EXAMINING PSYCHOLOGICAL HARDINESS AND LEADERSHIP PRACTICES AND THEIR RELATION TO OCCUPATIONAL SATISFACTION AMONG COUNSELOR EDUCATORS By SANDRA M. LOGAN A DISSERTATION PRESENTED TO THE GRADUATE SCHOOL OF THE UNIVERSITY OF FLORIDA IN PARTIAL FULFILLMENT OF THE REQUIREMENTS FOR THE DEGREE OF DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY UNIVERSITY OF FLORIDA 2016 © 2016 Sandra M. Logan To my Mom and Dad for providing me with endless love, support, and laughter ACKNOWLEDGMENTS Never did I think that my career path would have led me to this moment, but here I am and now I can’t imagine it any other way. There are many individuals that I wish to thank for their support and motivation throughout this doctoral journey.
To my committee—I wish to express my gratitude to my chair Dr. Amatea for serving as my Chair and guiding me in this journey over the last four years. Thanks to Dr. Kristina DePue for always making time to check in on me and giving me your precious time to chat when I needed it.
Thanks to Dr. Corinne Manley for always having a warm, approachable demeanor and making the research process fun--- Yes, you have taught me the skills that make data analysis process F-U-N, and I look forward to collaborating with you in the future! Thanks to Dr. Tony Andenoro for your infinite enthusiasm and for teaching me what leadership is (and is not) all about! Also, I can’t express my gratitude enough to Candy and Patty for holding down the office and being my “go to” gals to handle details and paperwork. Many professional mentors have impacted me, both personally and professionally, from recent and long ago: Dr.
Joel Lipman—You were perhaps the first person I called a mentor and you supported me through all that I set out to accomplish. You have been a great role model of persevering and striving for innovation and excellence. Jami Parsons—From the start, we were a dynamic duo! Thank you for modeling the way and showing me what a professional school counselor is all about. You embody the leadership and advocacy that is necessary in our profession.
I greatly attribute my strong professional identity as a school counselor to you and the opportunities that you afforded to me during my training. 4 Lori Rybaczyk—I will not forget our supervisory relationship that just sort of naturally evolved. I love your fiery attitude and your strong commitment to helping others. I believe that is why I was so drawn to you.
Vicki Kress—I will never forget how we met at ACA Conference in Cincinnati. Your enthusiasm and support throughout this journey is priceless! Thank you for always encouraging me, even when times got rough! I look forward to us having more “brainstorming” conversations that result in scribbled notes on cocktail napkins. Erin Mason—Although we initially “met” online, I knew we would eventually meet face-to-face and hit it off. You are an incredible role model and feel honored to all you a mentor! Dr.
Melissa Wheeler—Wow, I didn’t know what I was getting myself into when I met you! Thank you for being a great colleague, but more importantly, a great friend! When I needed someone to vent to, or run ideas by, you were always there! Dr. Donna Gibson—It has been such a pleasure to work with you over the last few years. I have learned so much from you and truly appreciate our working relationship. Thank you for being a great role model! Dr.
Joy Burnham—You are such a gem! I am so appreciative of your kind words and ongoing support throughout the dissertation process and beyond. You have been and continue to be a wonderful mentor. In addition to my mentors, I would like to thank all of the students, supervisees, and supervisors at University of Florida and Lamar University that have motivated and inspired me with their growth over the last few years. You are truly what keep me going and remembering why I am doing what I’m doing.
5 To my Divine Dime colleagues—Thank you all for the inappropriate jokes and banter that helped us survive the process. I wish you all the best in your career aspirations. To Stephanie, Ami, Robin, and Eric—I honestly don’t think that I could have made it through this process, especially the last 2 years, without you. Each of you were always there to help me when I was stuck, needed to vent, or just simply give me a good laugh.
Thank you for your unconditional friendship. To my Cali Gals, you know who you are—Thank you for continuing to love and support me from afar. I value my friendships with you all! Bradley Bear—Wow, where to even begin! Never in my wildest dreams did I think I would have met such an incredible human being that I get to call my partner. You entered my life just as the “fun” began in my doctoral program—writing my specialty paper and tackling this dissertation.
You have consistently provided me with the love, support, and oftentimes, space that I needed. I appreciate all of the small gestures that kept me going. I look forward to spending our lives together, conquering this thing called life. Love you to the beach and back! And last but definitely not least, my family--Mom & Dad, thank you so much for always encouraging and supporting me! I know it’s not always easy to handle this self- proclaimed headstrong independent woman.
You both thought I was crazy when I said “What do you do when you’re turning 30, have no significant other, no children, and are burned out from your job…I’m moving across the country and earning a PhD!” Thank you for always taking my phone calls and allowing me to vent, even when you didn’t understand what I was saying, and for always making me laugh with your jokes, right at 6 the time that I needed them. The success of this endeavor truly could not be possible without the two of you. 7 TABLE OF CONTENTS ACKNOWLEDGMENTS. 4 LIST OF TABLES.
11 LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS. 15 Scope of the Problem. 17 Psychological Hardiness and Occupational Satisfaction. 25 Leadership Behaviors and Occupational Satisfaction.
28 Occupational Satisfaction among Counselors. 30 Counselor Leadership Behaviors. 36 Hagedorn’s Theory of Job Satisfaction in Higher Education. 36 Bass’ Theory of Transformational Leadership.
38 Need for the Study. 40 Purpose of the Study. 42 Definition of Terms. 43 Overview of the Study.
47 2 REVIEW OF THE RELATED LITERATURE. 49 Occupational Satisfaction in Higher Education. 78 Transformational Leadership in the Helping Professions. 80 Understanding Counselor Leadership.
85 Contributing Factors to Involvement in Leadership. 86 The Nature of Counselor Leadership. 92 Voices from the Field. 112 Dependent Variable of Occupational Satisfaction.
116 Population and Sample. 119 Demographics of the Resultant Sample. 121 Type of Higher Education Institution. 122 Current Salary for 9-month Contract.
122 Number of Academic Institutions in Which Employed. 123 Number of Years in Current Academic Position. 123 Number of Years Worked as a Counselor Educator. 124 Graduation from a CACREP-accredited Doctoral Program.
124 ACES Regional Affiliation. 125 Membership in Professional Organizations. 125 Data Collection Procedures. 126 Leadership Practices Inventory.
126 Dispositional Resilience Scale. 129 Occupational Satisfaction in Higher Education-Revised. 140 Data Analysis Procedures. 140 Descriptive Statistics for the Study Variables.
143 Relationships Among the Variables. 154 Descriptive Statistics for Study Variables. 157 Relationships Among Leadership Practices, Hardiness, and Occupational Satisfaction. 158 Factors Associated with Leadership Practices.
158 Factors Associated with Occupational Satisfaction. 162 Leadership Practices and Occupational Satisfaction. 165 Predictors of Occupational Satisfaction. 168 Implications for Educators.
172 Higher Education Administrators. 173 Implications for Counselor Education Preparation Programs. 174 Recommendations for Future Research. 179 APPENDIX A: INFORMED CONSENT DOCUMENT – ONLINE VERSION.
181 B: RECRUITMENT LETTER TO COUNSELOR EDUCATORS. 209 10 LIST OF TABLES 2-1 Five Subscales of the Leadership Practices Inventory. 104 3-1 Participants’ age range. 135 3-2 Participants’ race/ethnicity.
135 3-3 Participants’ relationship status. 135 3-4 Participants’ sexual orientation. 136 3-5 Participants’ Carnegie Classification work setting. 136 3-6 Participants’ current 9-month contract salary.
137 3-7 Year of highest degree earned. 137 3-8 Participants’ counseling specialization. 138 3-9 Participants’ ACES region affiliation. 138 3-10 Participant’s professional organization membership.
139 4-1 Descriptive statistics for the study’s variables. 152 4-2 Correlations among study variables. 152 4-3 Occupational satisfaction regression model summary. 152 4-4 Occupational satisfaction regression model coefficients.
153 4-5 Summary of hypothesis testing results. 153 11 LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS ACA American Counseling Association ACES Association for Counselor Education and Supervision CACREP Council for Accreditation of Counseling and Related Educational Programs CESNET Counselor Education and Supervision Network CSI Chi Sigma Iota CTP Challenge the Process DRS-15 Dispositional Resilience Scale (Bartone, 2014) EOA Enable Others to Act ETH Encourage the Heart ISV Inspire a Shared Vision JSS Job Satisfaction Survey (Spector, 1985) LPI Leadership Practices Inventory (Kouzes & Posner, 2013) MBI-ES Maslach Burnout Inventory—Educator Survey (Maslach et al., 1996) MLQ Multifactor Leadership Questionnaire (Bass & Avolio, 2000) MSQ Minnesota Satisfaction Questionnaire (Weiss, Dawis, England, & Lofquist, 1967) MTW Model the Way NSF National Science Foundation OSHE_R Occupational Satisfaction in Higher Education-Revised (Hill, 2005) OSI-R Occupational Stress Inventory (Osipow, 1998; Osipow & Spokane, 1983, 1984) PPLES Principles and Practices of Leadership Excellence RCS Racial Climate Survey (Watts & Carter, 1991) TL Transformational Leadership 12 Abstract of Dissertation Presented to the Graduate School of the University of Florida in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree of Doctor of Philosophy EXAMINING PSYCHOLOGICAL HARDINESS AND LEADERSHIP PRACTICES AND THEIR RELATION TO OCCUPATIONAL SATISFACTION AMONG COUNSELOR EDUCATORS By Sandra M. Logan August 2016 Chair: Ellen S. Amatea Major: Counseling and Counselor Education This study examined the psychological hardiness and leadership practices of counselor educators and to what extent they contributed to the occupational satisfaction in a sample of 159 full-time counselor educators employed in CACREP accredited programs.
Cross-sectional survey research methods were used. Correlations between the study variables were explored, and multiple regression analysis was employed to determine predictive relationships. Exploring relationships between the study variables identified numerous statistically significant correlations. Counselor educators’ leadership practices were significantly correlated with their level of hardiness.
Hardiness was also found to be correlated with occupational satisfaction. Additionally, counselor educators’ occupational satisfaction was significantly related to faculty rank. Multiple regression analysis revealed that leadership practices, hardiness, faculty rank, employment status, and gender were predictive of 20.3% of the amount of variance reported in occupational satisfaction among counselor educators in this sample. Further, hardiness, faculty rank, and the LPI Model the Way subscale scores were found to be significant predictors of 13 occupational satisfaction.
Discussion of the results and implications for counselor educators and counselor education preparation programs are presented, in addition to recommendations for future research. 14 CHAPTER 1 INTRODUCTION Although employee job satisfaction has been a heavily researched area in industry, business, and the corporate world, relatively little attention has been paid to examining the occupational satisfaction of faculty within higher education settings (Hagedorn, 2000). Tack and Patitu (1992) reviewed the research literature over a 20 year period and reported that 13.7% of the research studies examined the occupational satisfaction of faculty in higher education. One of the most noteworthy recent studies of faculty occupational satisfaction was conducted by Sabharwal and Corley (2009).
Using a national sample drawn from the National Science Foundation 2003 Survey of Doctorate Recipients dataset of more than 200,000 participants (weighted), these researchers reported that male faculty had significantly higher salaries than female faculty, as well as significantly higher levels of overall occupational satisfaction, across all included disciplines.