Validation of the Maslach Burnout Inventory-Student Survey in Spanish adolescents

Background: There are a large number of studies in the literature on burnout and its negative consequences for health and psychological wellbeing. Use of the burnout index in the academic context has increased to the point of identifying even the adolescent population. Nevertheless, at the present time there is no validated instrument for evaluating this syndrome in Spanish high school students. In view of this, our study attempted to evaluate the factor structure and reliability of the Spanish version of the Maslach Burnout Inventory-Student Survey (MBI-SS) in a sample of high school adolescents. Method: The sample included 1,209 students in the autonomous region of Andalusia (Spain), of whom 47.1% were boys and 52.9% girls, with a mean age of M=15.07, SD=1.174). Results: The exploratory and confirmatory factor analyses supported a model with 12 items showing good fit, distributed across three factors: emotional exhaustion, cynicism and academic efficacy. Conclusions: These results demonstrate that the proposed instrument has an excellent factor structure and internal consistency, and is useful for evaluating academic burnout in the adolescent Spanish high school population.