Iranian EFL Teachers’ Perceptions of Burnout Sources: A Qualitative Study

This qualitative study aims to investigate the sources of burnout from Iranian EFLteachers’ perspectives. To this end, thirty-four Iranian male and female EFLteachers participated in the semi-structured interview to comment on the burnoutsources and then rank them in terms of priority. Also, one hundred teachersresponded to an online open-ended questionnaire. The coding scheme revealed twoexternal and internal nodes, five themes, and fifteen subthemes. Under the externalnode lay financial, organizational, and teacher training problems. The internal nodeinvolved teachers’ psycho-affective traits and personal life affairs. The resultsshowed that external sources outweighed the internal ones. Among the externalsources, teachers’ low pay, the supervisor’s maltreatment, and workload, andamong the internal ones, teachers’ low problem-solving abilities, low motivationand self-efficacy held high ranks. No one attributed burnout to teachers’ genderand age, and almost all participants unanimously criticized the educationaladministration system of Iran for not providing teachers with the necessary meansof burnout recognition and prevention. The study has implications for educationalpolicymakers and practitioners.