Emotional Labour and its association with Burnout in Sri Lankan Prison Officers

Emotional labour is known to associate with employee burnout, which has not been previously studied in Sri Lankan prison officers. This article aimed to describe the emotional labour of Sri Lankan prison officers and its association with their burnout, as part of a wider study carried out on burnout. A cross-sectional study was conducted in 2017 in 32 prison institutions island-wide, among 1803 prison officers including 1683 prison guards and 120 rehabilitation officers. Prison guards were selected using multi-stage stratified sampling, while all the eligible rehabilitation officers were invited. Burnout was assessed using a translated and validated Sinhala version of the Maslach Burnout Inventory – Human Services Survey. A modified version of the Emotional Labour Scale was used in assessing surface acting and deep acting components of emotional labour. Majority of the participants were male (88%) and between 25-44years (64.2%). Burnout was observed in 593 (32.8%) of them. The mean score for hiding emotions with inmates was the highest at 7.88 (SE – 0.092). The lowest mean score of 4.74 (SE – 0.081) was seen for emotional regulation with colleagues. Participants with burnout were having more hiding emotions and faking emotions, while emotional regulation was seen more in those without burnout. In the bivariate analysis, hiding emotions, faking emotions and having emotional regulation with colleagues and superiors, and having emotional regulation with inmates, were found to be significantly associated with burnout (P<0.05). Emotional labour should be taken into consideration when developing interventions to reduce burnout in Sri Lankan prison officers. The study on teachers found that surface acting component of emotional labour was significantly positively related to burnout. It was also revealed that deep acting emotional labour was not significantly related to burnout in the logistic regression analysis, despite a significant correlation between the deep acting component and depersonalization in the bivariate analysis. Positive relationships of hiding emotions with emotional exhaustion and depersonalization, and faking emotions with depersonalization were identified in the study among service sector employees. This study was conducted among correctional officers in the rank of prison guards, and prison rehabilitation officers working in the prison institutions in Sri Lanka. Even though the study finding could be generalized to the prison guards and rehabilitation officers throughout the country, the findings cannot be generalized to the prison officers in the higher ranks, as they are not in contact with the inmates directly. The study adopted a cross-sectional study design, and therefore, despite the association between burnout and emotional labour was assessed as identified in literature, the temporal relationship between the two entities cannot be confidently commented on. The study assessed the emotional labour of both correctional and rehabilitation officers together. Further, the associations were determined for only burnout, and not for each subdomain of burnout. Further analysis in these aspects could reveal important comparative information on the potential associations. Future research should aim at assessing the aspects of emotional labour not assessed in the current study, with special emphasis on intensity, frequency and variety mentioned in the Emotional Labour Scale, and how they impact burnout.