When demands equal distress: An updated understanding of lawyer mental health and well-being

High rates of depression, anxiety, stress, and hazardous drinking are reported within the legal profession, yet large-scale data on current prevalence rates and occupational correlates remain limited or outdated. This study updates prevalence estimates, reports the first large, multi-jurisdictional estimate of work-related burnout among lawyers, and examines how distress, burnout, and drinking relate to practice environments and work demands.

We surveyed randomly invited lawyers recruited through twenty-eight participating jurisdictions (39,036 respondents; 36,925 eligible for weighting), calibrating responses to demographic benchmark margins by post-stratification raking. Survey-weighted models estimated associations between psychological distress (DASS-21), work-related burnout (Copenhagen Burnout Inventory), hazardous drinking (AUDIT-C), and work hours, practice setting, litigation, and work-family conflict.

Moderate-or-higher symptoms were reported by 21.6% for depression, 20.4% for anxiety, and 18.9% for stress; 47.5% reported high or very high burnout. Hazardous drinking was 41.8% at the standard AUDIT-C threshold and 26.4% at the higher. Distress rose nonlinearly with burnout and was higher among lawyers reporting greater work-family conflict, with the largest absolute differences at high burnout. Confidentiality (53.3%) and career concerns (49.2%) were the most cited barriers to seeking help.

Distress, burnout, and hazardous drinking were common and associated with practice demands, practice setting, and work-family conflict. Burnout is the more proximal correlate of distress, and tailored interventions addressing occupational exhaustion and work-life interference merit exploration and evaluation for the lawyer population.