An exploration of effective events influencing job satisfaction amongst secondary school teachers

Abstract

The purpose of this study was to explore what affective events influence job satisfaction amongst secondary school teachers of two private schools in Gauteng. The theoretical framework for this study was the Affective Events Theory as proposed by Weiss and Cropanzano. A total of 37 participants completed an open-ended questionnaire presenting an emotion and asking participants to describe an event that could be linked to the emotion experienced in as much detail as possible. Thereafter 6 participants were selected for follow-up interviews, based on age, gender and years' teaching experience to enquire about their perception on the role of leadership behaviour played in creating these events as well as investigating possible turnover intent. The results from this study highlighted that events which resulted in positive affectivity were mostly connected to learners as negative affective events involved leadership behaviour. It also highlighted how leadership behaviour contributed to these events and expressed possible turnover intent as a result of their experiences of these events at school.