Professional Quality of Life of Clinical Psychologists During COVID-19 Pandemic in India: A Short Survey
Keywords:
compassion fatigue, compassion satisfaction, quality of life, burnout, secondary traumatic stress, clinical psychologistAbstract
Mental health professionals regularly exposed to the traumatic experiences of the people they serve are
particularly susceptible to develop stress reactions. Such exposures during their professional activity
often cause physical and mental exhaustion depleting their ability to cope with challenges in the day-to-
day life. From this perspective, the present study attempts to examine the professional quality of life
(compassion satisfaction, burnout and secondary traumatic stress) during COVID-19 pandemic in a
sample of 42 clinical psychologists in India. The study employed an online survey method to estimate
the professional quality of life among clinical psychologists working in different settings providing
psychotherapies or counseling services to the individuals during COVID-19. Professional Quality of
Life Scale (PROQOL) version 5 online Google form was used for collecting their responses. However,
the findings of this short survey indicates that almost all the clinical psychologists reported their
professional quality of life in terms of average to high compassion satisfaction, no burnout and
minimum secondary traumatic stress even during the time of COVID-19 pandemic when the second
wave was on the peak. In contrast to the Western studies, the present study concluded that professional
quality of life was found to be average to high among clinical psychologists in spite of exposure to
people experiencing traumaticstress. The reason could be their excellent social support system.
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