Responsible school leadership and teachers' emotional exhaustion
The moderated mediation role of work meaningfulness and proactive personality
Bibliographic Data
| ID | 21297063 |
|---|---|
| Authors | Mahmut Polatcan (0000-0002-5181-0316, Faculty of Humanities and Social Sciences, Department of Educational Science Karabuk University Karabuk Turkey), Mehmet Şükrü Bellibaş (0000-0003-1281-4493, College of Public Policy and Institute of Leadership in Higher Education University of Sharjah Sharjah UAE, corresponding author), Erhan Boğan (0000-0002-8225-4666, Department of Management College of Business Administration, University of Sharjah Sharjah UAE) |
| Year | 2026 |
| Volume | 96 |
| Issue | 2 |
| Pages | 631-647 |
| Publication date | 2026-06-01 |
| Open Access | Yes |
| Type | ARTICLE |
| Venue | British Journal of Educational Psychology (JOURNAL) |
| Journal identifiers | ISSN: 0007-0998 • E-ISSN: 2044-8279 |
| Publisher | Wiley (PUBLISHER • GB) |
| DOI | 10.1111/bjep.70042 |
| PMID | 41147325 |
| OpenAlex | W4415619531 |
| Language | EN |
| References cited | 52 |
BACKGROUND: Despite increasing research attention to teachers' emotional states, there remains a significant gap in understanding how educational leaders can effectively mitigate these issues. PURPOSE: This study examined a multilevel, moderated mediation model that explored the relationship between responsible school leadership and emotional exhaustion, with the moderating role of teachers' proactive personality and the mediating effect of work meaningfulness. SAMPLE: The study utilized data from 739 teachers working in 72 schools across Türkiye. Participants represented a range of school contexts and demographic backgrounds, allowing for examination of both individual and school-level effects. METHOD: A multilevel analytical approach was employed to test the hypothesized moderated mediation model, examining both direct and indirect effects of responsible leadership on emotional exhaustion. RESULTS: The findings indicate that responsible leadership is directly associated with reduced emotional exhaustion and indirectly linked to lower exhaustion through increased work meaningfulness. Moreover, among teachers with higher levels of proactive personality, responsible leadership was associated with a stronger reduction in emotional exhaustion compared to those with lower levels of proactive personality. CONCLUSION: The findings contribute to the current literature by providing empirical evidence that the impact of leadership on teachers' emotional state is likely to vary across teachers with different personality traits.
Empirical evidence · Empirical research · Mediation · Moderated mediation · Personality · Work (physics) · Emotional Labor in Professions · Job Satisfaction and Organizational Behavior · Teacher Education and Leadership Studies
Teacher Stress and Teacher Self-Efficacy as Predictors of Engagement, Emotional Exhaustion, and Motivation to Leave the Teaching Profession
The psychological conditions of meaningfulness, safety and availability and the engagement of the human spirit at work
Estimating within-group interrater reliability with and without response bias.
Emotional intelligence and teacher burnout
Relations between teachers’ emotional exhaustion and students’ educational outcomes.
Bayesian structural equation modeling
Teachers' occupational well-being and quality of instruction
Modeling the antecedents of proactive behavior at work.
Job Satisfaction, Stress and Coping Strategies in the Teaching Profession—What Do Teachers Say?
The relationship of emotional exhaustion to work attitudes, job performance, and organizational citizenship behaviors.
Proactive Behavior in Organizations
Teachers’ emotional exhaustion is negatively related to students’ achievement
Becoming a teacher
Toward a theoretical model to understand teacher emotions and teacher burnout in the context of student misbehavior
Measuring Meaningful Work
Cutoff criteria for fit indexes in covariance structure analysis
Development of the Job Diagnostic Survey.
Common method biases in behavioral research
The Job Demands‐Resources model
Transformational leadership and teacher burnout in Türkiye
Empirical research on responsible leadership
Responsible leadership, teacher recognition, and teacher emotional well-being
Does school context matter? Relations with teacher burnout and job satisfaction
Teachers’ emotional exhaustion and job satisfaction
Calling and Vocation at Work
The measurement of experienced burnout
Responsible Leadership in a Stakeholder Society - A Relational Perspective
The proactive component of organizational behavior
Job Burnout
Adapting Tests for Use in Multiple Languages and Cultures
| Highly cited | No |
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