Development of a teacher-specific school stress model: examination of relationships between Stressors, Coping, Self-Efficacy and Stress Reactions in Japanese high school teachers

抄録

【Introduction】 The number of prior studies has reported that mental health problems related to Japanese school teachers have increased sharply during the last two decades, and have become a severe problem for school administration, as well as Japanese society. Therefore, this study is to develop a high school teacher-specific version of four stress-related scales, and to examine the hypothesis, based on the school stress model that stressors, self-efficacy, and coping predict teachers’ stress reactions. 【Methods】The sample of this study included 368 Japanese high school teachers (248 male and 120 female, mean age=42.2, SD=8.2). The participants voluntarily responded to a questionnaire survey that was composed of items in the teacher-specific stressor scale, the self-Efficacy scale, the coping scale, and the stress reaction scale. Exploratory factor analyses, confirmatory factor analyses, and reliability analyses were conducted to develop the four original scales. The hierarchical regression analyses were performed to confirm the relationships between the four scales. 【Results】The results of exploratory factor analyses indicated that the Stressor Scale, the Self-Efficacy Scale, the Coping Scale, and the Stress Reaction Scale consisted of two factors. All the subscales had satisfactory internal consistency as indicated by Cronbach’s alpha reliabilities, and fit indices of structural validities. The results of hierarchical regression analyses indicated that gender, stressors, self-efficacy, and coping, predicted stress reactions. Contrary to the hypothesis of this study, both approach and avoidance coping were associated with higher stress levels. Moreover, there was a limited impact of self-efficacy on the relationship between the stressor and the stress reaction, whereas coping failed to moderate the impact of stressors on stress reactions.【Conclusion】These results suggest that mental health interventions for reducing teachers’ stress burden should focus on addressing the causes of stress, as well as enhancing the teachers’ self-efficacy. Furthermore, more targeted support is needed for female teachers given their reports of elevated stress levels.