Abstract
A persistent teacher shortage obstructs equitable education in the United States. Ample empirical research has identified myriad (often system-level) variables that predict retention of special education teachers (SETs). However, three teacher-level psychological factors have yet to be examined: the moral identity of SETs, basic psychological needs (BPN) satisfaction from special education work, and intrinsic/extrinsic motivation for special education work. This exploratory study conducted multiple regression modeling on 202 cases of practicing SETs to determine the extent that the three factors relate with SET retention as measured by total years special education teaching experience. Results present preliminary empirical evidence that internalized and symbolized moral identity relate with SET retention—but with inverse negative and positive relationships. Furthermore, BPN satisfaction and intrinsic/extrinsic motivation appear to not relate with SET retention. Results point to the potential in considering proximal teacher-level psychological factors to describe and address teacher retention.
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Data availability
Data available upon vetted request to ensure participant confidentiality. This study does not serve the financial interest or benefit of the authors. This study was partially supported by a Dille Grant through the Minnesota State University, Moorhead Alumni Foundation.
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Acknowledgements
Authors wish to thank special education teachers for carving time and thought to participate in the project. Authors also thank Dr. Bob Ives for insights with data collection. Authors thank Minnesota State University, Moorhead Alumni Foundation for financial support. And the corresponding Author wishes to thank Kaija Dockter for love, light, and joi de vivre through the process.
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Appendix
Appendix
Screening Protocol
Authors assumed a conservative approach to delete cases that met any 2 out of 8 criteria below:
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(a)
Lack of consent.
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(b)
Lack of institutional email (e.g., author@outlook.com).
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(c)
Improbable short survey duration (e.g., < 5 min).
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(d)
Improbable discrepancy between IP submission geolocation and home/school zipcode. (e.g., Chicago IP submission and Minnesota home/school zipcode).
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(e)
Negative or missing answer to question “Are you a fully licensed SPED teacher?”.
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(f)
Contradictory or repeated answers to two pairs of items which convey unthinking responses. (e.g., strong agreement to “It would make me feel good to be a person who has these characteristics” and strong disagreement to “I would be ashamed to be a person who has these characteristics. OR strong agreement to “Being someone who has these characteristics is an important part of who I am” and strong agreement to “Having these characteristics is not really important to me.”
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(g)
Atypical name inputs with special characters (e.g., Leonard¬†L¬†Stark) or incoherent character sequence (e.g., ‰æùÂæ∑Êãâ¬∑Â∏ÉÈáå‰∫öÁ∫ ≥).
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(h)
Submission appears as part of block of en masse submissions with similar email patterns (e.g., twenty emails submitted within seconds of each other that share firstname_lastname_two randomletters@gmail.com).
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Locquiao, J., DeSutter, K. The relationship between moral identity, motivation, and basic psychological needs to special education teacher retention. Curr Psychol 43, 15176–15190 (2024). https://doi.org/10.1007/s12144-023-05454-8
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s12144-023-05454-8