Relationship between compassion fatigue and satisfaction, self-compassion, social support and negative emotionality among registered nurses

BACKGROUND: There is a growing body of research which suggests that observing and helping those who suffer results in both compassion fatigue and compassion satisfaction. Together, they form the construct called professional quality of life (ProQOL). Our goal was to determine the levels of compassion fatigue and compassion satisfaction among nurses, and to explore their relationship with social support, negative emotionality, and self-compassion.METHODS: Two hundred fifty registered nurses completed the online study, which consisted of the following: Profes-sional Quality of Life Scale, Scale of Social Support at Work and in the Family, Self-Compassion Scale, and the Negative Emotionality Scale from the Big Five Inventory-2.RESULTS: All three ProQOL domains were rated in the moderate intensity range. Higher negative emotionality and age were significant predictors of higher levels of STS. Negative emotionality, lower social support, lower self-compassion, and lower compassion satisfaction were significantly related to higher levels of burnout. They also proved to significantly predict burnout levels. Similarly, negative emotionality and lower social support from their supervisors and family were also shown to be significant factors in predicting the levels of compassion satisfaction, while self-compassion proved to be a mediator of the relationship between negative emotionality and compassion satisfaction.CONCLUSIONS: This study emphasizes the significance of professional life quality among registered nurses and pro-vides recommendations on how it can be improved.