Interpersonal strain represents the feeling of discomfort and disengagement in
the relationships with people at work resulting from exceeding social requests
and pressures. This article has three aims: (1) to introduce the Interpersonal
Strain at Work scale (ISW), (2) to examine its construct validity and reliability,
and its relationship with the Maslach Burnout Inventory exhaustion and
cynicism; and (3) to test the generalizability of the ISW across different work
settings. Multilevel CFA on two samples of call centre agents (5407) and
hospital professionals (753), nested in 191 and 43 units, respectively, confirmed
the good psychometric properties of the ISW and its distinctiveness from
established burnout dimensions. The generalizability of ISW was also
supported. Interpersonal strain at work seems to be a promising construct
to recapture the interpersonal nature of the burnout syndrome that was lost
when the concept of burnout was extended beyond the human services.
Keywords: Burnout; Interpersonal strain; Interpersonal Strain at Work Scale.