The Effects of Self-Compassion Training on Academic Stress and Academic Burnout in Students With Depression Symptoms

Depression is among the most prevalent and disabling psychological disorders; this condition can seriously damage the communicative, academic, developmental, and psychological processes in individuals. A characteristic that can be affected by depression is academic stress. Academic stress is often comprised of an individual's perception of increasing academic demands and the lack of time to respond to those demands. Depression can also generate academic burnout in students. Academic burnout reduces the level of energy required to perform the cognitive tasks of learning as well as the ability to focus on existing cognitive resources. This study employed the method of self–compassion, i.e., an element of positive psychology. Considering the effects of depression on adolescents' performance, this study aimed to investigate the impact of self–compassion training on academic stress and academic burnout in students with the symptoms of depression.

This was an experimental research with a pretest–posttest and a control group design. The study population included a total of 2028 male high school students with the symptoms of depression in Parsabad City, Iran, in 2018. Sampling was conducted by a multistage cluster sampling method. The Depression Self–Rating Scale (DSRS; Birleson, 1981) was employed to identify and screen the students with depression. We intended to specify individuals obtaining scores >15 (cut–off point) in the questionnaire. A total of 82 students’ scores fell in this range. Next, 40 of these students were selected as the study sample based on a clinical interview performed by the researcher, according to the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, Fifth Edition (DSM–5) criteria and the inclusion criteria of the research. Then, they were randomly divided into two groups of 20 subjects (self–compassion training & control groups). The inclusion criteria of the study included the following: being eighth– and ninth–grade male students; being diagnosed with depression symptoms based on the DSRS and a clinical interview; not receiving pharmacotherapy for mental health disorders; not consuming psychotropic drugs; not generating other psychiatric disorders; the lack of specific physical illnesses and brain injuries (based on the clinical interview), and completing the informed consent form to participate in the training sessions. Additionally, absence from>2 sessions (the lack of cooperation) as well as receiving psychiatric and psychological interventions was considered as the exclusion criteria. For data collection, the DSRS, the Academic Stress Questionnaire (Lakaev, 2009), and the Academic Burnout Questionnaire (Bresó et al., 2007) were applied. Cognitive self–compassion training (Gilbert, 2009) was provided in eight 90–minute weekly sessions to the experimental group. Finally, the collected data were analyzed by Multivariate Analysis of Covariance (MANCOVA) in SPSS at the significance level of 0.05.

The present study results indicated that self–compassion training could effectively reduce academic stress (p<0.001) and its components, including physiological (p<0.001), behavioral (p<0.001), cognitive (p<0.001), and emotional (p<0.001) aspects in the explored male students with the symptoms of depression. Moreover, self–compassion training reduced academic burnout (p<0.001) and its components, including emotional exhaustion (p<0.001), academic uninterest (p<0.001), and academic inefficiency (p<0.001) in the examined male students with the symptoms of depression.

The present study data revealed that self–compassion training is an appropriate approach to reduce academic stress and academic burnout in students with depression symptoms.