Factors Influencing Life Satisfaction in Basic Education Teachers

Fatores que Influenciam a Satisfação de Vida em Professores da Educação Básica

Factores que Influyen en la Satisfacción de Vida en Docentes de Educación Básica

Abstract

This study explored how the following aspects may influence basic education teachers’ life satisfaction: self-esteem, general self-efficacy, self-compassion, positive and negative feelings, moral competence, social support, positive relationships with a colleague, work engagement, age, professional experience (in years), time teaching in the same school, number of schools currently teaching, and approximate number of students per week. One hundred primary and high-school teachers (74 women) participated in the study (mean age 40.9; SD = 10.01). Network analysis provided a model which encompasses the six most relevant aspects that interfere in the life and work of basic education teachers: life satisfaction, self-efficacy, self-esteem, positive affects, work engagement, and giving instrumental social support. In addition, the yielded model showed that self-efficacy presented the closest relationship with life satisfaction. We discuss the results in line with previous studies on self-efficacy. Interventions directed at basic education teachers may be more effective if self-efficacy is part of the program.

Keywords:
teachers; quality of life; self-efficacy

Resumo

Este estudo explorou como os seguintes aspectos influenciam a satisfação de vida de professores da educação básica: autoestima, autoeficácia, autocompaixão, sentimentos positivos e negativos, competência moral, suporte social, relacionamento positivo com colega, engajamento no trabalho, idade, experiência profissional, tempo de ensino na mesma escola, número de escolas e de estudantes. Cem docentes do ensino básico (74 mulheres) participaram do estudo (média de 40,9 anos de idade; DP = 10.01). A análise de rede proporcionou um modelo com os seis aspectos mais relevantes para a vida e o trabalho de professores: satisfação de vida, autoeficácia, autoestima, afetos positivos, engajamento no trabalho e dar suporte social instrumental. Além disso, o modelo mostrou que a autoeficácia apresentou a relação mais próxima com satisfação de vida. Os resultados são discutidos com base em estudos prévios sobre autoeficácia. Intervenções dedicadas a docentes da educação básica podem se beneficiar da inclusão da autoeficácia como parte da programação.

Palavras-chave:
professores; qualidade de vida; autoeficácia

Resumen

Este estudio exploró cómo los siguientes aspectos influyen en la satisfacción de vida de los profesores de educación básica: autoestima, autoeficacia, autocompasión, sentimientos positivos y negativos, competencia moral, apoyo social, relación positiva con compañeros, compromiso laboral, edad, experiencia profesional, tiempo de enseñanza en la misma escuela, número de escuelas y número de estudiantes. Cien profesores de educación básica (74 mujeres) participaron en el estudio (edad media 40,9 años; DS = 10,01). El análisis de red proporcionó un modelo con los seis aspectos más relevantes para la vida y el trabajo: satisfacción con la vida, autoeficacia, autoestima, afecto positivo, compromiso en el trabajo y proporcionar apoyo social instrumental. Además, el modelo mostró que la autoeficacia tiene la relación más cercana con la satisfacción en la vida. Los resultados son discutidos con base en estudios previos sobre la autoeficacia. Las intervenciones dirigidas a profesores de educación básica pueden beneficiarse al incluir la autoeficacia como parte del programa.

Palabras clave:
profesores; calidad de vida; autoeficacia

This study explored the relationships among Brazilian basic education teachers’ life satisfaction, personal characteristics, work experience, and relationships. More specifically, we investigated how the following aspects influence teachers’ life satisfaction: self-esteem, general self-efficacy, self-compassion, positive and negative feelings, moral competence, social support, positive relationships with a colleague, work engagement, age, professional experience (in years), time teaching in the same school, number of schools currently teaching, and approximate number of students per week. It is a different direction from where most psychological research on teachers stands. It primarily examines stress, depression, anxiety, poor physical health, low-quality relationships (including colleagues, students, and their families), and burnout.

