The Relationships among Nursing Teachers’ Stress, Social Support, and Burnout

Abstract

〔Purpose〕Nursing teachers are prone to burnout due to stress from their work environment, teacher qualifications to meet, and educational methods they need to implement. In particular, the low number of years in teaching experience, teacher qualifications and social support access may all contribute to an increased level of stress and eventual burnout. The purpose of this study was therefore to clarify the relationships among these factors.

〔Method〕A self-administered questionnaire was administered to 306 nursing teachers at nursing diploma schools in Chugoku Region.

〔Results〕There were 182 valid responses with a response rate of 59.5%. The average age of the respondents was 44.3±8.2 years. In terms of the number of years in teacher experience and the absence of teacher qualifications, there was a negative relationship in regards to stress-factor related busyness （p<0.05, p <.01）. For social support, there were negative relationships in regards to stress-factor related work environment （p<.001）, teacher qualifications （p<.01） and research resources （p<.001）. For work environment and teacher qualifications, there were positive relationships in regards to emotional exhaustion （p<.01, p<.05） and depersonalization （p<.001, p<.01）. Finally, for research resources, there was a positive relationship in regards to sense of personal accomplishment （p<.05）.

〔Conclusion〕The implication of the study was that if nursing teachers obtain social support such as competence evaluation, understanding, advice and awareness of teacher roles, stress related to work environment and teacher qualifications would be reduced and sense of emotional exhaustion and depersonalization would be alleviated.