While professors across the tenure spectrum scored within the average range of “emotional exhaustion,” tenure track faculty had the highest score at 22.3, edging toward the “high degree of burnout” designation. In contrast, those not on the tenure track had the lowest scores at 16.4, and tenured faculty were in the middle at 20.9.
Surveyed faculty also fell within the scale's average range of burnout when assessed for “depersonalization,” a category marked by heightened cynicism and a tendency to abandon tasks. Notably, however, tenure track faculty had the most heightened levels of depersonalization as well, coming in on the high end of the scale's overall average at 6.8. As with the "emotional exhaustion" category, non-tenure track faculty scored the lowest -- 5.2 -- and tenured professors were in the middle at 6.6.