Teaching is one of the most stressful professions. Many studies provide evidence of the high-stress levels of basic education teachers in different countries (Asaloei et al., 2020; Bottiani et al., 2019; García-Carmona et al., 2019; Pressley et al., 2021). In addition, the Global Teacher Status Index, conducted by The Varkey Foundation¹ on 35 countries, reported that in 2018 Brazil occupied the last place (The Varkey Foundation, 2018). It reflects how governments and society have treated Brazilian teachers for decades. The psychological literature provides long-standing evidence of the poor health condition of Brazilian teachers.

Studies with Brazilian basic education teachers conducted in the last ten years (published with data collected before the COVID-19 pandemics) show how worrying is their mental health situation. Previous to that, there is Benevides-Pereira’s (2012) literature review on the subject of teachers’ burnout with studies from 1996 to 2011. There were reports of high levels of emotional exhaustion (ranging from 25 to 55%), low professional accomplishment (31 to 43%), and increased loss of identity (11 to 32%).

Rausch and Dubiella (2013) found teachers report their well-being is affected mainly by insufficient payment, professional devaluation, students’ lack of limits, and excessive workload. Sources of well-being were identified as good teacher-student and teacher-teacher relationships, students’ learning, and teachers’ continuing education. One teacher stated that workplace well-being means “feeling part of the community advancement, having families and students allied throughout the process, being part of the life history of many families, being a teacher in the true sense of the word” (p. 1056, our translation). Pereira (2017) also identified feelings of self-devaluation, complicated interactions with students, and perceived former higher-education deficiencies that interfere with their work as teachers.

Koga et al. (2015) found high levels of burnout in teachers associated with age, teaching experience, the opportunity to express their own opinion at work, workplace violence, and relationship quality. The worst cases were teachers who perceived their relationships with students, parents, superiors, and colleagues as bad or regular. Dalagasperina and Monteiro (2014) detected that excessive workload and relationship difficulties with students were predictors of burnout. Monteiro and Brun (2017) reported two studies with teachers: in the 2011-2012 study, 58% scored high on stress, and 17% showed signs of burnout; in 2015-2016, 55% presented minor psychiatric disorders, and 35% showed symptoms of depression.

Assunção and Abreu (2019) reported a study conducted in 2015-2016 with 6,510 Brazilian basic education teachers. The authors explored the factors influencing a subset of teachers who felt pressured to work even when facing health difficulties, and analyzed the role of demographical aspects, characteristics of the schools and school systems, and the health status of participants. More than half of the sample reported pressure for work while feeling sick (55%). Significant associations (p < .05) were detected between perceived pressure to work during sickness and the following aspects: sex, marital status, educational level, having children, and major geographical region of Brazil (there are five). More women (56%) perceived pressure to work, married (56.5%), with a university degree (55%), with children (56%), lived in the central region of Brazil, worked in more than one school (57%), teaching in state schools (57.5%), with weak social support (62%), and working in an “agitated school environment due to unruly students” (p. 4) (64%).

More recently², three studies have provided evidence of basic education teachers’ poor health conditions. Ferreira-Costa and Pedro-Silva (2019) investigated levels of anxiety and depression in 105 Brazilian female teachers. They found that at least 50% of the participants presented depression or anxiety levels detrimental to their professional performance. Pereira-Neto et al. (2019) analyzed the relationships between subjective well-being and teaching stressors in 188 Brazilian teachers. Career conditions, time spent going to school (negative influence), and professional experience (positive influence) explained the levels of life satisfaction. And Hanzelmann et al. (2020) found significant relationships between work conditions and levels of stress in 421 Brazilian primary teachers.

An effort to counter the unfortunate picture of Brazilian teachers came in 2014 when the Brazilian National Congress approved the National Education Plan (Plano Nacional de Educação - PNE) for 2014-2024 (see https://pne.mec.gov.br/). The PNE integrates efforts and resources from local, regional, and federal governments. Structured by 20 goals, they include improving the educational level of the population in general (from kindergarten to university), valuing teachers and educators (from raising salaries to providing opportunities for their continuing education), and reducing social inequalities.

