Burn-out and job satisfaction: their relation with health education in Italian teachers

The aims of this study were: to analyze job conditions, burn-out, and job satisfaction relationships in a sample of teachers in Milan; to verify the relation between the two latter variables and intentions to develop health education programmes. 106 teachers filled out a questionnaire to evaluate their job conditions (role identity, job overload, work group), job satisfaction, burn-out and their intention to promote health education programmes. 27% and 17% of teachers respectively had high levels of emotional exhaustion and depersonalization; 45% had low levels of personal accomplishment. Analyses based on structural equation modelling showed that job satisfaction was related to the work group, emotional exhaustion and personal accomplishment; the latter was also indirectly related to job satisfaction through emotional exhaustion. Role identity and job overload contributed significantly to emotional exhaustion while the work group influenced personal accomplishment. No relationship was found between teachers’ promotion of health education programmes and burn-out or job satisfaction