Aguerri 1

Adriana Aguerri

Joel Bergholtz

ENC1102

February 12t h, 2023

Annotated Bibliography and Research Proposal: Lawyers & Stress

Leclerc, Marie-Eve, et al. “The Unseen Cost of Justice: Post-Traumatic Stress Symptoms in

Canadian Lawyers.” Taylor & Francis, 10 May 2019,

https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/1068316X.2019.1611830

This article offers insight into post-traumatic stress symptoms in Canadian lawyers.

Published in 2020; this article gives relevant statistics on lawyers dealing with stress due to

their subject of work. The evidence used to support this article was a study using 476

lawyers within different fields of law across Canada. There were three different groups for

the study such as no, moderate, and high work-related exposure. It is hypothesized that the

lawyers who worked in moderate and high work-related trauma exposure groups obtained

higher scores. These scores entailed PTSD symptoms, psychological distress, and a poorer

quality of life compared to those unexposed. Some of the lawyers scored at a mean portion

of PTSD (9%), psychological distress (23%), and unsatisfactory quality of life (23%).

Trauma-exposed lawyers were 2.62 times more likely to meet the probable PTSD threshold

than the unexposed lawyers. Thus, this makes the hypothesis true that exposure to trauma

causes lawyers to be at a higher risk of having PTSD symptoms which will later need

therapy. This article this evidence allows me to see how lawyers obtain high levels of

stress, and even though it is not a hands-on job it can cause traumas due to the exposure
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from the work. This fits in the bigger question that being a lawyer is a high-risk job and not

only demanding but becomes chaos to one’s mind.

TSA, Feng-Jen, et al. “Occupational Stress and Burnout of Lawyers.” Wiley Online Library,

Journal of Occupational Health, 2009,

https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1539/joh.L8179

This article discusses the stress and burnout lawyers face within their occupation. This

article was published in 2009, and even though it could be seem as outdated in terms of

relevancy. I believe the information it presents is still relevant towards what lawyers deal

with in their work force. However, this article discusses a study on the similarities with

burnout, stress, and struggles that occur between practicing lawyers in Japan. The specifics

in this study were to use 180 lawyers from 26 law firms in the Taipei Bar to create a vast

amount of variable and not show biased to just one type of law profession. They used

different types of questionnaires such as the Chinese version of Karasek's job content

questionnaire and the Chinese version of Siegrist's ERI questionnaire which were used to

measure occupational stress, and the Chinese version of the Copenhagen Burnout

Inventory questionnaire was used to measure client, work, and personal burnout. The point

of this questionnaire was to see logistic regression analysis to determine the associations

between burnout and lawyers' occupational stress and job specialty. Overall, lead to the

conclusion that high occupational stress was associated with high levels of personal and

work-related burnout among lawyers. Nonetheless, even with this article being made in

2009 it’s obvious the conclusion that was found from the study still relates to today’s world.
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This fits into project two because it gives me more valid evidence on how lawyers are

caused stress, and it something that needs to be taken more seriously about.

Bergin, Adele J, and Nerina L Jimmieson. “Interactive Relationships Among Multiple

Dimensions of Professional Commitment: Implications for Stress Outcomes in

Lawyers.” Jcd.sagepub.com, Sage Pub, 2015,

https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/pdf/10.1177/0894845315577448

This article deliberates on how different interactive relationships in professional

atmosphere has different implicature’s of stress. The article came out in 2015 and is still

very applicable to lawyers today. This article is about examining four strains of what

occurs to most in a profession. They used a study with a two-wave design which measured

time of the strain and it was remeasured two months later to see how it affected lawyers.

176 law professions were used to conduct the study and it allowed for them to see the

implications this profession had on people who worked in them. I would use this

information to gain further knowledge on how this profession can cause a lot of

phycological damage on one’s health. When committing to big jobs and high paying

careers there’s another cost many don’t stress, which is our mental health. The perspective

this gives me is what happens with all these lawyers once they’re 80? Does the lawyer

have high blood pressure now or are their lots of side effects as they grow older. I feel that

this information has allowed me to ask bigger questions. Overall, I feel that this article

holds a lot of information that can further my argument for project 2. It made me ask

bigger questions on lawyer’s health because there’s always an effect on something due to

the cause of it whether it has affected the lawyer’s health in the long run.
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Gabayoyo, Lunel J., and Dennis V. Madrigal. “Enduring Occupational Stress: Experiences of

First Level Women Court Judges in Central Philippines.” Philippine Social Science

Journal, University of Negros Occidental-Recoletos Graduate School, 2022,

https://philssj.org/index.php/main/article/view/629

This article discusses a better inside on what women deal with in first level courts in

