Teacher Burnout: A Case Study among EFL Instructors at the English Preparatory Schools at Universities in North Cyprus

The job of being an English language instructor is both demanding and challenging. Recently many researchers have been paying attention to determine teachers’ attitudes, burnouts, and self-efficacy towards the subject and to find a relationship between those psychological concepts and certain variables. However, there is not much research done in the field of English language teaching in North Cyprus, Turkey, and in the Middle East regarding EFL teacher burnout and self-efficacy. This study aimed to investigate the perceived levels of burnout among EFL Instructors at the English Preparatory Schools in Girne American University, Near East University and the European University of Lefke in North Cyprus using the Maslach Burnout Inventory-Education Survey developed by Friedman. The study, in which 51 EFL instructors participated found that instructors experienced low levels of emotional exhaustion, low levels of depersonalization in relationships with students, colleagues, and others, and a high level of personal accomplishment in their work. An EFL instructor’s age, marital status, work experience, weekly teaching hours, job status, native or non-native status do not seem to influence instructors’ responses on each of the sub-scales of the Maslach Burnout Inventory. However, variables gender and the university they work to influence their responses related to emotional exhaustion, but they do not influence their responses related to depersonalization and personal accomplishment scores on the Maslach Burnout Inventory.


Introduction
People especially learn English because it"s the most common language spoken in the world. Both at a distance and face-to-face, in Commerce, Tourism, Professions, Politics, Economics and Education English is increasingly needed. The rapid growth of the importance of learning English has made the teaching profession one of the world"s largest educational enterprises. Unfortunately, the realities of classrooms have made teaching a stressful environment. It is absolutely one of those jobs that you cannot leave at the school or office. Teachers" physical bodies, emotions, minds, and spirits are all involved in schoolwork. They may find themselves working, or at least thinking about their work even on holiday.
From this standpoint, EFL/ESL teachers have heavier responsibilities than before, and studies show that teaching is one of the most stressful jobs as compared to other occupations (Adams, 2001). Recent innovations in the field of education and language teaching have created a rather novel role for teachers.
Teachers are no longer looked at as the mere transferors of knowledge, but as individuals who need to communicate and engage with students more than before and to care for their inner worlds (Arnold, 1999). They are expected to empathize with learners, try to motivate them, and encourage them to participate in classroom activities, and generally speaking, to help facilitate learning. However, in addition to all these roles, they also need to engage in many other tasks such as paperwork, evaluating students, preparing for the class, remaining up-to-date with their teaching area, and preparing their teaching materials. At the same time, they might have positive or negative encounters with parents, colleagues, administrative authorities, and students, all of which can affect them psychologically. As a result, many teachers end up having more negative feelings about themselves, their students, and their profession than they were initially. They start developing feelings of emotional exhaustion and fatigue, negative attitudes towards their students, and loss of feelings of accomplishment in their job. People experiencing these feelings have been described as suffering from "job burnout" (Maslach & Jackson, 1981;Maslach & Goldberg, 1998;Maslach, Schaufeli, & Leiter, 2001;Pietarinen, Pyhä ltö, Haverinen, Leskinen, & Soini, 2021).
The concept of burnout occurring in stages was researched by Evers et al. (2000), who also encourages the view that burnout is a process that has varying levels and degrees. Understanding the extent to which an individual suffers from burnout can be helpful in diagnosing and treating the syndrome. Thus, to have a better understanding of the development of burnout, its causes must first be investigated.
of an existential vacuum characterized by apathy, boredom, and a loss of interest in relationships.
According to Karazman (1994), people displaying symptoms of an existential vacuum seem to have high degrees of depersonalization and emotional exhaustion. Burnouts misinterpret the requirements for and components of successful human existence as they lack a sense of inner fulfillment. Burnouts view their work as something to serve their own aims and not as something that should be appreciated for its unique value and inherent meaning (Lä ngle, 2003).
As far as burnout is concerned in the field of teacher education, researchers first studied teacher burnout through the lens of teacher stress (Smylie, 1999). According to their findings, special education teachers are the most prone to high stress and burnout (McIntyre, 1983). However, in the 1980s, scholars in teacher education identified the important factors in teacher stress and burnout from demographic information such as age, gender, marital status, work experience, and level of education.
In the early 1990s, researchers began to examine the work-related factors, such as teacher-pupil ratio, grade level taught, types of exceptional children taught, and workload. As workload appeared to be the most salient element among the work-related factors, some models were proposed to investigate teacher burnout regarding it. And findings of that studies show that burnout is a syndrome caused by prolonged stress and is certainly in connection with the work environment. Recently, Maslach"s work on burnout seems to have emerged as the dominant framework for studying burnout because of the defining psychological constructs she developed.

