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      The wellbeing of language teachers in the private sector: An ecological perspective

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      Language Teaching Research
      SAGE Publications

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          Abstract

          The teaching profession has been characterized as having high levels of stress and record rates of burnout and attrition. Language teaching is no exception to this global trend. Indeed, it could be argued that it is subject to additional specific stressors such as high intercultural and linguistic demands as well as the frequent use of energy-intense methodologies. Generally, language teacher psychology has been relatively neglected in research; however, those working in the private sector have almost exclusively been ignored. In terms of wellbeing, this is especially problematic given concerns about their working conditions. Therefore, this study takes an ecological perspective to investigating the wellbeing of teachers of English language teaching (ELT) working in the private sector in Malta. Eight volunteer teachers took part in a series of two semi-structured interviews assisted by visual prompts and journal entries. The data were analysed using a grounded Interpretative Phenomenological Analysis (IPA) approach and presented in line with the ecological perspective. The main findings revealed how the teachers’ wellbeing is defined by the business model character of the private sector in particular in terms of working conditions and status of the ELT profession in Malta. For the teachers, this very often means precarity in terms of the job and future prospects. However, the study also revealed aspects of positivity. For example, teachers reported enjoying their teaching, positive relationships with colleagues and students, and a positive work climate, which varied across institutions. The findings suggest implications for good practice in the field and directions for further research.

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          A Theory of Social Comparison Processes

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            On happiness and human potentials: a review of research on hedonic and eudaimonic well-being.

            Well-being is a complex construct that concerns optimal experience and functioning. Current research on well-being has been derived from two general perspectives: the hedonic approach, which focuses on happiness and defines well-being in terms of pleasure attainment and pain avoidance; and the eudaimonic approach, which focuses on meaning and self-realization and defines well-being in terms of the degree to which a person is fully functioning. These two views have given rise to different research foci and a body of knowledge that is in some areas divergent and in others complementary. New methodological developments concerning multilevel modeling and construct comparisons are also allowing researchers to formulate new questions for the field. This review considers research from both perspectives concerning the nature of well-being, its antecedents, and its stability across time and culture.
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              Subjective well-being: Three decades of progress.

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                Author and article information

                Contributors
                Journal
                Language Teaching Research
                Language Teaching Research
                SAGE Publications
                1362-1688
                1477-0954
                November 28 2020
                : 136216882097351
                Affiliations
                [1 ]University of Graz, Austria
                Article
                10.1177/1362168820973510
                0dd68ecb-1623-49f4-8e49-1799e7be0c33
                © 2020

                https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/

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