A novel pilot study at the University of Bradford points to a possible link between burnout, food intake and eating behaviour

Barbara Stewart-Knox, Professor of Psychology and colleagues, undertook an online research survey at the University of Bradford to which over 100 staff from various roles responded about their levels of stress and eating habits. This is the first study to have explored associations between burnout, eating behaviour traits and dietary patterns.

Barbara is a food psychologist and is interested in promoting health in a normal population through her research. Barbara said “People spend a lot of time at work and I’m interested in seeing if there’s any connection between what we eat and increased burnout at work, and if we can decrease burnout through changing our habits.”

Burnout is a way of describing extreme prolonged stress causing emotional, physical and mental exhaustion.  The study suggests that what we eat can worsen or improve it. Results showed that those with higher levels of burnout were more likely to consume a diet with  lower levels of restraint and more  junk food intake. A larger more in-depth study into this connection could help identify interventions for health promotion as a follow-on.  The theory was that burnout can lead to poor levels of performance at work and that this could be associated with less healthy patterns. Conversely, a better diet should be associated with lower levels of burnout. Because the study was exploratory it was not possible to establish cause and effect, but the results implied that reducing burnout could lead to staff eating more healthily and performing better at work.

Survey participants average ages was 39. 79% were female and 65% were from non-academic roles.  The team would like to thank all the staff who completed the survey conducted in 2016.

The research  study,  undertaken in collaboration with  the University of Cantabria (Spain), has also involved Dr Ellie Bryant, a psychologist at the University of Bradford, Dr Helena Chui and Shames Maskeen -  who have both now moved to other institutions from Bradford.  Shames, a summer internship student who helped with data collection, has now moved to Leeds Trinity University to do a PhD.