ACTA UNIVERSITATIS PALACKIANAE OLOMUCENSIS GYMNICA ...

Acta Univ. Palacki. Olomuc., Gymn. 2004, vol. 34, no. 2 9sexual identity, social support, level of education offeredand type of school (public schools, special educationschools), sex, age, education, as well as the time of practicingthe profession (Krawulska-Ptaszyńska, 1992; Sęk,1994, 1996; Golińska & Świętochowski, 1998; Kliś &Kossewska, 1998; Przybyła, 1998; Mandal, 1999;Sekułowicz, 2002; Tucholska, 2003). Świętochowski(2001) investigated the effect of burnout on non-clinicalsomatic disorders among teachers. Tucholska (2003), inher cross-sectional study of general education schoolteachers(N = 256), included a variable of the subjecttaught; the number of investigated physical trainingteachers was N = 16. Using the concept developed byGolembiewski, she also proposed a sequence of increasingburnout symptoms in the studied group.The aim of the present report was to answer thequestion of how the burnout syndrome developed inphysical training teachers and to attempt to define themacro-path of burnout in teachers of this subject.Two hypotheses were formulated:In view of the specific character of their work, thepopulation of female and male physical training teachersmanifests the phenomenon of burnout.The course of the burnout macro-path among physicaltraining teachers is in agreement with the burnoutpath described by Maslach, the latter illustrates theprocess as occurring in social professions.METHODThe study employed the method of diagnostic pollingand was carried out between February and September,2003, among physical training teachers from variousCracow and Wieliczka schools (elementary, junior highand high), students of the Cracow Academy of PhysicalEducation (freshmen attending the post-baccalaureateextramural program, students of extramural courses)and participants of three post-grad courses for physicaltraining teachers organized by Province PostgraduateTraining Center for Teachers in Cracow and Nowy Sącz(N = 256; women N = 144, men N = 112).Among the respondents, the most numerous groupconsisted of physical training teachers employed byelementary schools (38.7%) in large urban centers(province capital – 72.3%, district towns – 19.1%, ruralareas – 8.6%). The mean age of the respondents was36.9 years, the mean duration of employment in schoolamounted to approximately 13 years (TABLE 4), withthe range of age and employment duration of 23–57 and1–40 years, respectively.To diagnose the burnout syndrome, the Maslach BurnoutInventory (MBI Form Ed.) was employed; the scalehad been adapted to Polish conditions by Noworol (1994;an unpublished manuscript). The MBI questionnaireallows for determining the level of burnout as a consequenceof chronic emotional stress in a work setting.The questionnaire consists of 22 statements groupedinto three subscales:• Emotional Exhaustion (EE) – 9 items;• Negative Sense of Professional Achievement (NSPA)– 8 items;• Depersonalization (DP) – 5 items.Using a seven-point scale, each responder determinesthe frequency of experiencing a given state. The scaleranges from 0 – never, to 6 – every day; the intermediatevalues denote the frequency of once/several times peryear, month, and week.The empirical material was analyzed using the varianceanalysis, the non-parametric U Mann-Whitney test(Ferguson & Takane, 1999), as well as the cluster analysis(the k-mean method of Mac Quin) (Noworol, 1987)and employing the SPSS/11 statistical software.RESULTSIn the investigated population of physical trainingteachers, the gender variable basically did not affectthe structure of the burnout phenomenon. Only inthe group of women was emotional exhaustion (EE)slightly more pronounced (p < 0.05) (TABLE 1). Themean values of the other dimensions (NSPA and DP)did not differ significantly.TABLE 1The burnout structure among female and male teachersof physical trainingFemales N = 144 Males N = 112MBI x – SD x – SD pEE 13.56 8.302 11.70 8.560 0.042NSPA 11.53 7.682 10.36 6.865 0.255DP 3.85 3.847 4.42 4.026 0.204EE – emotional exhaustion, NSPA – negative sense of professional achievement,DP – depersonalizationTABLE 2Burnout among physical training teachers – the clusteranalysisBurnout among physical training teachersCluster N % – x Me SD min maxI. 150 58.6 18.67 19.00 8.27 1 45II. 1 0.4 105.00 105.00 – 105 105III. 30 11.7 30.53 28.50 7.14 18 49IV. 6 2.3 44.33 44.50 8.64 30 54V. 69 27.0 44.14 42.00 10.60 29 74Total 256 100 27.86 26.00 15.14 1 105