Three Aspects of Burnout
Burnout refers to a cluster of physical, emotional, and interactional symptoms, including emotional exhaustion, a sense of lacking personal accomplishment, and depersonalization of clients. Maslach and Jackson (1981) argue that burnout comprises three factors: (a) "emotional exhaustion", which is described as feelings of being emotionally overextended and exhausted, (b) "personal accomplishment", which is experienced by teachers as decreased feelings of competence and achievement and a tendency to evaluate oneself negatively with respect to work and (c) "depersonalization" which is the development of negative feelings and attitudes about the profession.
On the whole, research studies identifying sources of burnout as individual factors provided the answers to "who" experiences burnout, while studies identifying sources of burnout as social and organizational factors provided the answers to "what" makes teachers burn out. And finally, transactional factors include interactions of individual factors with organizational and/or social factors, such as an employee"s perceptions of leadership style, teachers" attribution of student misbehaviors, and teachers" perceptions of exchange of investments and outcomes (Bibou-nakou, Stogiannidou, & Kiosseoglou, 1999;Evers et al., 2004;Friedman, 1995;Van Horn, Schaufeli, & Enzmann, 1999).

The EFL Context in North Cyprus
English as a foreign language is formally taught to Cypriot students from nursery school to university education (first year of nursery school, primary eight years of primary school, high school for three years, and another year during the pre-university level and university education There are several common complaints from teachers about their work environments. Many don"t have their office or even their desk to store materials. Those who do have their offices often find that the facilities aren"t adequate to handle their students" needs. Some don"t have computers or internet access.
Others don"t receive sufficient benefit packages or training hours per year. Some schools don"t have good libraries.
On the whole, school staffing is about more than just finding teachers to work in schools. It"s also important to retain good teachers. Constant turnover of new teachers leads to students coping with a stream of novices in the classroom, this contributes to academic breakdowns, failure to notice specific academic problems, and eventually to an environment where the students have to teach as much as to learn.
Finally, the universities can fire EFL instructors regularly for absolutely no valid reason. Most instructors have one-year working contracts and they are often underpaid and under-supported in their need for educational resources for their students. Poor working conditions can lead to many negative issues for teachers including depression, anger, lack of interest, and burnout.
Several research studies (e.g., Chang & Davis, 2009;Dussault, Deaudelin, Royer, & Loisella, 1999;Fullan, 2001;Maslach et al., 1996;Maslach et al., 2001;Napoles, 2021;Saloviita & Pakarinen, 2021;Woolfolk Hoy & Davis, 2005) have examined the problem of teacher burnout. Since very little research has been done on teacher stress and burnout in the field of EFL/ESL, and there is not much research done in the field of English language teaching in North Cyprus, Turkey, and in the Middle East regarding teacher burnout and self-efficacy.
This study aimed to investigate potential inside and outside classroom sources of burnout among instructors of EFL within the university preparatory context in North Cyprus. Based on the research and problems discussed above, there is a need to examine EFL instructors" perceptions of their burnout within the university English preparatory context in North Cyprus. The study is also expected to have implications for the current attitudes of EFL instructors towards their job and professional development.

Hypothesis
EFL instructors" perceived burnout is correlated with their performance and a teacher who is prone to burnout may be inefficacious and have lower competence in his or her capabilities while carrying out instructional activities.

