Research Burnout Among Chinese University English Teachers: An Actor Network Theory Perspective

Abstract

In order to explore the situation of College English teachers' research burnout and ways to alleviate it, 144 College English teachers were investigated by using the University Teachers' Research Burnout Inventory, and the data were analyzed by SPSS 24. It was found that College English teachers' research burnout was common and serious, especially the research emotional exhaustion(REE). In addition, there were significant differences for different groups of teachers in terms of variables like age of teaching, weekly class hours, core papers published and the punishment system of research, while there were no significant differences concerning variables such as gender, age, education background, university level and professional title. Based on the actor network theory, this study considers that factors such as teaching age, weekly hours, the number of core papers published, and the research punishment system are the stronger actors in the network, while the variables such as gender, age, education background, university level and professional title are the weaker actors in the network.