Doctoral Dissertation Research Improvement Grant: Burnout: The Epistemologies of a Modern Condition

这个项目调查工作中的“倦怠”，作为科学、组织设计和文化方面的一种经验和调查对象。它综合了科学和技术研究对科学分类过程、组织设计和知识工作者的见解，提出了三个主要的研究问题：认知、政治和制度变化是如何解释工作倦怠被概念化和解决的方式变化的？演员们是如何宣称工作倦怠的呢？为什么精疲力竭的概念会成为维持员工幸福感的关键？这些问题的答案将使用混合方法的研究设计，其中包括档案研究、人种学、访谈和参与者研讨会，以调查三个案例研究：职业倦怠研究的早期历史，一组研究医护人员的职业倦怠，以及一组经历职业倦怠的软件开发人员。更广泛的影响包括在利益相关者中举办参与性研讨会，告知他们自己的状况，并产生关于个人、人际和机构环境中如何表现职业倦怠的知识。该项目综合了多种定性研究方法的数据，以了解现代工作场所中的“职业倦怠”现象。来自历史档案研究、民族志观察和参与性焦点小组的数据被三角划分，以了解现代劳动力中职业倦怠的原因和后果，以及职业倦怠的概念如何经历文化、政治和历史上的转变。通过对工作倦怠研究早期历史的文献分析，可以了解工作倦怠的概念是如何随着时间的推移而变化的。通过对一个研究医护人员职业倦怠的大学研究小组的参与者观察，可以了解职业倦怠如何影响医生，以及如何制定干预措施来应对它。在开发开源软件的信息技术工作者中进行的人种学观察有助于更深入地理解工作者如何在非医疗环境中定义和部署工作倦怠的概念。综上所述，该项目促进了科学技术研究和工作的社会文化研究中关于职业倦怠的当前知识状态。该奖项反映了NSF的法定使命，并通过使用基金会的智力优势和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估，被认为值得支持。

This project investigates ‘burnout’ at work as a category of experience and object of inquiry in science, organizational design, and culture. Blending insights from science and technology studies on scientific classification processes, organizational design, and knowledge workers, it asks three main research questions: What epistemic, political, and institutional changes account for shifts in the ways that burnout has been conceptualized and addressed? How do actors make claims about burnout? Why has the concept of burnout become crucial to efforts to maintain well-being within the workforce? These questions will be answered using a mixed-methods research design blending archival research, ethnography, interviews, and participant workshops to investigate three case studies: the early history of burnout research, a group who study burnout among healthcare workers, and a group of software developers experiencing burnout. Broader impacts include holding participatory workshops among stakeholders to inform them about their condition and generate knowledge about how burnout manifests in individual, interpersonal, and institutional contexts.This project synthesizes data from multiple qualitative research methods to understand the phenomena of ‘burnout’ within the modern workplace. Data from historical archival research, ethnographic observations, and participatory focus groups are triangulated to understand the causes and consequences of burnout within the modern workforce, and how the concept of burnout has undergone cultural, political, and historical transformations. Documentary analysis of the early history of burnout research enables understanding of how the concept of burnout has changed over time. Participant observation of a university-based research group who studies burnout among healthcare workers allows for understanding of how burnout affects physicians and how interventions are developed to deal with it. Ethnographic observations among information technology workers who develop open source software facilitates deeper understanding of how workers define and deploy the notion of burnout in non-medical contexts. Taken together, this project advances the current state of knowledge about burnout in science and technology studies and social and cultural studies of work.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.