Evaluating the immediate and delayed effects of psychological need thwarting of online teaching on Chinese primary and middle school teachers' psychological well-being

I-Hua Chen; Xiu-Mei Chen; Xiao-Ling Liao; Ke-Yun Zhao; Zhi-Hui Wei; Chung-Ying Lin; Jeffrey Hugh Gamble

doi:10.3389/fpsyg.2022.943449

Evaluating the immediate and delayed effects of psychological need thwarting of online teaching on Chinese primary and middle school teachers' psychological well-being

Front Psychol. 2022 Aug 16:13:943449. doi: 10.3389/fpsyg.2022.943449. eCollection 2022.

Authors

I-Hua Chen¹, Xiu-Mei Chen², Xiao-Ling Liao³, Ke-Yun Zhao⁴, Zhi-Hui Wei⁵, Chung-Ying Lin^{6

7

8}, Jeffrey Hugh Gamble⁹

Affiliations

¹ Chinese Academy of Education Big Data, Qufu Normal University, Qufu, China.
² Faculty of Education, Qufu Normal University, Qufu, China.
³ International College, Krirk University, Bangkok, Thailand.
⁴ School of Communication, Qufu Normal University, Rizhao, China.
⁵ Department of Development and Research, Shanghai Open University, Shanghai, China.
⁶ Institute of Allied Health Sciences, College of Medicine, National Cheng Kung University, Tainan, Taiwan.
⁷ Department of Occupational Therapy, College of Medicine, National Cheng Kung University, Tainan, Taiwan.
⁸ Biostatistics Consulting Center, National Cheng Kung University Hospital, College of Medicine, National Cheng Kung University, Tainan, Taiwan.
⁹ Department of English, National Changhua University of Education, Changhua, Taiwan.

Abstract

Recent studies on the effects of mandatory online teaching, resulting from the COVID-19 pandemic, have widely reported low levels of satisfaction, unwillingness to continue online teaching, and negative impacts on the psychological well-being of teachers. Emerging research has highlighted the potential role of psychological need thwarting (PNT), in terms of autonomy, competence, and relatedness thwarting, resulting from online teaching. The aim of this study was to evaluate the immediate and delayed (longitudinal) effects of PNT of online teaching on teachers' well-being (including distress and burnout), intention to continue online teaching, and job satisfaction. Moreover, data collected from both cross-sectional and longitudinal surveys allowed for a systematic validation of an important instrument in the field of teacher psychology, the Psychological Need Thwarting Scale of Online Teaching (PNTSOT), in terms of longitudinal reliability and validity. The data reveal the usefulness of the construct of PNT in terms predicting and explaining teachers' willingness to continue using online teaching as well as the degree of burnout after a period of 2 months, such that PNT is positively associated with burnout and negatively associated with willingness to continue online teaching. As such, the PNTSOT is recommended for future research evaluating the long-term psychological, affective, and intentional outcomes stemming from teachers' PNT. Moreover, based on our findings that the impact from PNT of online teaching is persistent and long-term, we suggest that school leaders provide flexible and sustained professional development, model respectful and adaptive leadership, and create opportunities for mastery for the development of community of practice that can mitigate the thwarting of teachers' autonomy, competence, and relatedness during times of uncertainty. Additionally, in terms of the psychometric properties of the PNTSOT instrument, our empirical findings demonstrate internal reliability, test-retest reliability, measurement invariance, and criterion validity (concurrent and predictive) based on cross-sectional and longitudinal data.

Keywords: COVID-19 pandemic; burnout; instrument validation; longitudinal data; online teaching; psychological need thwarting; psychological well-being; teacher psychology.