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Comment by jawns | Hacker News Reader

> "Previously, we have not had a detailed enough measurement tool for use in both the field of practice and research that identifies workers who are at risk of burnout," says psychologist Leon De Beer, from the Norwegian University of Science and Technology.

Have they never heard of the Maslach Burnout Inventory? The MBI measures burnout as defined by the World Health Organization (WHO) and in the ICD-11.

It has been around for 35 years, and it is considered the gold standard for measuring burnout.

More details here: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6194874/

Edit: Indeed, they have heard of the MBI. It is mentioned in the paper itself: https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/sjop.12996

In fact, one of the key hypotheses they explore is how their BAT compares to the MBI. So why in the world would its lead author be saying that it's the first of its kind?

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From the paper introduction, about the limitations of existing methods:

> However, over the last few decades burnout measures have been shown to have some limitations, including differences in the conceptualization of burnout being measured (exhaustion-only or multidimensional [e.g., including cynicism, professional efficacy]; see Guseva-Canu et al., 2021 and Schaufeli, 2021), the prescribed factor structure, which remains unclear (three-factor vs. two-factor; e.g., Worley, Vassar, Wheeler, & Barnes, 2008), the apparent divergent role of professional efficacy (e.g., De Beer & Bianchi, 2019), and the inability of these measures to provide a global burnout score as is ideally required when measuring a syndrome (Schaufeli, Desart & De Witte, 2020).

What they decided to do and what is novel about it follows right after:

> Due to these afore-mentioned limitations, Schaufeli, Desart, and De Witte (2020) endeavored to create a new instrument, the Burnout Assessment Tool (BAT). The development of the BAT is unique in that, unlike the development of other burnout measures, both inductive and deductive approaches were used to decide on the final list of items included in the survey. The specific inductive approach employed by Schaufeli and colleagues is uncommon, because the Dutch authorities acknowledge burnout as an occupational disease, and therefore experts who have experience working with (and categorizing) these patients could be interviewed.

It doesn't mean it's enough for you to think it's novel but at least that's why they think it is.

I understand it to say that it’s new because it identifies people at risk of burnout ahead of time.

The description of MBI sounds like it’s used for diagnosis of people who are already burned out?

I wonder if it allows minority reports...

I wager the lead guy made no such statement, this is the accuracy of journalism.

So the journalist falsified a direct quote?

"Improved". For "engagement".

I've been interviewed by the press multiple times, with direct quotes that I never uttered. Friends and associates too. Journalism is a joke, seriously.

Former journalist here, so I may be biased, but I think a lot of people think of "the press" as if it's one thing, when in reality there is a vast, vast spectrum of quality across different news outlets. Unfortunately, as with other negative stereotypes, a few bad impressions is all it takes for some people to attribute those stereotypes to the whole group. But having spent time behind the scenes, I would say that most people who make journalism their profession really do try very hard to be accurate, especially when it comes to quoting people. Mistakes happen, yes, but aside from some bottom-feeders who don't care about accuracy as long as it sells, most of the journalists I know see theirs as a public-service profession. Certainly they're not in it for the money.

What happens when the “few bad apples” get all of the traction and all of their news spreads vs good journalists who get very small readership? You end up with all perceived journalism being bad and the good being so diluted by the bad that their impact isn’t ever felt. I believe this is where we are headed if we aren’t already there now.

I don't believe the failure of journalism is journalists' fault. It's their owners driving revenues, and their editors obeying orders. I know a few journalists at various stages of their career, and they are worked, run hard, not paid, and discarded at every turn.

Case in point how revenues drive journalism to failure: Trump was never qualified as a candidate for POTUS, but his candidacy was good for news revenues. And here we are, with the fallout of that desire for revenues over journalistic integrity: on the brink of a destroyed democracy, and 1 of two political parties largely populated by insane illogical and desperate.

"The science news cycle" :

https://phdcomics.com/comics/archive.php?comicid=1174

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