Teachers' Perspectives Matter in Work Style Reform in Japan: Teachers' Expected, Real, and Ideal Work Hours

• In Event: Fairmont Roundtable Session Sixteen
  In Roundtable Session: A Quest for Well-Being: Insight Into Teaching Demands (Table 4)

Abstract

Teachers in Japan are known to work extremely long. Regardless of the workstyle reform, there has been no improvement. In order to explore a new way of solving this problem of long working hours, our research teams intended to collect teachers’ opinions about how they ideally want to work. Guided by the expectancy violation theory, our research examined the teachers’ expected and ideal work hours, in addition to their actual, and how the gaps among them influence their satisfaction. The results show that the gap between the ideal and actual work hours negatively influences teacher’ level of enjoyment to work as teachers. However, this negative influence is mitigated when teachers can predict their work hours accurately.

Authors

• Naomi Kagawa, Shimane University
  Presenting Author

• David Wong, Michigan State University
  Presenting Author