Date
8-29-2025
Department
School of Behavioral Sciences
Degree
Doctor of Philosophy in Psychology (PhD)
Chair
Natalie Hamrick
Keywords
school counselors, burnout, resilience, self-care, self-esteem, self-awareness
Disciplines
Counseling | Educational Psychology
Recommended Citation
McCarthy, Sarah C., "The Relationship Between Self-Care, Resilience and Burnout, and the Role of Self-Esteem and Self-Awareness to Facilitate Self-Care Among School Counselors" (2025). Doctoral Dissertations and Projects. 7414.
https://digitalcommons.liberty.edu/doctoral/7414
Abstract
School counselors play a pivotal role in fostering students’ academic, social, and emotional development. School counselors are responsible for addressing a wide range of student needs, such as academic advising, assisting in behavior management, crisis intervention, and mental health support. Being in this position that requires many responsibilities, coupled with high student-to-counselor ratios, many school counselors report having elevated stress levels, potentially leading to the feeling of burnout. Therefore, the purpose of this study focuses on three goals: (1) Determine which self-care practices, and at what frequency, are being used by school counselors to determine which type of self-care practices are more successful in increasing resilience and reducing burnout rates among counselors; (2) determine if an individual’s level of self-care impacts their self-esteem or self-awareness; (3) determine if self-care serves as a mediating factor between self-esteem and resilience, or between self-awareness and resilience. These variables will be assessed using the Counselor Burnout Inventory (CBI), Brief Resilience Scale (BRS), Self-Care Assessment Worksheet (SCAW), Rosenberg Self-Esteem Scale (RSES), and the Situational Self-Awareness Scale (SSAS). The findings of this study demonstrate that when school counselors engage in self-care activities on a regular basis, they are more likely to have increased levels of resilience, self-esteem, and self-awareness while decreasing overall burnout. These findings show that when school counselors engage in self-care activities, they are better equipped to handle the challenges related to their position while boosting their overall well-being, which allows them to provide better support and assistance to those they serve.
