Objectives. It is well known that stress can play a part in parenting (Caputo, 2014). Burnout is an extreme version of stress, and research on parental burnout is still in its infancy (Roskam et al.,2018). Therefore, the present study investigated what contributes to parental burnout in the U.K., specifically looking at perfectionism and key sociodemographics. Moreover, the study investigated if perfectionism was more or less of a predictor than the demographics.
Methods. Questionnaire-based data was collected from 89 parents and analysed using SPSS 25.
Results. The results showed that gender, parent age, parent sleep hours, household income and single parenthood were predictors of parental burnout. Once perfectionism was added to the analysis, global perfectionism was not a significant predictor; gender, parent age, household income, and single parenthood remained significant, with employment status becoming a predictor and parent sleep hours no longer a predictor. However, when investigating the subsections of the perfectionism scale, socially-prescribed perfectionism was the strongest predictor overall. Also, other-oriented perfectionism was not a predictor on its own but became a significant negative predictor when added to the analysis with socially-prescribed perfectionism. Therefore, a unique effect was discovered between socially-prescribed and other-oriented perfectionism, meaning global perfectionism could be a stronger predictor than is shown in the analysis, as two of the perfectionism subsections are pulling each other in opposite directions. Gender analysis discovered that males scored higher in parental burnout than females, contrasting with previous research (Cicio Ila & Luthar, 2019). Also, the study found perfectionism marginally mediates sleep and parental burnout.
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