Method
As this study aimed to investigate the perceived levels of burnout among EFL instructors in North Cyprus, the research design of this study was a descriptive survey method. Maslach Burnout Inventory-Education Survey developed by Friedman (1999) was used to determine the frequency of burnout in respondents. The MBI-ES is the predominant instrument used to assess burnout in teachers and educational administrators (Maslach, Jackson, & Schwab, 1986).

Research Questions
Four research questions were asked and answered on 1) the extent to which EFL instructors experienced emotional exhaustion in their work; 2) the extent to which EFL instructors experienced depersonalization in relationships with students, colleagues, and other; 3) the extent to which they experienced personal accomplishment at work; 4) if burnout among them was influenced by selected individual characteristics of gender, job status, native or non-native status, university they work, age, marital status, work experience and weekly teaching hours.

Participants
A total of 51 EFL instructors working at the English Preparatory Schools of Girne American University, Near East University, and the European University of Lefke participated in this study. The participants were not selected as participation was voluntary. Participants filled out the questionnaires anonymously.

Data Collection Procedures and Instruments
The instrument selected for this study was the Maslach Burnout Inventory-Education Survey developed by Friedman (1999) to determine the frequency of burnout in respondents. The MBI-ES consists of 22 statements describing the feelings an individual might have as a result of being over-stressed or burned out. It also measures burnout on three sub-scales: Emotional Exhaustion (EE), Depersonalization (DP), and Personal Accomplishment (PA). The reliability of the questionnaire was also tested, and the Cronbach"s Alpha Coefficient was found as .731.
After selecting the data collection instruments, the necessary permissions were obtained from the directors of Preparatory Schools of the three universities to administer the questionnaire. As the instructors agreed to participate, the instrument was administered at the instructors' work sites.

Data Analysis
After the data were collected at the Fall Semester of 2010-2011 Academic Year, the researcher used SPSS (PASW 18.0) to analyze the data collected. 51 questionnaires were coded for statistical analysis with PASW 18.0. The data were examined for reliability over the entire questionnaire and according to the six sub-groups, descriptive statistics, including means and standard deviations, frequencies, percentages were computed to summarize the instructors" responses to the items in the questionnaire, and independent sample T-Test and ANOVA tests were used to determine whether there was a statistically significant effect of demographical variables. The analyses were done in the order of the research questions.

Result and Discussion
Results gained from this study are given and discussed based on each research question.

Results and Discussion of the Research Question 1
The research question 1 seeks answers as to the perceptions of EFL instructors regarding the perceived levels of burnout related to emotional exhaustion-EE. The data for this is seen in Table 2. In response to the first research question, the research findings reveal that EFL instructors work very hard and they get tired at the end of the day.
Concerning item analysis to investigate the high and low burnout beliefs among EFL instructors, the third item "I feel I am working too hard on my job" (M=2.44) shows the highest mean among the nine items related to Emotional Exhaustion-EE in the questionnaire. It might be implied that instructors are working very hard and this may lead to burnout over time (Dorman, 2003;Schwab & Iwanicki, 1982). This also shows that the working loads of EFL instructors are very high as compared to teaching loads of primary and secondary school teachers in North Cyprus working very hard.
The first item "I feel used up at the end of the workday" (M=2.14) in the questionnaire shows the second-highest mean among the nine items related to Emotional Exhaustion-EE. It might give the idea that EFL teachers feel used up at the end of the day after high working loads. And this result also supports the fact that they are not happy with the working conditions in terms of weekly teaching hours.
However, this might also reveal that EFL instructors make a great contribution to language learning development in the EFL context in North Cyprus.
Regarding the lowest means, the researcher has identified two items: "I feel like I am at the end of my rope" (M=.25) and "working with people all day is really a strain for me" (M=.57). This result might reveal the fact that EFL instructors are highly energetic and hard-working. As discussed earlier, emotional exhaustion, as the core element of burnout, is considered to be the most obvious manifestation of this complex syndrome. Within this framework, EFL instructors included in this study are not prone to burnout due to the enthusiasm they feel for their job.
As discussed earlier, working conditions play a major role in burnout (Cheek, Bradley, Parr, & Lan, 2003;Dorman, 2003). Concerning our research study context, there might be a wide range of factors involved. From the standpoint of working conditions, EFL instructors at universities in North Cyprus have currently been suffering more and more as compared to the early 2000s. They get paid less than they used to in the early 2000s. There are still serious problems in terms of their work environments.
Many don't have their office or even their desk to store materials, whereas instructors teaching at other departments have better work environments. Weekly teaching hours of EFL instructors at preparatory schools are higher than those of instructors teaching at other departments at the universities and primary and secondary school teachers in North Cyprus.

