T 2001, ‘Self-efficacy in eliciting social support and burnout among secondary-school teachers

Abstract

A nonrecursive model with relationships between perceived lack of social support, per-ceived self-efficacy in eliciting support at the workplace. and the 3 successive burnout dimensions-emotional exhaustion. depersonalization, and personal accomplishment-was tested;, a sample of 277 secondary-school teachers in The Netherlands. Results showed that teachers ’ perceived lack of support from colleagues and principals had a sig-nificant effect on their self-efficacy beliefs in eliciting support from them, while these self-efficacy beliefs were shown to predict their level of burnout. The hypothesized feed-back loop was also confirmed: Teachers ’ level of burnout predicted the extent to which they feel lack of support. An additional effect of the personal-accomplishment dimension of burnout on perceived self-efficacy was suggested. It was concluded that perceived self-efficacy in eliciting support at the workplace is a usable construct in the prediction of teacher burnout. Future directions in research are suggested. Burnout is described as a psychological syndrome of emotional exhaustion, depersonaliza-tion, and reduced personal accomplishment that can occur among individuals who work with other people in some capacity. Emotional exhaustion refers to feelings of being emotionally over-extended and depleted of one’s emotional resources. Depersonal-ization refers to a negative, callous, or excessively detached response to other people, who are usually the recipients of one’s services or care. (Maslach, 1993, pp. 20-21) Reduced personal accomplishment is described as “a person’s negative self-evaluation in relation to his or her job performance ” (Schaufeli, Maslach, &amp