Research On Academic Passion,occupational Stress And Vitality Of High-level University Teachers

With the changes in the governance structure of higher education and the advancement of managerialism in recent years,the excessive occupational stress on university teachers has become a global problem.Previous studies have shown that excessive occupational stress can have many negative effects on teachers,and this may include the decline of academic passion and the decline of academic vitality.Based on literature review and theoretical analysis,this study attempts to investigate the phenomenon and the causal factors behind it through a questionnaire survey of3,813 teachers in 35“double first-class”universities and interviews with 18 teachers from 9 universities.Exploratory research has been carried out on the mechanism.The relevant important conclusions are as follows:1.Academic passion is divided into harmonious research passion,harmonious teaching passion,obsessive research passion and obsessive teaching passion.Among high-level universities represented by "double first-class" universities,90% of teachers have at least one type of passion.Teacher’s obsessive research passion is higher than other passions.Academic passion(especially harmonious research passion)has a close positive correlation with higher academic achievements;most teachers believe that the performance of typical harmonious passion and obsessive passion is not frequent."Research experience in higher education" and "Impact of tutors" are the most important factors for academic passion,followed by "native interest",that is,the individual’s academic interest and recognition of academic value before receiving higher education.2.The occupational stress of high-level university teachers in China is generally high.Except for "interpersonal relationships",the average score of stress in all other dimensions(teaching,living burden,academic competition,workload,administrative affairs,and international communication)has exceeded the middle score.Administrative affairs are the most stressful.Teachers’ degree of occupational stress is closely related to their institutions,disciplines and personal characteristics.3.Excessive occupational stress will lead to a decrease in teachers’ harmonious passion and an increase in obsessive passion.Harmonious and obsessive passion can both promote academic vitality,but harmonious passion is significantly more effective than obsessive passion.The relationship between occupational stress and academic vitality is mainly negatively correlated.Harmonious passion can effectively alleviate the negative impact of occupational stress on academic vitality,and at the same time can make occupational stress less fluctuating with the publication / teaching awards,and obsessive passion mainly plays the opposite role.This function of academic passion is mainly achieved through the mediation / suppressing effect rather than the moderating effect.Occupational stress is also the most important cause of teachers’ job burnout.Harmonious academic passion has a negative predictive effect on job burnout,obsessive academic passion has a positive predictive effect on job burnout.The stress of academic competition will obviously cause teachers’ risk avoidance tendency,while the harmonious research passion has the opposite effect.The stress of most dimensions and the obsessive research passion will motivate teachers to leave their jobs,while the harmonious academic passion has the opposite effect too.4.Based on the analysis of interview materials,the study believes that the characteristics and stratification of academic professions,the influence of managementism,the quality assurance movement of higher education,and the construction of first-class universities are the important factors that cause the current academic career environment to become severe and teachers’ occupational stress to be excessive.At the same time,lack of autonomy in running universities,the imbalance of administrative and academic power,and the immature academic community in Chinese academia have magnified and increased the problems that are common and technical in academic environment.These factors make the problem more difficult to solve.In response to the above issues,this study proposes the following: First,students should be involved in research activities in the higher education stage as far as possible,and teachers who love academics should be selected in the process of selecting mentors.Priority can be given to the "master-doctoral" training method.For in-service teachers,create as many training and communication opportunities as possible to meet their needs.Secondly,in the management system of higher education,the administrative and academic power relations between universities and governments as well as within universities should be handled well to avoid administrative interference in academic activities.We should continue to improve the reform of the appointment system for teachers and establish a correct view of higher education performance.Finally,teachers should be given ample choices in the allocation of academic resources within universities.In the case where quantitative assessment is unavoidable within a short period of time,assessment indicators should be made more scientific and reasonable.