Compassion Fatigue and Satisfaction: A Professional Quality of Life (ProQoL) of Filipino Guidance Designates

Abstract

The quality of professional life is the degree on how the individuals feel in relation to their work as care providers. For helping professionals, it has positive and negative aspects that influence their professional quality of life. The present descriptive study focused on the above phenomenon of the teacher-guidance designates. More specifically, this study explored the level and significance difference of the three components of professional quality of life. The participants were the 20 secondary teachers (N = 20) of the Division of Cadiz City. The ProQoL – 5 Scale was used as a psychometric tool for the evaluation of the quality of professional life; and an interview guide was conducted during the focus group discussion. Frequency, mean, Mann – Whitney U test and Kruskall – Wallis test were used for data analysis. Results show that a high level of compassion satisfaction was evident towards 21 – 30 years old guidance designates. Also, guidance designates who were teaching Social Science showed a high level of compassion satisfaction. On the other hand, the professional quality of life of the guidance designates showed no statistical significance regardless of sex, age, area of specialization and years of service as guidance designates. The participants generally showed an average level of satisfaction and exhaustion as care providers. Hence, the guidance designates’ attributes may suggest that through their coping abilities they settle their emotional residues due to empathetic engagement.