Determinants of Parental Burnout

Parental burnout is a syndrome characterised by exhaustion in parenting as a result of permanent exposure to chronic parental stress. This syndrome manifests in emotional distancing from one's children with loss of pleasure and fulfilment in one's parental role and doubts about the ability to be a good parent. The main goal was to examine the contribution of sociodemographic variables (gender and age of parents, education, work status and financial status of the family), personal characteristics of parents (emotional (in)stability and perfectionism in parenting), dimensions of parental behaviour (parental support, permissiveness and restrictive control) and personal characteristics of the target child (gender, age, strengths and difficulties of the child) in explaining parental burnout. A total of 490 parents (90% mothers) participated in the research, with the average age of 40 (M = 40,04; SD = 5,63). The results of HRA show that the most significant predictors of parental burnout are parental characteristics (higher emotional instability and perfectionistic concerns), parental behaviour (low parental support) and child characteristics (younger age of the child, higher level of internalised and externalised problems). The emotional (in)stability of parents is the most significant predictor of parental burnout in the parental role.