical, emotional and mental resilience has been deeply acknowledged in
the recent past. Uninterrupted stress brings in serious implications for the wellbeing of the
individuals. Resilience refers to the ability to return to normal being after undergoing difficult
situation. A person having resilience has a positive attitude towards situations, and learns from
mistakes to regulate emotions and feelings that can lead to undesirable situations (van der Riet et
al., 2015).
Resilience is a skill that is to be cultivated with time. Instilling the essence of resilience
might be a challenging task due to a number of barriers. These include absence of alignment with
coworkers or peers, lack of focus, absence of accountability, organizational factors. It is often

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difficult to come into agreement with peers or coworkers regarding a certain aspect. Tensions
and interpersonal conflicts act as hindrances in showing resilience. When one does not hold the
accountability for any mistake done, resilience is not achieved. Lack of focus is also a barrier in
that it deviate the thought process of the individual in an indirect manner. Lastly, organizational
factors also contribute to lack of resilience as the culture is not supportive of the skill (Whitt et
al., 2017).
Conclusion
Critical appraisal of articles is necessary to understand whether the key findings of the
paper can be considered for application to practice. The present paper gave valuable insights into
the relationship between resilience and reduction of stress, burnout and distress. Thought the
research was successful in addressing the research questions, there were certain limitations of the
research. A number of barriers have been identified that would be faced while translating the
evidence gained into practice. Overcoming the barriers is essential for ensuring that resilience
might be instilled within individuals to combat distress and burnout.

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References
Harker, R., Pidgeon, A., Klaassen, F., & King, S. (2016). Exploring resilience and mindfulness
as preventative factors for psychological distress burnout and secondary traumatic stress
among human service professional. Work, 54(3), 631-637. Retrieved from
http://ezproxy.acu.edu.au/login?url=http://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?
direct=true&db=c cm&AN=117046339&site=ehost-live&scope=site
Holloway, I., & Galvin, K. (2016). Qualitative research in nursing and healthcare. John Wiley
& Sons.
LoBiondo-Wood, G., & Haber, J. (2017). Nursing Research-E-Book: Methods and Critical
Appraisal for Evidence-Based Practice. Elsevier Health Sciences.
Moule, P., Aveyard, H., & Goodman, M. (2016). Nursing research: An introduction. Sage.
Nieswiadomy, R. M., & Bailey, C. (2017). Foundations of nursing research. Pearson
van der Riet, P., Rossiter, R., Kirby, D., Dluzewska, T., & Harmon, C. (2015). Piloting a stress
management and mindfulness program for undergraduate nursing students: Student
feedback and lessons learned. Nurse Education Today, 35(1), 44-49.
Whitt, K. J., Eden, L., Merrill, K. C., & Hughes, M. (2017). Nursing student experiences
regarding safe use of electronic health records: a pilot study of the safety and assurance
factors for EHR resilience guides. CIN: Computers, Informatics, Nursing, 35(1), 45-53.