Self-compassion among university students as a personal resource in the job demand-resources model

Based on Job Demand Resource Model (JD-R), and Conservation of Resources Theory (COR Theory), self-compassion was set as a personal resource, and how it affected academic burnout, and academic engagement had been investigated. This study was conducted on a sample of 599 university students in South Korea who were expected to have overwhelming study demands during their transition from school to work. A structural equation model was applied to estimate the mediation effect. We found that self-compassion partially mediated the relationship between academic demands and burnout, and fully mediated the relationship between academic demands and engagement. Furthermore, social support was reciprocally related to self-compassion, and both had a positive effect on engagement. Since self-compassion triggered engagement and managed to decrease the effect of academic demands on burnout, we discussed self-compassion’s function as a personal resource.