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United States of America Child and Adolescent Psychiatrists’ Career Satisfaction by Career Stage

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Abstract

Objective

This study sought to examine career satisfaction among United States of America child and adolescent psychiatrists (CAPs) across career stages, identifying predictive factors for their career satisfaction.

Methods

A total of 526 CAPs responded to a national career satisfaction survey. Satisfaction was assessed via responses to statements about their career on a Likert scale. Career satisfaction was defined as the sum of the scores for satisfaction with their choice of career, career advancement, and career recognition. Responses were disaggregated by the number of years post child and adolescent psychiatry residency training (early career: 0–10 years; midcareer: 11–20 years; and late career: 21 + years post-training). Stepwise linear regression analyses identified predictive factors of career satisfaction.

Results

CAPs’ career satisfaction was high (3.95) and increased with career stage. It was most positively correlated with advancement opportunities, job enjoyment, and control of assigned tasks, and most negatively correlated with workload. Job enjoyment was the leading predictive factor of career satisfaction for early career and late career CAPs, with midcareer CAPs identifying task assignment control as the leading contributor to their career satisfaction (all p = .000).

Conclusions

Career satisfaction in Child and Adolescent Psychiatry is high, increases with career stage, and is most predicted by advancement opportunities. Further study of the predictive factors of CAPs’ career satisfaction is warranted as we focus on increasing the workforce in child and adolescent psychiatry.

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Acknowledgements

The authors acknowledge their sponsoring institutions and commend their support of career development research. This study’s results were presented as a poster in the 67th Annual virtual meeting of the American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry October 12-22, 2020.

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Lakeland Regional Health, Lakeland, FL, USA

    Shirley Alleyne

  2. University of Florida, College of Medicine-Jacksonville, Jacksonville, FL, USA

    Lourdes Dale, Steven Cuffe & Elise Fallucco

  3. Florida State University, Daytona Beach, FL, USA

    Emma Robertson-Blackmore

  4. Stanford University, Stanford, CA, USA

    Anita Kishore

Authors
  1. Shirley Alleyne
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  2. Lourdes Dale
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  3. Emma Robertson-Blackmore
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  4. Anita Kishore
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Correspondence to Shirley Alleyne.

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On behalf of all authors, the corresponding author states that there is no conflict of interest.

Ethical Approval

This research project was approved by the Institutional Review Board of the University of Florida, College of Medicine-Jacksonville.

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Alleyne, S., Dale, L., Robertson-Blackmore, E. et al. United States of America Child and Adolescent Psychiatrists’ Career Satisfaction by Career Stage. Acad Psychiatry 46, 441–450 (2022). https://doi.org/10.1007/s40596-021-01577-x

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s40596-021-01577-x

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