Teachers’ Psychological Needs Link Social Pressure with Personal Adjustment and Motivating Teaching Style

Abstract

Grounded in self-determination theory, this study examined the explanatory role of teachers’ need-based experiences in the association between teachers’ perceived social pressure (i.e., from the principal, colleagues, and students) and their personal adjustment and motivating teaching style. In total, 482 secondary school teachers (M age = 39.9 years) participated in this questionnaire-based study. Teacher need satisfaction was primarily related to adaptive work adjustment (i.e., job satisfaction) and a motivating teaching style (i.e., provided autonomy support and structure), while need frustration was primarily related to maladjustment (i.e., emotional exhaustion) and a demotivating teaching style (i.e., provided control and chaos). Need-based experiences played either a partial or fully mediating role in the relation between different sources of social pressure and all but one outcome (i.e., chaos). Pressure from students yielded the strongest relation to teacher outcomes, suggesting that the need for targeting this source in intervention research and daily school life. Overall, the present findings highlight the unifying role of need-based experiences as a critical mechanism underlying the relation between different sources of pressure and both teachers’ personal adjustment and their motivating teaching style.

Keywords:

• basic psychological needs
• emotional exhaustion
• job satisfaction
• teaching styles
• self-determination theory
• social pressure

Disclosure statement

The authors declare that they have no conflict of interest.

Compliance of ethical standards

The authors declare that they have complied with the American Psychological Association ethical standards. All participants filled in an informed consent before participating in the study. Funding was received from Ghent University.

Notes

1 The data of this sample are also partly published in a paper written by Aelterman et al. (i.e., sample 6, 2019).

2 In a series of supplementary hierarchical linear regression analyses, we examined if 961 teaching experience would moderate the effect of perceived social pressure on teachers’ need-962 based experiences and motivating teaching style. Results show that out of the 18 examined 963 interaction effects between pressure and teaching experience, none was significant (.07 < p < 964 .88), indicating no moderating effect of teaching experience.