Psychological Health and Life Satisfaction of Portuguese Teachers

Abstract

Background: In Portugal, teachers have constantly sought better working conditions in order to improve their mental health, which can result in demotivation and personal and professional exhaustion. Methods: A total of 1454 national public school teachers participated in this study, 17.4% (n = 253) male, aged between 22 and 66 years old (M = 51.4, SD = 7.5). The instrument used included questions concerning sociodemographic data (gender, years of teaching experience, age, length of service), a life satisfaction scale, WHO-5/quality of life perception, the physical and psychological symptoms scale-HBSC, depression, stress, and the anxiety scale-DASS-21. It also included questions about the school environment: relationship with the principal, and school atmosphere. Results: Four groups of teachers were created for the statistical analyses: No Life Satisfied/No Symptoms; Life Satisfied/No Symptoms; No Life Satisfied/With Symptoms; and Life Satisfied/With Symptoms. The results revealed that male teachers showed higher percentages for the following groups: No Life Satisfied/No Symptoms (χ2 = 17.223(3), p ≤ 0.001, 20.2%), Life Satisfied/No Symptoms (χ2 = 17.223(3), p ≤ 0.001, 43.3%) and No Life Satisfied/With Symptoms (χ2 = 17.223(3), p ≤ 0.001, 23.9%). Conclusions: The results made it possible to identify a profile of teachers who are more likely to develop mental health problems and psychological distress: those who have lower perceived life satisfaction and more psychological symptoms, which are associated with a low perception of quality of life, a worse relationship with principals and a worse perception of the quality of the school environment; this situation seems to be even worse among female teachers.