Marriage and Family Therapists’ Exposure to Trauma, Access to Support, and Intention to Leave: It Takes a Village

ABSTRACT

Secondary traumatic stress (STS), or experiencing trauma through exposure to clients’ traumatic stories, occurs across helping professions. No studies have focused solely on STS in Marriage and Family Therapists (MFTs). In a sample of MFTs (N = 201), this study hypothesized that exposure to trauma through therapeutic work would be associated with STS and MFTs’ intentions to leave their job. Findings indicated trauma exposure was positively associated with STS (β = .33, p < .001) and intention to leave (β = .18, p < .001). STS partially mediated the association between MFTs’ exposure to trauma in their work and intention to leave (β = .06, p < .05). Compassion satisfaction (β = −.49, p < .001) and organizational commitment to resilience building (β = −.26, p < .001) were negatively associated with intention to leave. The final model accounted for 58% of the variance in intention to leave. Prevention implications are discussed.

KEYWORDS:

• Marriage and family therapists
• secondary traumatic stress
• support
• intention to leave

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).