The present study intends to contribute toward Goal 16 of the PNE. This goal states that at least 50% of elementary, middle-, and high-school teachers (altogether named basic education in Brazil) need to acquire a post-graduation degree by 2024 and that basic education professionals receive continuing education in their area of expertise. Investigating life satisfaction, personal resources (self-esteem, self-efficacy, self-compassion, moral competence, work engagement), relationship aspects (social support, relationship with colleagues), work experience (professional experience, time teaching in the same school, number of schools currently teaching), and teaching conditions (number of students per week) may shed light on innovative forms of helping teachers cope with professional difficulties and their adverse outcomes. This knowledge is relevant to interventions dedicated to promoting the well-being of teachers and the development of abilities they need to cope with work challenges that harm their psychological health (for example, see Dalcin & Carlotto, 2018; Souza & Hutz, 2021). We also hope to add knowledge to the revised literature by investigating positive aspects yet not reported by studies on teachers’ psychological and social resources.

From the revised literature, we identified aspects that contribute, positively or negatively, to the well-being of teachers. Different studies addressed factors like students’ lack of limits (Assunção & Abreu, 2019; Rausch & Dubiella, 2013), relationships with students, families, and colleagues, and social support (Assunção & Abreu, 2019; Dalagasperina & Monteiro, 2014; Koga et al., 2015; Rausch & Dubiella, 2013).

Life satisfaction is one of the most investigated facets to study well-being in Psychology. There are several publications showing how life satisfaction is associated to health outcomes, how it can be promoted through interventions, and how frequently policy makers and governmental organizations have been making decisions weighing life satisfaction indexes. One of the most used definitions for life satisfaction is “a person’s evaluation of his or her own life based on the factors that the person deems most important” (Nakamura et al., 2022, p. 1044).

This study aimed to investigate how life satisfaction in Brazilian basic education teachers may be affected by personal characteristics, work experience, and work relationships. We explored how the following aspects may influence teachers’ life satisfaction: self-esteem, general self-efficacy, self-compassion, positive and negative feelings, moral competence, social support, positive relationships with a colleague, work engagement, age, professional experience (in years), time teaching in the same school, number of schools currently teaching, and approximate number of students per week. We designed an exploratory study with that goal and attempted different models to explain the relationships detected.

Method

Participants

The sample comprised 100 basic education teachers (74 women) dedicated to elementary or/and high-school education. The requirements to participate in the study were: to teach at the fundamental or high-school level, in public or private schools, for at least six months in the same school. We received the participation of 258 people, from which 100 filled out all instruments needed to pursue the research questions (convenience sampling). The mean age was 40.9 years (SD = 10.01), aged 20 to 66. Sixty percent resided in the state of Rio Grande do Sul, the southernmost state in Brazil. Teachers worked at one to three schools at the time of the study; 44% in public schools, 41% in private schools, and 15% in public and private schools. Time of teaching in the same school varied from six months to 28 years (M = 8.96; SD = 7.01). Teaching experience ranged from 2 to 37 years (M = 16.12; SD = 8.82). As for teaching areas, 18% were generalist teachers (serving elementary or middle school), 17% taught Portuguese, 10% Mathematics, and the remaining 55% taught a variety of areas of knowledge (e. g., History, Chemistry, Physical Education). The majority had a post-graduate degree: 52% had a specialization degree, and 32% held a Master’s or Doctor’s degree.

