The Comparison of Compassion Fatigue of Exceptional Schools Teachers Based on Age, Gender, and Education in Hamadan

Education in exceptional schools has its own difficulties and characteristics. The purpose of this study was to survey and compare the compassion fatigue of five groups of exceptional school teachers (including Mentally Retarded, Learning Disorders, Blind, Deaf, and Autistic) based on age, gender and education factors in Hamadan, Iran. The method was correlational. One-hundred teachers of exceptional schools in Hamadan were selected by the convenience sampling method and completed the 40-items Compassion Fatigue questionnaire (Portnoy, 1996). Data were analyzed, using the SPSS-version 25 software, through running the independent samples t-test, correlation coefficient, and one-way analysis of variance. The results showed a significant and positive correlation between fatigue compassion and age (r = 0.7, P < 0.05). But there was no significant correlation between education and fatigue compassion (P < 0.05). There was a significant difference between fatigue compassion of male and female teachers of exceptional schools. Additionally, there was a significant difference between the teachers of deaf and learning disordered students with the teachers of mentally retarded, autistic, and blind students in terms of compassion fatigue (P < 0.05). Thus, fatigue compassion had a significant relationship with age, but it did not have a significant relationship with education. The levels of compassion fatigue among teachers of mentally retarded, autistic, and blind groups were significantly higher than those in teachers of deaf and learning disordered students. Thus, paying more attention to the age of the teachers as well as the type of exceptionality in students with whom the teacher works are significant for the compassion fatigue.