This study sought to investigate whether counselors' ability to manage counter-transference mediates the relationship between counselors' developmental level and psychological burnout. For this, 322 counselors working in the Seoul Metropolitan and Gye...
This study sought to investigate whether counselors' ability to manage counter-transference mediates the relationship between counselors' developmental level and psychological burnout. For this, 322 counselors working in the Seoul Metropolitan and Gyeonggi areas participated in the study's survey. Measures included in the survey were Korean Counselor Level Questionnaire (KCLQ), Maslach Burnout Inventory (MBI), Counter-transference Factors Invetnory (CFI). SPSS 18 statistical package was used to conduct descriptive analysis, correlation analyses, and multiple regression. Results of the analyses can be summarized as follows. First, there seemed to be a negative correlation between counselors’ developmental level, a positive relationship between counselors’ developmental level and ability to manage counter-transference, and a negative correlation between counselors’ ability to manage counter-transference and psychological burnout. This implies that counselors with higher developmental levels tend to experience less psychological burnout and have greater ability to manage counter-transference. Also, counselors who have greater ability to manage counter-transference appeared to experience psychological burnout less. Second, counselors’ developmental level appeared to have an impact on psychological burnout. In particular, humane & ethical attitude, a subfactor of counselors’ developmental level, had a statistically significant effect on psychological burnout. This implies that counselors who have high levels of humane & ethical attitude tend to experience less psychological burnout. Third, counselors’ ability to manage counter-transference acted as a complete mediator between counselors’ developmental level and psychological burnout. This implies that counselors’ ability to manage counter-transference completely mediates the effect of counselors’ developmental level has on psychological burnout. Based on above findings, the significance, implications, and suggestions for future research were presented in the Discussion section.