EXAMINATION OF THE INVARIANCE AND TEMPORAL ORDERING OF SELF-EFFICACY AND JOB SATISFACTION USING TALIS 2018 AND LONGITUDINAL TEACHER DATA

It is often assumed that the association between self-efficacy and job satisfaction is invariant and that the former predicts the latter. However, these two assumptions — its invariance and constructs’ temporal order—have rarely been examined. Focusing on teachers, we tested these two assumptions through a two-part study. In Study 1, we conducted a second-order multigroup factor model (MGCFA) to assess the invariance of the association between teacher self-efficacy (TSE) and job satisfaction (JS) using OECD’s TALIS 2018 data. In Study 2, we used an autoregressive cross-lagged panel design to examine the invariance and temporal ordering of TSE and JS using data from an initial sample of 3002 Croatian teachers (82% female) who completed questionnaires at three time points (at approximately six-month intervals). We found that the associations were invariant across gender, career stages, educational levels, and time. Moreover, we found that JS predicts future levels of TSE but TSE does not predict future levels of JS. These findings challenge previous theoretical and empirical conceptualizations of the constructs’ temporal order. Policies and interventions may thus choose to focus on increasing JS levels to asset in increasing TSE.