Instruments

The participants filled out the instruments in the following order: (1) Sociodemographic and Teaching Experience Questionnaire: gathered information on socio-demographic characteristics (age, city of residence, marital status), education (e.g., degrees), teaching experience (e.g., years of teaching, area of teaching), and work-related aspects (e.g., teaches at public, private, or both schools, for how long has been teaching in the same school); (2) Rosenberg Self-Esteem Scale (RSE): the Brazilian version (Hutz, Zanon, & Vazquez, 2014) shows an alpha of .90 with ten items; (3) General Self-Efficacy Scale (GSE): 20 items, Brazilian version (Pacico et al., 2014) with an alpha of .89; (4) Life Satisfaction Scale (LSS): five items, Brazilian version (Zanon et al., 2014) with alpha of .87; (5) Positive and Negative Affect Scale (PANAS): 20 items (10 positive and 10 negative), Brazilian version by Zanon et al. (2013), alpha of .83 for positive items and .77 for negative items; (6) Self-Compassion Scale (SCS): Brazilian version by Souza and Hutz (2016), 26 items, alpha of .94; (7) Perceived Social Support Scale (PSSS): 20 items, assesses giving (alpha of .80) and receiving (.93) social support by a Brazilian version from Bastianello and Hutz (2016); (8) Positive Feelings for a Colleague Scale: created for this study inspired on McGill Friendship Respondent’s Affection (Mendelson & Aboud, 1999), Brazilian version by Souza et al. (2016); (9) Utrecht Work Engagement Scale - Brief (UWES-9): 9 items, Brazilian version by Vazquez et al. (2015); Moral Competence Test_extended version (MCT_xt): Brazilian version, with three dilemmas, validated by Lind and Bataglia (1998).

Procedures

Data collection

The instruments were organized into an online survey using a popular research platform. We invited elementary and high-school teachers via the Internet by email and social media tools. In addition, we received the support of a teacher’s union, which extended our invitation to hundreds of affiliates. Data collection took place in 2018. Each participant would click on a link that would first show the informed consent with information about the research, participants’ rights, research ethics, and a place for accepting or declining participation in the survey. Participants who accepted participation were transferred to the first page of the survey, which had the socio-demographic questions. All instruments took about 20 minutes to answer. The end of the survey had a note of gratitude and an opportunity for the participant to leave their email address if they were open to participating in future research. All procedures followed the required ethical norms regarding research with humans (ethical approval number 2477549).

Data Analysis

A network analysis (Borsboom et al., 2021) was employed to evaluate the multifactorial nature of well-being in basic education teachers, encompassing close relationships among the many factors that influence their psychological health and work environment. Network analyses provide graphical models that help understand how and to what extent the variables under study interact highly complexly (Borsboom et al., 2021). Each variable is a node in a network plot, and the association between any two variables is an edge. Edges vary in magnitude, representing more or less strength of association between two variables. Additionally, each variable has an amount of centrality within the obtained network, in terms of the number of connections with other variables (degree), of how close such connections are (closeness), and of how many times it establishes the connection between other variables (betweenness). Higher centrality indexes point to higher relative prominence a given variable exerts in the model. Finally, the Barrat coefficient specifies to which extent one variable clusters the others around it. For the model presented in the results section, we employed the EBICglasso method for network estimation, and normalized centrality measures. All statistical analyses were executed through JASP 0.16.1 (JASP Team).

Results

We applied the Shapiro-Wilk normality test, and all but four variables (age, general self-efficacy, self-compassion, and positive affects) violated the normality premise. Hence, non-parametric tests were employed throughout the analyses. We checked the internal-consistency reliability of each scale, according to our sample: RSE = alpha of .83; GSE = .90; LSS = .88; PANAS = alpha of .93 for positive items and .91 for negative items; SCS = .91; PSSS = giving (alpha of .86) and receiving (.94) social support; Positive Feelings for a Colleague Scale = .91; UWES-9 = .94.

Spearman’s rho correlations among all variables ranged from zero to .80. We focused on life satisfaction as a preeminent outcome of interest. The mean score for life satisfaction was 4.84 (SD = 1.26), higher than the mean reported in the study conducted by Hutz, Zanon, and Bardagi (2014), who determined the norm score for Brazilian samples. Table 1 shows the correlations of Life Satisfaction to the remaining variables assessed.

