COMPASSION FATIGUE, EMOTIONAL REGULATION, AND FRUSTRATION TOLERANCE IN THE THERAPISTS WORKING WITH SPECIAL NEEDS CHILDREN

Abstract

Working with special needs children is a service that requires patience, devotion, and compassion. The workload and static circumstances may frustrate those professionals who are serving them diligently, and many other circumstances may make them vulnerable to a disturbed emotional state. The current study aimed to evaluate the association between compassion fatigue, difficulties in emotional regulation, and frustration discomfort. A sample of 200 therapists (125 Women) was recruited through convenient sampling strategy. Compassion Fatigue‐Short Scale (CF‐Short Scale; Figley, 1995), Difficulties in Emotion Regulation Scale (DERS-16; Gratz & Roemer, 2004) and Frustration Discomfort Scale (FDS; Harington, 2005) were administered to assess the study variables. The findings of the study revealed a significant positive association between all the study variables (p < .05). In the mediation analysis, difficulties in emotional regulation were considered a mediating variable between compassion fatigue and frustration discomfort (χ² > .05, 95% CI). This study implicates the need to provide a balanced workload and a burnout leave for these therapists after a fixed time interval. This step would improve their performance level significantly while enhancing their compassion and positively regulating their emotions