Study title

Teachers are more likely than average to suffer from mental disorders and psychosomatic illnesses. They experience disruptions of teaching by students (hereinafter referred to as "classroom disruptions") as a major stress factor. Teachers also report classroom disruptions as the main reason for leaving the profession and for early retirement. These findings are based primarily on teacher self-reports. Teachers' objective working conditions and physiological stress reactions to acute stressful events in the classroom, on the other hand, have hardly been researched so far. This field study aimed to record a workday and a day off for 44 teachers, focusing on teacher-student interactions in the classroom and daily life. In an ambulatory assessment design with complementary follow-up surveys, the multimodal recording of psychological stress experience, biological stress responses, and disruptions occurring in the classroom by independent observers will answer the following questions: Research questions: 1) How does the degree of stress of teachers vary intraindividually and interindividually between workdays and days off, during the course of the day, and as a function of activity classes? 2) What forms of aggressive and non-aggressive classroom disruptions are associated with physiological stress responses in teachers? How do teachers' acute stress reactions and their associated classroom actions affect further student disruptive behavior and classroom interaction? 3) How do teachers' general strains and resources influence their acute stress responses, their actions in the face of disruptions, and their appraisals of the teacher-student relationship? What are the short- and longer-term consequences of increased teacher stress for the teacher, learners, and instruction? The project's significance for schools and education: The study contributes to primary and secondary stress prevention among teachers. Short-term physiological stress responses triggered by...