Abstract:

Teaching is one of the professions that are exposed to burnout the most. Various measures can be developed to reduce the professional burnout levels of teachers. Determining the potential factors affecting professional burnout can offer perspectives on issues that need to be prioritized to reduce these effects. In the present study, increasing professional social support factors was considered an important source of support. The research aimed to determine the priority order of professional social support factors that should be prioritized in reducing professional burnout levels of teachers. The study was designed in the relational research design among the quantitative research methods. The research data were collected from a total of 709 teachers, 397 (56%) females and 312 (44%) males, working in different types of schools in a metropolitan city center located in Central Anatolia and selected using the convenient sampling method. Artificial neural networks were used to determine the priority order of the variables affecting the level of professional burnout. In the study, it was determined that the main factors of professional social support that should be prioritized in reducing professional burnout were administrative support and student support. Based on the results of this study, it can be argued that studies aimed at improving administrative and student support in schools would enable teachers to prevent or reduce their professional burnout levels.

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