Table 1
Correlations between Life Satisfaction and the Variables under Study

Correlations with Life Satisfaction	rho
Age	-.04a
Number of Schools Currently Teaching	-.16a
Years Teaching at the Same School	-.09a
Years Working as a Teacher	0a
Number of Students per Week	-.04a
Self-esteem	.42***
Self-efficacy	.64***
Self-compassion	.46***
Positive Affects	.53***
Negative Affects	-.36***
Giving Emotional Support	.33***
Giving Instrumental Support	.40***
Receiving Emotional Support	.36***
Receiving Instrumental Support	.46***
Positive Feelings towards a Colleague	.24**
Work Engagement	.42***
Moral Competence (total)	-.20*

• Note. NS = non-significant; *** = p < .001; ** = p < .01; * = p < .05.

As shown in Table 1, correlations with life satisfaction ranged from zero to .64. Most correlations were moderate (rho from .30 to .60). We might highlight life satisfaction’s low positive correlation with positive feelings toward a colleague (rho < .24), and low negative correlation with Moral Competence (rho = -.20).

Most socio-demographic and work experience variables obtained low to null correlations with life satisfaction. Therefore, we decided to keep only one of them for further analysis. Although the number of years working as a teacher had a null correlation with life satisfaction, it was considered the most representative of the set. This decision follows previous studies that analyzed teachers’ work experiences (Merk et al., 2021; Pishchik, 2020). Hence, we included the following variables in the network analysis: years of working as a teacher, self-efficacy, self-esteem, life satisfaction, positive affects, negative affects, self-compassion, positive feelings for a good colleague, giving emotional social support, giving instrumental social support, receiving emotional social support, receiving instrumental social support, work engagement, and moral competence. The network analysis employed the EBICglasso estimator, and the centrality measures were normalized.

Visual inspection of the network plot finds the variable general self-efficacy at the model’s topographical center (Figure 1). General self-efficacy correlated positively with self-esteem, positive affects, work engagement, life satisfaction, and giving instrumental social support. On the other hand, moral competence correlated negatively with self-efficacy, although with a lower correlation magnitude.

Figure 1
Network Plot of the Variables under Study

The variable life satisfaction - the outcome prioritized in this study - correlated positively with receiving instrumental social support and giving instrumental social support. Negative affects, located in the graph’s periphery, correlated negatively with positive feelings toward a good colleague and self-compassion. Self-compassion, also in the margin of the figure, correlated positively with self-esteem and receiving instrumental social support. Finally, years of working as a teacher correlated negatively with receiving emotional social support but positively with work engagement and giving emotional social support.

Centrality measures reflect the prominence a variable exerts over the network. The centrality measures that accompany Figure 2 (centrality plot), depicted in Table 2 (centrality measures per variable), show that self-efficacy is the variable with the most centrality in the network, either in the number of relations to other variables (degree), how close are these relations (closeness), or how many times the variable allows the relationship between other variables (betweenness).

Figure 2
Centrality Plot

Table 2
Centrality Measures in the Network, per Variable

Variable	Betweenness	Closeness	Strength
Self-efficacy	2.636	1.631	1.813
Positive Affects	1.198	1.309	0.990
Negative Affects	0.399	0.660	0.197
Life Satisfaction	0.399	0.588	-0.089
Receiving Instrumental Support	0.399	-0.083	0.709
Work Engagement	-0.080	0.338	0.371
Giving Instrumental Support	-0.080	-0.032	-0.115
Self-compassion	-0.240	0.502	0.737
Receiving Emotional Support	-0.399	-0.385	0.256
Self-esteem	-0.559	0.665	0.232
Giving Emotional Support	-0.559	-0.979	-0.545
Positive Feelings Colleague	-0.879	-1.428	-1.313
Years Teaching	-1.038	-1.359	-1.413
Moral Competence	-1.198	-1.427	-1.831

Positive affects was the second variable with a high centrality index in the network. Life satisfaction presented low to moderate levels of centrality in the extended model.

