A Study On The Relationships Among Social Support, Occupational Well-being, And Professional Development Of College English Teachers In Gansu

With the ongoing educational reform and development of college English teaching, theprofessional development of college English teachers has caused wide social concern, because they arepromoters and practitioners of college English education, and undertake demanding workloads.However, studies on college English teachers often focus on their professional development,overlooking relatively poor social support and lower levels of occupational well-being as the source ofsome poor performance and inefficiency in their professional development. The present study aimed toexamine relationships among social support, occupational well-being and professional development ofcollege English teachers, furthermore, explore to which extent occupational well-being may bepredicted by social support, and to which extent professional development may be predicted by socialsupport and occupational well-being, respectively. The study also tried to reveal which dimensions ofsocial support could be relatively strong predictors for occupational well-being, and which dimensionsof social support and occupational well-being, respectively, could be relatively strong predictors forprofessional development among college English teachers.A deep and comprehensive study was conducted by means of questionnaires, three measures,including Social Support Rating Scale (SSRS), Teachers’ Wellbeing Questionnaire, and Teachers’Professional Development Questionnaire, were used in this survey.100college English teachers from5universities in Gansu answered questionnaires, and SPSS was used to analyze data collected to explorethe relationships among college English teachers’ social support, occupational well-being andprofessional development quantitatively. The study indicated that social support was positively relatedwith occupational well-being; and both social support and occupational well-being were significantlypositively associated with professional development; social support could be relatively strongpredictors for occupational well-being; social support and occupational well-being could be relativelystrong predictors for professional development respectively among college English teachers as well.The results also indicated that subjective support and the utility of social support could be relativelystrong predictors for occupational well-being; some dimensions of occupational well-being, such as theworking contexts and the interpersonal relationships, could be relatively strong predictors forprofessional development; the subjective support and the objective support, could be moderatepredictors for professional development among college English teachers in Gansu.These findings suggested that social support can be a valuable resource for college English teachers, this study also highlighted the need to prioritize college English teachers’ occupationalwell-being and for related college administrators and teachers themselves to work together to boost theprofessional development of college English teachers, in another word, to improve especially theirsense of occupational well-being, therefore improving their effectiveness in the classroom. It’s hopedthat a dialogue between college English teachers, unions and other sources of social support could beinitiated for college English teachers. Now is the time to improve communication and to work togetherto increase social support for, and make improvements in the occupational well-being of collegeEnglish teachers, and also for their long-tem professional development as well.