• Korean Journal of Social Welfare Studies
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• v.47 no.1
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• pp.29-56
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• 2016

The purpose of this study is first, to explore the level of codependency among social work related professionals since codependency of professionals in the field has not been explored much in Korea. Second purpose is to examine whether codependency affects the level of burnout. Last purpose is to examine moderating effects of the Sex-role attitude on the relationship between codependency and burnout. Data were collected from the 11th of December in 2014 until the 28th of February in the following year. Self-administered questionnaires were distributed to care professionals practicing in social work institutions in Daejeon City and Choongcheong province, via email and mail. In addition, surveys were administered at several continuing education training venues. Instruments used for this study include CODAT(Codependency Assessment Tool) developed by Hughes-Hammer and colleagues in 1998, MBI(Maslach Burnout Inventory) developed by Maslach and Jackson in 1981, and SRA(Sex Role Attitude) developed by Osmond and Maryin in 1975. In total, 368 surveys were used for final analysis. The results include that gender did not have statistically significant relationship with the overall codependency, however, male showed statistically higher score than female in one of subscales of codependency called hiding oneself. Workers in the residential settings showed higher level of codependency than those in non-residential settings, especially in the subscale of Other focus or Self-neglect. Codependency showed a strong relationship with Burnout. Among the five-factor structure of the CODAT, Medical problem, Low Self-worth and Family of Origin showed strong relationship with the Burnout score. And the moderating effects of Sex-role Attitude showed a statistically significant relationship between codependency and burnout. Conservative sex-role attitude amplified the level of burnout on the relationship between codependency and burnout. Based on the result, educational and policy implications were made in order to prevent burnout among social work related professionals.