In network analysis, the primary measure of local grouping - the Barrat coefficient - indicates how much a particular variable aggregates a subgroup of other variables around itself. In the network obtained, Figure 3 and Table 3 show that the variable with a higher Barrat coefficient was life satisfaction, followed by giving emotional social support and positive affects.

Figure 3
Barrat Coefficient’s Plot

Table 3
Clustering Measure Barrat Coefficient in the Network, per Variable

Variable	Barrat
Life Satisfaction	1.016
Giving Emotional Support	0.948
Positive Affects	0.869
Years Teaching	0.629
Self-efficacy	0.457
Self-compassion	0.443
Giving Instrumental Support	0.300
Work Engagement	0.177
Receiving Instrumental Support	-0.043
Self-esteem	-0.215
Negative Affects	-0.258
Moral Competence	-0.354
Receiving Emotional Support	-1.185
Positive Feelings Colleague	-2.783

Given the extended model under study, the most central variable was general self-efficacy. In the vicinity of self-efficacy and positively correlated with it are positive affects, life satisfaction, self-esteem, work engagement, and giving instrumental social support. Interestingly, this group of variables seems to be organized by life satisfaction, given its high grouping coefficient. In other words, life satisfaction is responsible for grouping the variables in the extended model.

Discussion

First, it is worth acknowledging that our 100 participants showed higher life satisfaction than expected. Based on the revised literature on basic education teachers’ mental health, work conditions, and salary situation, we would expect lower life satisfaction. Nevertheless, as mentioned before, there were no previous studies on life satisfaction of Brazilian basic education teachers. One avenue of interpretation we could take is that teachers who have the time and are motivated to respond to online surveys might be more satisfied, in general, with their life.

Network analyses demonstrated the centrality of general self-efficacy and its proximity to life satisfaction, positive affects, self-esteem, work engagement, and giving instrumental social support. Moreover, by the same model, life satisfaction plays a role in attracting and grouping the variables with self-efficacy. These results suggest that from the original set of 14 variables a more concise model of six encompasses the most relevant aspects that interfere in the life and work of basic education teachers: life satisfaction, self-efficacy, self-esteem, positive affects, work engagement, and giving instrumental social support.

Teachers’ life satisfaction is very much influenced by self-efficacy, which is crucial to their profession. Self-efficacy is a person’s belief in their capacity to organize and execute a plan of action to get the desired result (Bandura, 1993). Teachers have the opportunity to directly influence the development (cognitive, social, etc.), learning, and acquisition of knowledge and skills of dozens of children per year. Suppose done effectively, believing that one can do it and knows how to do it well plays an essential part in the profession. In addition, self-efficacy weighs more on the life satisfaction of teachers than other variables. Therefore, this may be a starting point for understanding and predicting success in the teaching profession.

In Brazil, the image of the teaching profession is very much stained with low salaries and a very dissatisfied and stressed professional. Even so, many choose the career and the path to facing the difficulties it entails. However, as our model indicates, the school teacher with high self-esteem, self-efficacy, work engagement, positive affects, and a higher tendency to give instrumental social support is a professional with increased life satisfaction. Moreover, our results suggest that self-efficacy may be, for the most part, what keeps the teacher working and satisfied with their own life.

According to Bandura’s (2004) proposal, a good sense of self-efficacy depends on developing four mechanisms: observing positive models, being persuaded into performing successfully, attending to one’s emotional states, and having previous experiences dominating the activity of interest. We observed how positive affects and self-esteem played a role in the model, which are in tune with the emotional states preconized in theory. Work engagement was also present in the model, indicating the importance of the relationship between the person and their work and how it allows a sense of well-being and fulfillment (Vazquez et al., 2015). One may also understand that giving instrumental support is an activity very much connected to the work of the teacher. Therefore, a higher perception of providing this support indicates good experience in teaching.