Central Philippine’s. This article was published in 2022, which is an extremely credible

source that really speaks on about what women deal with in the work system for law. This

study looked at stress and how they deal with stress of judges in Central Philippines. The

judges were chosen through a purposive sampling technique. The ten female judges of the

first-level courts answered using an unstructured interview. In this interview six different

themes were brought up to conduct the study. These themes that were used is deadlines in

deciding cases, struggling with compliance with the reglementary period, balancing work

and family life challenges, dealing with courtroom challenges during the pandemic,

handling lawyers in the courtroom, handling various roles, and engaging in

positive stress management activities. These six themes allowed for the various roles their

jobs provide to show how they serve fairly. The burnout and stress experienced by judges

must be brought into question. The reason I find that this works for the argument in project

2 because it is very hard to find articles, books, discussions that talk about women in actual

work force livelihoods.

Miki, Sharon. “Why Being a Lawyer Is Stressful & 7 Tips to Manage Lawyer Stress.” Clio, 10

June 2022, https://www.clio.com/blog/lawyer-stress/

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This article is different unlike my others as it is my one non-academic source regarding

lawyers and stress. This article describes why lawyers have stress and some tips and

tricks on how to manage that stress. The article talks on how being lawyer comes with

many stressors and it can negatively impact one’s health. It impacts both mental and

physical health such as headaches, insomnia, muscle pain, and even anxiety. It even

entails what causes lawyers these mental and physical challenges. Such as crazy

deadlines, draining hours, and difficult situations. It even goes into how getting into law

practice is very hard and adds many stressors. The final part of the article talks about

what one can do to remove the stress a lawyer gets in his life. Ways of coping is exercise,

making time for hobbies, loved ones, and boundaries for oneself. The reason this may

become uncredible is because there isn’t a lot of information that one cannot make up for

oneself. I do believe it adds to the bigger picture because it still gives another insight on

what lawyers go through and what they can do to be better.

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Research Proposal

The objective of my research is that lawyers deal with stress, and it is something that

carries on far on in life. This topic is important because I hope to one day be a lawyer. I know

that being a lawyer is very wary. My grandpa is now a retired lawyer, but I know from stories he

has told me that some cases he has worked on have left a long-lasting effect on his mind. Also,

my grandpa did not practice law in the United States but in Nicaragua, and he later was in the

judicial court system there. In his work life, there were traumatic issues that he still has. I believe

others should care about this because lawyers get exposed to many traumatic cases that leave

them troubled. Sometimes the stress many law corporations put on their workers causes many to

retain hardships. I think the world has a stigma that lawyers live this dandy life and just read and

get to win a case, but it's way more than that and is overlooked. I want it to warrant attention

because as I grow old and my hopes to become a lawyer hopefully come true, I am allowed to

work on cases but also can destress and find ways to continue this career without it affecting me

terminally in the future. Some of my primary research is four academic articles that I have gotten

from the UCF library and are peer-reviewed by others, so I believe it is very credible. So far,

there is proven statics from different studies. For example, in the Philippines women are in court.

To an array of lawyers in Canada doing studies. As well as a study was done in Japan where

lawyers did questionaries to measure how PTSD affected them. In these spaces, I am looking for

studies to show how lawyers work can be detrimental to them. My only issue with these studies

is that they're all just data after data. Lawyers cannot put their opinion or a mutual conversation

to discuss their stress. The articles only bring a scientific part to my argument to attain an

understanding. However, the study offers an abundance of evidence to use to support my

research. No, these articles are statistics and put out reliable information if lawyers obtaining
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stressed from their job. The ones that engage are the study and participants because in the study

there is no place for a regular conversation in scientific data. Moreover, my secondary research is

my one nonacademic source and Reddit. Reddit is not listed because I am still trying to find a

good conversation to add to my research. I have an opinionated article on why lawyers are

stressed, and ways lawyers can cope with it. Even though it still needs to find more, I liked the

insight Reddit pages offer. It is actual lawyers discussing what troubles them and things that do

not help them within their field. It gives me a first view of the stress, PTSD, and other challenges

they face due to their job. Whether it’s their long working hours, traumatic cases, needing to win

for clients, and trying to live a normal life. My secondary research gives a bigger insight into

what lawyers deal with but in a more personal tone. Overall, my research has opened more

conversation on why lawyers have stress even though it is overlooked. I think stress and being a

lawyer go hand in hand. Being a doctor, surgeon, and therapist can be a more demanding job.

But the reason I feel many lawyers dealing with stress aren’t spoken about is that lawyers must

always have a pertain record and have this persona have always been confident. I believe my

research opens the conversation on mental health and regardless of your occupation, it should be

something that matters. In all, my hopes to be a lawyer are still there, but I want mental health

matters more so that stress and PTSD can be improved.