Results and Discussion of the Research Question 2
Research question 2 seeks answers as to the perceptions of EFL instructors regarding the perceived levels of burnout related to depersonalization-DP. The data for this is seen in Table 3. As can be seen in depersonalization due to low levels of beliefs regarding depersonalization among EFL instructors.
Regarding the lowest means, as pointed out before, the researcher defined all other 4 items related to depersonalization as having low means at similar levels: "I have become more callous toward people since I took this job" (M=.27), "I feel I treat some students as if they were impersonal objects" (M=.29), "I feel students blame me for their problems" (M=.39), "I worry that this job is hardening me emotionally" (M=.63).
As discussed earlier, Evers et al. (2004) describe depersonalization as "a negative callous and detached attitude towards the people who one works with, i.e., patients, students" (p. 132). Taking the low level of means of the participants related to depersonalization into consideration, this result might reveal the fact that EFL instructors in this study are far away from depersonalization because perception level to the item "I have become more callous toward people since I took this job" is very low (M=.27).

Results and Discussion of the Research Question 3
Research question 3 seeks answers as to the perceptions of EFL instructors regarding the perceived levels of burnout related to personal accomplishment-PA. The data for this is seen in Table 4. As can be seen in Table 4, in response to the third research question, the research findings reveal that EFL instructors on average felt rather confident of their competence to perform their job professionally.
Concerning item analysis to investigate the perceptions of EFL instructors regarding the perceived levels of burnout related to personal accomplishment-PA, the eighth item "I can easily create a relaxed atmosphere with my students" (M=5.46) shows the highest mean among the eight items related to personal accomplishment-PA in the questionnaire. It might be implied that EFL instructors are quite able to do perform good classroom management skills. It might also give the idea that most of the instructors feel comfortable with the way they cope with students" problems. The second highest item is "I can easily understand how my students feel about things" (M=5.25). It might give the idea that instructors are more interested in listening to the problems of students developing empathy. And the following three high items "I have accomplished many worthwhile things in this job" (M=5.14), "I feel very energetic" (M=5.08), and "I feel I am positively influencing other people`s lives through my work" (M=5.02) might also reveal that EFL instructors do not feel exhausted or indifferent toward serving or helping people. Although it is not easy to gain a sense of accomplishment, the EFL instructors included in this study appear to have gained it. Bandura (1997) argues that self-efficacy reflects an individual"s beliefs in his or her capabilities to pursue a course of action to meet given situational demands. Viewed in this light, an efficacious teacher may have higher competence in his or her capabilities while carrying out instructional activities.
Regarding the lowest means, the researcher identified only one item which was not low at all. "I feel exhilarated after working closely with my students" (M=3.63) might reveal the fact that EFL instructors have a high level of efficacy regarding their teaching competence. It is still worth noticing that EFL instructors appear to be working very enthusiastically despite their poor working conditions.
As discussed earlier in the literature review, burnout is manifested in the following ways: work overload, lack of control over one"s work environment, lack of community among teachers in the school, lack of fairness in work assignments, and the uneven distribution or absence of rewards (Maslach et al., 1996;Napoles, 2021). Within this context then, one can argue that level of personal accomplishment seems not to have reduced for EFL instructors at universities in North Cyprus.

