Associations between burnout and personal and professional characteristics: a study of Portuguese teachers

Recent research has suggested that teachers’ burnout is growing and, consequently,
affecting their overall satisfaction with life and professional involvement. The goal
of this study was to assess burnout in Portuguese teachers and to explore whether
burnout levels are associated with teachers’ personal and professional character‑
istics. A sociodemographic questionnaire and the Oldenburg Burnout Inventory
(OLBI) were used to collect data from a sample of 262 teachers, who were mostly
female (66.0%), were aged between 26 and 63 years (mean = 44, SD = 7.95), and had
an average of 18 years of experience in teaching regular classes (SD = 9.22) and an
average of 2 years of experience in special education (SD = 4.97). The results sug‑
gested the adequate psychometric properties of the OLBI in Portuguese teachers.
Moreover, the older the teachers were, the higher the levels of burnout they reported.
Burnout was positively associated with the number of years of experience but only
in regular education teachers. Although no differences in burnout as a function of
experience in inclusive classrooms were found, a positive correlation of teachers’
burnout with the number of students with special needs in the classroom was identi‑
fied. The results are discussed according to the literature, and suggestions for future
studies are presented.
This work was supported by National Funds, provided through FCT (Fundação para a Ciência e a Tecnologia) to the strategic projects UID/FIL/00683/2019 and POCI-01-0145-FEDER-007562.