An investigation of the relationships among EFL teachers’ perfectionism, reflection and burnout

Abstract

The present study was aimed at investigating the relationships among perfectionism, reflection and burnout among Iranian EFL teachers. To this end, 156 Iranian EFL teachers completed a battery of questionnaires, namely Multidimensional Perfectionism Scale, Maslach Burnout Inventory-Educators Survey and English Language Teaching Reflection Inventory. Data were analyzed through Pearson correlation and multiple regression followed by path analysis. Our results showed that teachers’ reflection was a significant correlate of their burnout with less reflective teachers experiencing more burnout. However, the findings were indicative of no significant relationship between the three aspects of perfectionism and teacher burnout. Further analysis of two path models which were conceptualized and proposed based on our primary findings, revealed a more detailed picture of the multilateral associations among perfectionism, reflection and burnout. Our first model assumed that teachers’ reflection can function as a mediator in the relationship between self-oriented perfectionism and burnout. Our second model presupposed that perfectionism components affect reflection positively, and reflection has in turn a negative effect on teachers’ burnout. Results from path analysis showed that both of the proposed models enjoyed acceptable goodness of fit.