Results and Discussion of the Research Question 4
Research question 4 seeks answers as to the perceptions of EFL instructors regarding the variation according to a) gender, b) job status, c) native or non-native status, d) university they work, e) age, f) marital status, g) work experience, and h) weekly teaching hours. a) gender: To respond to this problem, the researcher made use of descriptive statistics and a "t" test to analyze the collected data. Table 5 shows the results of descriptive statistics. As it is seen in Table 5, the mean values of female instructors in terms of emotional exhaustion, depersonalization at work, and personal accomplishment at work are higher than those values of male instructors. However, only this does not indicate that there is a statistically significant difference between male and female instructors. To interpret whether there is a significant difference between them, independent samples "t" test results are illustrated in Table 6. depersonalization at work and personal accomplishment at work, no statistical significance has been found. In other words, male and female instructors have the same perceived levels of burnout and they have similar beliefs related to items for depersonalization at work and personal accomplishment. b) job status: To respond to this problem, the researcher used descriptive statistics and a "t" test to analyze the collected data. Table 7 shows the results of descriptive statistics. As can be seen in Table 7, the mean values of both full-time and part-time EFL instructors in terms of emotional exhaustion, depersonalization at work, and personal accomplishment at work are very similar. However, this does not indicate that there is a statistically significant difference between the perceptions of both full-time and part-time EFL instructors regarding emotional exhaustion, depersonalization, and personal accomplishment at work.
To reveal whether there is a statistically significant difference between the perceptions of full-time and part-time EFL instructors, independent samples "t" test results are illustrated in Table 8.   As it is seen in Table 9, the mean values of both native and non-native EFL instructors in terms of emotional exhaustion, depersonalization at work, and personal accomplishment at work are very similar. However, this does not indicate that there is a statistically significant difference between the perceptions of both native and non-native EFL instructors. To reveal whether there is a significant difference between the perceptions of native and non-native EFL instructors in terms of emotional exhaustion, depersonalization, and personal accomplishment at work, a "t" test was utilized. The results of the "t" test are shown in Table 10.

Table 10. Independent Samples Test for Native or Non-native Status
As it is seen in Table 10, regarding emotional exhaustion, depersonalization at work, and personal accomplishment at work, no statistical significance was found between the perceptions of both native and non-native EFL instructors. In other words, native and non-native EFL instructors have similar opinions related to items for emotional exhaustion, depersonalization, and personal accomplishment at work. d) university they work: To respond to this problem, an "analysis of variance" ANOVA was applied. The results of the analysis are given in Table 11.
Levene"s   e) age: To respond to this problem, an "analysis of variance" ANOVA was applied. The results of the analysis are given in Table 13. As it is seen in Table 13, the mean values of participants of all age groups in terms of emotional exhaustion, depersonalization at work, and personal accomplishment at work are very similar. In other words, regarding emotional exhaustion, depersonalization at work, and personal accomplishment at work, no statistical significance was found between the perceptions of EFL instructors from all age groups.
f) marital status: To respond to this problem, an "analysis of variance" ANOVA was applied.
The results of the analysis are given in Table 14. As it is seen in Table 14, the mean values of participants of all marital status groups in terms of emotional exhaustion, depersonalization at work, and personal accomplishment at work are very similar. In other words, regarding emotional exhaustion, depersonalization at work, and personal accomplishment at work, no statistical significance was found between the perceptions of EFL instructors from all marital status groups.
g) work experience: To respond to this problem, an "analysis of variance" ANOVA was applied.
The results of the analysis are given in Table 15. As can be seen in Table 15, the mean values of participants of all work experience groups in terms of emotional exhaustion, depersonalization at work, and personal accomplishment at work are very similar. In other words, regarding emotional exhaustion, depersonalization at work, and personal accomplishment at work, no statistical significance was found between the perceptions of EFL instructors from all work experience groups.
h) weekly teaching hours: To respond to this problem, an "analysis of variance" ANOVA was applied. The results of the analysis are given in Table 16. www.scholink.org/ojs/index.php/grhe Global Research in Higher Education Vol. 4, No. 4, 2021 67 Published by SCHOLINK INC.

