The Relationship Between Burnout and Social Support for Iranian High-School Administrators

Abstract

This paper investigates the relationship between job burnout and social support among high school administrators of Iran. Existence of social support in this study was assessed by three dimensions of burnout including the emotional exhaustion, depersonalization and personal
accomplishment. A Sample including 212 high school administrators was studied via a questionnaire-based survey in order to collect the necessary data, based on Maslach and Jackson’s theory about job burnout and a handmade inventory for use in evaluating the impact of social support. The
results (obtained from hierarchical regression analyses) indicated that co-worker and organization supports have predictive value for burnoutdiminished quality of work life. The increased levels of social support were associated with decreased staff emotional exhaustion. Also, the increase
of supervisor support is related to decreased depersonalization. It was observed that there is a moderating role of social support from family members, colleagues and superiors for personal accomplishment. These findings have important implications for policymakers and researches with
a solution-oriented approach to burnout prevention among educational administrators.