Burnout and work engagement: Do individual differences make a difference?

The central aim of the present study among 572 Dutch employees was to examine whether burnout and its positive antipode - work engagement - could be differentiated on the basis of personality and temperament. We expected burnout to be characterized by high neuroticism and low extraversion, and engagement by low neuroticism and high extraversion. Additionally, we predicted that burnout would correlate negatively with the temperament traits (strength of excitation, strength of inhibition, and mobility), whereas work engagement would correlate positively. Discriminant analyses were used to distinguish burned-out and engaged employees from their non-burned-out and non-engaged counterparts, respectively. Results showed that high neuroticism is the core characteristic of burnout, whereas work engagement is characterized by low neuroticism in combination with high extraversion and high levels of mobility. Thus, personality and temperament make a difference as far as burnout and work engagement are concerned.