The empirical study of the kindergarten teachers job

satisfaction in Taiwan: exploring the effect of the intrinsic

demand, external reward, and organizational treatment
Dr. