Effect of Rational-Emotive Behavior Intervention on Managing Burnout Symptoms among Postgraduate Students in Public Universities

Burnout symptom is an emotional and psychological imbalance commonly experienced by students of tertiary institutions. This unhealthy state of existence is capable of undermining the quality of health and academic performances resulting in exhaustion and disengagement. The current study therefore aimed to investigate the effect of rational-emotive behavior intervention -REBI on managing burnout symptoms among postgraduate students in public universities. This research was based on experimental design involving treatment and control groups. Using a purposive sampling technique, 92 study participants were recruited from the public universities in Nigeria from July 2019 and January 2020. The treatment intervention was delivered to only the experimental group with an evidence-based REBI manual. Data collection process was completed using the Oldenburg Burnout Inventory-student version -OLBIS with internal consistency of 0.77 index. The complete data analysis was done using SPSS version 22. The results indicated that no significant difference existed between the participants in the experimental (23.17±2.71) and control groups (21.69±2.80) on OLBI-S pretest, F=0.147, P=.738, h2p =0.014, DR2=0.709, SE=1.52. Statistically significant difference was found to exist between the participants in the experimental (11.43±4.17) and control groups (22.02±5.66) on OLBI-S posttest scores, F=2.081, P=0.041, h2p=0.105, DR2=0.706, SE=1.40. This study showed that REBI was effective in managing burnout symptoms among postgraduate students in public universities in Nigeria. The REBI is considered very effective in managing diverse emotional and psychological problems existing among students. There is need for enlightenment and massive health education on burnout and prospective ways of managing it.