An Empirical Study On Burnout Among EFL Teachers

A large number of studies abroad showed that human services industry professionals are at the highest risk of job burnout. From the 1970s the research focus switched to teacher burnout problems. At home, job burnout is one of the hot topics for researchers in recent years, which mainly refers to the extreme reactions that the individual is unable to cope with work pressure smoothly as a result of exhaustion state of a long-time experience of emotion, attitude and behavior. The typical symptoms of burnout are the depletion of emotions, alienation and indifference and lower job satisfaction, loss of work enthusiasm and interest.In recent years, many domestic researchers began to pay more and more attention to the empirical study of teacher burnout, but the quantity is not satisfactory, especially the empirical studies of English teachers in high schools are relatively fewer. The English teacher burnout problem in high schools is more prominent.Based on the collection and analysis of relevant researches at home and abroad, this study utilizes the questionnaires survey and individual interview to explore the current burnout situations and affecting factors of EFL teachers in high schools in Xi’an, Shaanxi province.The results of questionnaires and individual interviews show that:(a) The general burnout situation:the degree of burnout level is generally slight among EFL teachers in high schools in Xi’an, Shaanxi province; the emotional exhaustion is higher, depersonalization and reduced personal accomplishment is much lower;(b)The relationship between teachers’ personal factors and burnout:there is no statistically significant difference as to the demographic variables such as gender, age, marital status, education level, academic title, being a head teacher or not, grade being taught, weekly workload and years of teaching experience, however, the male teachers are more burned out than female teachers, married teachers, aged 41 to 50 teachers, teachers with master’s degree, teachers with senior title, head teachers, teachers teaching grade three, teachers with less than 8 periods, and teachers with more than 21 years of teaching experience experienced the highest degree of burnout level; as to the school type and monthly salary, it showed the significant difference among EFL teachers:the burnout level of EFL teachers in the top five provincial key middle schools is higher than that of teachers in other non-top five provincial key schools and ordinary middle schools; teachers with monthly salary under 2000 RMB suffered the highest burnout level;(c)The relationship between work environmental factors and teacher burnout: according to the personal interviews, the school factors pose the greatest influence on teacher burnout. Working time and workload, problems of students, evaluation mechanism and reward system are the most evident influential factors on teacher burnout. Social factors on the effects of burnout among EFL teachers in high schools in Xi’an are not obvious.On the basis of research results, this research proposes several suggestions to reduce teacher burnout from the aspects of personal efforts, school support and social support.