Psychological capital and job satisfaction in public-school teachers: the mediating role of prosocial behaviours

The level of satisfaction teachers experience in their profession not only has an impact on their personal life, but also influences the lives of their students and, thus, indirectly orients greater community at a certain level. This study proposed and tested a model of teacher job satisfaction predicted by self-efficacy, hope, resilience and optimism through the mediating role of prosocial behaviours. The sample included 372 teachers (120 males, 252 females) working in public schools. A path analysis was conducted to analyse the data. The results of the path analysis showed that the goodness of fit values for the proposed model were poor. A second model was generated by excluding hope from the model and adding a direct path from optimism to job satisfaction. The results for the adjusted model showed that self-efficacy, resilience and optimism hold a significantly positive relationship with prosocial behaviours, while prosocial behaviours enjoy a significantly positive relationship with job satisfaction among teachers. The adjusted model was found to explain a 20% variance in job satisfaction in the field, thus encouraging a discussion on the possible implications the study carries for teacher training and skill acquisition programmes.