One study shows approximations of what we tried to accomplish in this opportunity. Cansoy et al. (2020) investigated the relationship between teacher self-efficacy and psychological well-being in 412 teachers (70% women) from public schools in Istanbul (Turkey). Teacher self-efficacy, following Bandura’s proposal (1993), showed a significantly high positive correlation with psychological well-being: r = .73; p < .01. Psychological well-being was measured by a single factor scale that comprised elements of autonomy, environmental dominance, individual development, positive relationships with others, life goals, and self-acceptance. Simple linear regression analysis demonstrated that teacher self-efficacy predicts psychological well-being (p < .01). The authors discuss this result compared to previous data on Turkish studies with teachers. In our research, as we did not predict the role of self-efficacy in basic education teachers’ life satisfaction, we opted for a general self-efficacy account of the matter. Nonetheless, Cansoy et al. (2020) study stress the strong relationship between how well the teacher perceives his well-being and their belief in using effective teaching practices to achieve goals in this context. As expected, the authors highlight the pertinence of including self-efficacy in teacher training, continuing education, and interventions toward teachers’ well-being and work competence.

To raise teachers’ morale, interventions directed at basic education teachers may be more effective if self-efficacy is part of the program. Increased life satisfaction is the outcome that counters teachers’ numerous stress factors. More than this, working with teachers’ self-efficacy might influence the other values depicted by the model: self-esteem, positive affects, work engagement, and giving instrumental support. As a result, teaching may be more pleasurable, effective, and favorable to children’s development and learning processes. Perhaps future teachers enjoyed observing their masters working with a positive view of themselves, their work, and their life.

Concluding remarks

The main result of our study showed that self-efficacy is strongly linked to teachers’ life satisfaction in a design where other essential variables to teaching and teachers also were analyzed. We believe that psychological interventions with basic education teachers would contribute to this profession by including self-efficacy in its implementation.

The main limitation of our work was the sample size. We only managed to remain with 100 teachers from the data collection. Deadline restraints were the main reason for this, but online teacher participation was only possible when we created a collaborative approach with a teacher’s union. This collaboration is the main reason for the absence of a regression analysis not being undertaken, which is the other limitation we wish to point out.

For future studies, it would be interesting to pursue the relationships between teacher self-efficacy, life satisfaction, self-esteem, positive affects, work engagement, and giving instrumental social support. Examining the specific self-efficacy directed to teachers would strengthen the study. A larger sample would certainly help carry out cause-effect analyses. From another perspective, qualitative research, with either focus groups or individual interviews, would allow a more detailed account of how teachers perceive their competence at work, its relationship with well-being, and our model’s other variables.

Acknowledgments:

The author Luciana Karine de Souza thanks the Post-Graduate Program in Psychology at Universidade Federal do Rio Grande do Sul, the PNPD-CAPES institutional scholarship (2013-2018), and the teachers who participated in the study.

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• 1
  The survey involved 35 countries selected according to their performance in PISA (Programme for International Student Assessment) and TIMSS (Trends in International Mathematics and Science Study) assessments. More than one thousand people from each country answered questions like “how teachers are respected in relation to other professions; whether parents would encourage their children to be teachers; whether it is perceived that children respect their teachers”. (https://www.varkeyfoundation.org/media/4867/gts-index-13-11-2018.pdf). More information is available at https://www.varkeyfoundation.org/what-we-do/research/global-teacher-status-index-2018/
• 2
  As our study was conducted before the COVID-19 pandemics, we decided not to review articles with data collected during or after this tragic event, and it is widely agreed that the pandemics indeed added many obstacles to this noble profession.

Publication Dates

• Publication in this collection
  12 Jan 2024
• Date of issue
  Oct-Dec 2023

History

• Received
  28 July 2022
• Reviewed
  10 July 2023
• Accepted
  01 Aug 2023