The influence of self-efficacy and experience of Sri Lankan teachers on their experience of occupational stress and resilience

Abstract

Back ground: The study focussed on the teaching community of Sri Lanka which examined, sense of efficacy, stress, years in service and resilience. Aims: There were two objectives in the study. First objective was to examine whether there was a relationship between a teacher’s sense of efficacy and the perceived occupational stress. Second objective was to understand whether a teacher’s years in service had an impact on their resilience. Method: A questionnaire with few demographic questions and three scales which assessed their sense of efficacy, occupational stress and resilience were presented via Qualitrics. Participants were attracted through a social media advert. Approval was granted to conduct the study under reference number UG7496 by the ethics panel of Cardiff School of Sport and Health Sciences. A quantitative research was conducted and the collected data was analysed using SPSS. Results: A total number of 113 responses were collected where 89 responses were used for analysis. Spearman’s correlation tests were carried out, and the computed results indicated a moderate negative relationship between teacher’s sense of efficacy and occupational stress, r=-0.56, n=89, p<.001. Further, a strong positive relationship was indicated between years in service and resilience of a teacher, r=0.70, n=89, p<.001. Conclusions: Both hypotheses which were tested were supported by the obtained results. Therefore, it was suggested that teachers with greater sense of efficacy perceived less occupational tress and teachers with more work experience had higher levels of resilience.