Decent work and teacher professional development: the mediation of survival needs satisfaction amongst a sample of teachers in South Africa

This is the authors' abstract. We don't add key points for this paper.

This study examined the links between decent work and teacher professional development (TPD) through the Psychology of Working Theory perspective by positioning survival needs satisfaction as a mediator of this relationship. A sample of 330 teachers from various public schools in the Royal Mhlaba Local Municipality in the Eastern Cape completed the Decent Work Scale, Survival Needs Satisfaction SubScale, and Teacher Professional Development Scale. Structural equation modelling results revealed that decent work has a direct positive but non-significant link with TPD. Decent work positively and significantly predicted rural teachers’ survival needs satisfaction; survival needs satisfaction directly and significantly predicted TPD. Overall, decent work predicted TPD indirectly via survival need fulfilment. Implications for research, policy, and practice are discussed.