Instructor role conflict in educational organizations having thecharacteristics of total institutions

Examines the degree to which the findings of earlier studies of school teacher role conflict can be generalized to instructors in educational organizations manifesting many of the characteristics of total institutions. Uses a random sample of 233 instructors serving in the Israeli Defence Forces and attempts to identify additional antecedents of instructor role conflict which may have especially powerful effects in such educational organizations. Suggests that work design characteristics having the potential to exacerbate approach‐distance incongruencies may be more powerful in explaining the level of role conflict experienced by instructors in these educational organizations than those work design variables rooted in the professional‐bureaucratic conflict perspective of role stress.