Re-examining Athletes’ Stress-Burnout Relationship: A Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis

Abstract

To re-examine the impact of athletes’ stress on burnout by extending the previous meta-analytic review conducted by Lin et al. (2022) and by investigating the additional moderators, including athletes’ age, gender, sports experience, training load, athletic level, and region, within the stress-burnout relationship. Studies published between 2001 and April 2025 from five online academic databases were collected following PRISMA guidelines (Page et al., 2021) and evaluated using the 14 evaluation questions (Kmet et al., 2004). Fifty-nine eligible studies with 15,370 athletes were identified. The meta-analysis employing a random-effects model indicated a medium-to-large association between stress and burnout (r = 0.478, p < .05). Furthermore, athletes’ stress-burnout relationship showed different patterns according to age, sports experience, training load, athletic level, and region. The athletes’ stress-burnout association was confirmed, with variations across demographic, sport-specific, and cultural-regional factors. These findings highlight the need for tailored prevention programmes that integrate psychological strategies, coaching practices, and recovery monitoring to mitigate training-induced burnout across different developmental stages and cultural contexts.