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ORIGINAL RESEARCH article

Front. Public Health
Sec. Public Mental Health
Volume 12 - 2024 | doi: 10.3389/fpubh.2024.1497629
This article is part of the Research Topic Public Health Strategies to Improve Mental Health in the Education Sector: Perspectives and Applications View all articles

Constructing a Model of the Factors Related to the Job Well-Being of Preschool Teachers in China: A Grounded Theory Study

Provisionally accepted
Li-Ying Nong Li-Ying Nong 1Chen Liao Chen Liao 1Jian-Hong Ye Jian-Hong Ye 2*
  • 1 Hezhou University, Hezhou, China
  • 2 Beijing Normal University, Beijing, China

The final, formatted version of the article will be published soon.

    As educational management research deepens, leadership style is being increasingly recognized as an important managerial skill. In many work environments, empowering leadership has been shown to significantly enhance employee job performance and satisfaction. Previous research has focused more on job performance in work settings, with less attention paid to the relationship between empowering leadership and the job well-being of preschool teachers in the educational sector.Therefore, this study explored how empowering leadership is related to preschool teachers' job well-being from the perspective of the Job Demands-Resources model. This research employed semi-structured interviews, collecting qualitative data from 12 Chinese preschool teachers and 12 kindergarten leaders, and used grounded theory for systematic analysis and integration of coding. The findings suggest that the empowering leadership of kindergarten principals might be related to preschool teachers' job well-being through stress pathways such as work pressure and burnout, as well as potentially enhancing organizational support and the work environment, which Correlate with stress factors, individual factors, and job well-being. Additionally, kindergarten principals' empowering leadership could be related to preschool teachers' personal motivation and work engagement, and with their job well-being. Principals' empowering leadership may have a continuous correlation with preschool teachers' personal motivation and work engagement, allowing them to maintain a positive and proactive experience of job well-being.

    Keywords: Empowering leadership, Job Demands-Resources model, job well-being, Leadership style, preschool teachers, Work Pathways

    Received: 17 Sep 2024; Accepted: 10 Dec 2024.

    Copyright: © 2024 Nong, Liao and Ye. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.

    * Correspondence: Jian-Hong Ye, Beijing Normal University, Beijing, China

    Disclaimer: All claims expressed in this article are solely those of the authors and do not necessarily represent those of their affiliated organizations, or those of the publisher, the editors and the reviewers. Any product that may be evaluated in this article or claim that may be made by its manufacturer is not guaranteed or endorsed by the publisher.