Conclusion and Recommendations
The researcher"s goal in undertaking this survey study was to investigate the perceived levels of treating the syndrome.
From this standpoint of view, this study targeting the population of all EFL instructors working at the universities in North Cyprus aimed to determine the extent to which EFL instructors experienced personal accomplishment in their work, the extent to which they experienced depersonalization in relationships with students, colleagues and others, the extent to which they experienced emotional exhaustion in their work and finally if burnout among EFL instructors was influenced by selected individual instructor characteristics of gender, age, marital status, work experience, weekly teaching hours, job status, native or non-native status and the university they worked.
As we all well know, instructors who exhibit characteristics of being burned out are not effective in the classroom and they believe they can no longer be responsible for the behavior or active learning of the students in their classroom. Approached from this angle, burned-out instructors are not effective in the classroom, they provide their students with fewer positive reinforcements, and also they have negative effects on student performance. Results gained from this study show that EFL instructors are not very satisfied with their institutions, work environment. Paradoxically, however, within the context of this study then, the level of personal accomplishment seems not to have reduced for EFL instructors at universities in North Cyprus.
As far as depersonalization is concerned, low perceived levels of mean scores of the participants related to depersonalization might reveal the fact that EFL instructors in this study are far away from depersonalization. For example, the perception level of the item "I have become more callous toward people since I took this job" is very low (M=.27). As pointed out before, the other 4 items related to depersonalization were also defined to have low means at similar levels.
As discussed before, EFL instructors should empathize with learners, try to motivate them to participate in classroom activities, and help facilitate learning. In addition to all these roles, they are also expected to engage in many other tasks such as paperwork, student evaluation, preparation of materials for the class, and professional development. They are also likely to have positive or negative encounters with parents, colleagues, administrative authorities, and students, all of which can affect them psychologically.
It is in this way that, many instructors end up having more negative feelings about themselves, their students, and their profession. They start developing feelings of emotional exhaustion and fatigue, negative attitudes towards their students, and loss of feelings of accomplishment in their job. People experiencing these feelings have been described as suffering from "job burnout" (Maslach & Goldberg, 1998;Maslach et al., 2001;Norhisham, Husain, Abas, & Haza, 2021).
Taking the results of this study into consideration concerning emotional exhaustion, which is seen as a personal psychological status that cannot capture other behaviors related to burnout, it seems that EFL teachers feel used up at the end of the day after high working loads. And this result also supports the fact that they are not happy with the working conditions in terms of weekly teaching hours. As discussed earlier, burnout is manifested in the ways such as work overload, lack of control over one"s work environment, lack of community among teachers in the school, lack of fairness in work assignments, and the uneven distribution or absence of rewards (Maslach et al., 1996).
When one perceives a threat, a stress response is triggered and a series of physiological and psychological changes occur and stress occurs when that person perceives that he/she is incapable of coping with life"s demands (ERIC Development Team, 2002). What is clear is that teachers face many demands from students, parents, administrators, and peers every day. These demands can lead to stress that, over time, can end in burnout.
It is well known that all EFL instructors work on a contractual basis at the universities in North Cyprus and the universities can dismiss EFL instructors from their job regularly for absolutely no valid reason.
Most instructors have one-year working contracts and they are often underpaid and under-supported in their need for educational resources for their students. Poor working conditions can lead to many negative issues for teachers including depression, anger, lack of interest, and burnout. As part of my inductive observation and individual talks with some EFL instructors, I have observed that most of the instructors complain about working conditions, work environment, teaching loads, salaries.
Paradoxically, however, results gained from this study show that EFL instructors claim that they are not prone to burnout.

Recommendations for Future Research
As pointed out earlier, very little research has been done on teacher stress and burnout in the field of English Language Teaching. As this study aimed to investigate the perceived levels of burnout among EFL Instructors at the English Preparatory Schools in Girne American University, Near East University, and the European University of Lefke in North Cyprus, further research studies could be conducted primarily to investigate potential inside and outside classroom sources of burnout among instructors of EFL within university preparatory context in North Cyprus.
Based on the research and problems discussed above, there is also a need to examine the causes of burnout within the university preparatory context in North Cyprus. Similar studies could also be carried out in other EFL settings like primary and secondary schools.