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Tage S. Kristensen has a master's degree in sociology and a doctor's degree in medicine from the University of Copenhagen. He worked as a professor of psychosocial work environment at the National Institute of Occupational Health in Copenhagen until 2008. From 2008, he has worked as an independent researcher and consultant. His main research areas have been work environment and health, work and cardiovascular diseases, work environment of women, interventions and prevention, and research methods. The main researcher behind two widely used questionaires: The Copenhagen Burnout Inventory (CBI), and the Copenhagen Psychosocial Questionnaire (COPSOQ), he has taught in a large number of countries and is the author of more than 200 books and articles.
NAJP: How do you define burnout and how does your definition differ from that of the Maslach Burnout Inventory (MBI)?
TK: Basically, we define burnout in a very simple way: "Burnout is the degree of physical and psychological fatigue and exhaustion experienced by the person." We talk about "degree", because it is very difficult to distinguish between people with burnout and people without.
First, it is a question of degrees from a high level of vitality in one end to a state of complete exhaustion in the other. Second, because the level of burnout shifts in the same individual from one point of time to another. As a consequence, we find it problematic to use a fixed cut-point in order to distinguish between individuals with and without burnout.
Maslach sees burnout partly as a syndrome of exhaustion and reduced personal accomplishment that can occur among those who do "people work" of some kind." There are two main differences: We do not talk about a syndrome, and we do not limit burnout to something that can only happen to a specific group of people.
NAJP: What problems did you find with the MBI?
TK: Before we get to the problems, it might be relevant to point out that our first difficulties with the MBI were not scientific, but practical.
Originally, we planned to use the MBI - just like 90% of all other burnout researchers. We made a translation into Danish and tested the questionnaire on a sample of nurses and social workers. During this pilot test, we discovered that they found...