Identification of factors affecting student academic burnout in online education during the COVID-19 pandemic using grey Delphi and grey-DEMATEL techniques.

The coronavirus outbreak caused most education institutions to shift to online education. One of the consequences of the pandemic and spread of online education was the prevalence of academic burnout among students has been students' academic burnout. Accordingly, it is necessary to identify the influential factors to reduce burnout. This study aimed to identify the factors affecting academic burnout and their cause-effect relationships. For this purpose, to conduct the gray Delphi technique, a questionnaire was administered to a randomly selected sample consisted of 86 graduate students of the Islamic Azad University, Science and Research Branch. In addition, a randomly selected sample of 37 graduate students filled a matrix questionnaire Collected data were analyzed using the Gray-DEMATEL technique. As a result of Gray Delphi screening, out of the 43 sub-factors identified, six sub-factors were eliminated and 37 sub-factors in 7 main factors were determined as factors affecting students' academic burnout. Analysis of the collected data using the Grey-DEMATEL technique revealed that among the seven main factors, Technology infrastructure, institutional facilities, and faculty characteristics are in the net cause category, respectively. The classroom environment and course structure, the social-emotional factor, the characteristics of students, and the home and family environment are in the net effect category. Technology infrastructure is the most influential factor that affects other factors. Identifying effective factors and the causal relationships between them have significant implications for policymakers and academic planners to prevent and reduce student burnout in online environment by focusing on the most influential factors.