non-human animal rescue workers, compassion satisfaction, burnout, secondary traumatic stress, professional quality of life (ProQOL)
To better understand the psychological effects on humans of working with distressed non-human animals, the study set out to understand the professional quality of life experienced by this group of workers which included measures of compassion satisfaction, burnout and secondary traumatic stress. An online survey-based cross-sectional correlational design was employed to survey 340 animal rescue workers. The survey consisted of items assessing demographic information (gender, age, geographic location), type of work performed (single or multiple caring roles), exposure to euthanasia, in-home fostering of animals and whether the work was salaried or voluntary. The results of the present study may prove useful for both animal rescue organisations and animal rescue workers who may themselves be experiencing distress as a result of animal rescue work. Recommendations for future research include a focus on the effects of exposure to euthanasia and the home fostering of rescue animals.