Trends in Professional Psychology Trainee Self-Care: Before and 1 Year Into the COVID-19 Pandemic.

This study examined self-care behaviors and strategies used by trainees in professional psychology programs, both immediately before the start of the COVID-19 pandemic (N = 167), and approximately 1 year in (N = 99). Trainees completed online measures to assess perceived stress, well-being, self-care behaviors, and program self-care culture. Self-care behaviors had a negative relationship with perceived stress and number of hours worked, and positive relationships with well-being and program self-care culture. Perceived stress mediated the relationship between self-care domain and perceived well-being, although it did not fully account for the relationships between self-care and perceived well-being in most models. The most frequent self-care behaviors endorsed by trainees were related to the professional support and life balance self-care domains which were of particular importance for trainees in this sample. This study demonstrates that self-care is associated with trainee functioning and efforts within programs to actively promote self-care may have a beneficial effect. We propose that professional psychology training programs consider what organizational and program wellness might mean, and that an exclusive focus on impairment and individual responsibility are barriers to enacting a shared culture of wellness in our programs. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

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