<b>Comparative Analysis of Machine Learning Models for Burnout Prediction in Generation-Z</b>

Burnout has become an increasingly prevalent mental health issue among Generation Z due to the interaction of psychological and behavioral factors in a highly digitalized environment. This study aims to predict burnout risk levels using a multi-class machine learning classification approach. The research follows the Cross-Industry Standard Process for Data Mining (CRISP-DM), encompassing data understanding, preprocessing, modeling, and evaluation. A synthetic dataset containing 10,000 records and 22 psychological, behavioral, and lifestyle attributes was used to classify burnout risk into three categories: low, medium, and high. To address class imbalance and ensure reliable performance estimation, Stratified K-Fold cross-validation was employed. Logistic Regression was implemented as a baseline linear model, while Random Forest represented a non-linear approach. Experimental results demonstrate that Random Forest achieved the best performance, obtaining a macro F1-score of 0.988 and outperforming Logistic Regression in multi-class burnout prediction. Feature importance analysis further revealed that psychological variables, particularly the wellbeing index and anxiety score, contributed more substantially to burnout prediction than behavioral variables such as screen time. These findings indicate that internal psychological conditions are stronger predictors of burnout risk than external digital behaviors. This study provides a comparative evaluation of linear and non-linear machine learning models in an imbalanced multi-class setting and offers an interpretable framework to support data-driven strategies for early burnout detection and mental health intervention.