Currently, a considerable amount of work stress is present in school teachers,
one of the occupational groups with the highest levels of job strain and
burnout. As chronic stress produces significant modifications in emotional
adjustment and neuroendocrine functioning, we aimed to investigate the role of
these work stress constructs in the endocrine and mood responses of a group of
female teachers during two working days (WD) at different moments in the
academic year. We studied mood as well as levels of cortisol and testosterone,
representative of a predominant catabolic or anabolic balance. Our results
showed that higher “control” was associated with higher
positive mood (p = .028 on WD1 and
p = .057 on WD2) and salivary testosterone (Tsal)
(p = .022 on WD1), whereas
“demands” and “total job strain”
were related to negative mood (p = .011 and
p = .015, respectively). Participants with
higher scores on “total burnout” and “emotional
exhaustion” also had higher negative mood (p
< .05 in all cases). Depersonalization correlated positively with
negative mood (p = .019 and p
= .006 on WD1 and WD2, respectively). Finally, personal
accomplishment showed an inverse relationship with negative mood
(p = .038 on WD2). These results are useful for job
risk prevention and interventions that should focus on the control dimension of
the job strain questionnaire and on personal accomplishment from the burnout
scale.