The Role of Perception of School Leadership in Emotional Burnout and Commitment to School among Russian Teachers

Abstract

Introduction. The problem of professional burnout of teaching staff is especially relevant. Despite the numerous publications on this topic, there are practically no studies on the perception of leadership in the school environment and its impact on the emotional burnout of Russian teachers. The purpose of the research paper is to determine the relationship between the perception of school leadership and emotional burnout with the level of organizational commitment of teachers, as well as the relationship of emotional burnout and the perception of school leadership with the intentions of Russian teachers to change their profession. Materials and Methods. The following methods were used for the analysis: a questionnaire for assessing professional burnout (C. Maslach), a scale of subjective well-being of a teacher (T. Renshaw), a questionnaire on the perception of school leadership in schools and the city’s education department (K. Crosby), the confidence level questionnaire (L. G. Pochebut), the scale of organizational commitment (R. Collie). 426 teachers from the regions of Russia took part in the survey. The SPSS 19.0 software was used for data processing. Results. The analysis of foreign publications allowed us to summarize that emotional burnout is negatively associated with teachers’ support of learners, with parental relationships, and it is also associated with low learners’ performance in many subjects and insufficient level of skills to be gained in learning. In addition, emotional burnout correlates with learners’ aggressiveness, hyperactivity and attention problems, but is not associated with emotional distress (anxiety, depression and emotional control), and also negatively correlates with a positive outlook (optimism and subjective perception of happiness). The majority of respondents do not regret their chosen profession and remain faithful to it, considering themselves competent, and their teaching methods effective and successful. Emotional burnout is expected to be higher among those teachers who consider their professional choice to be erroneous. In addition, emotional burnout is negatively associated with the organizational commitment of teachers. Comparative analysis has shown that Moscow teachers have a more developed reduction of personal achievements, and teachers from other regions have a more obvious depersonalization. The degree of hostility and the level of trust were expected to be interrelated with professional burnout among teachers. Discussion and Conclusion. The results of the study contribute to pedagogical psychology, the psychology of the teacher's work and his professional training in terms of understanding the phenomena of perception of the status of a leader and emotional burnout among teachers. The materials of the article will be useful to teachers and the pedagogical community involved in the teacher training system.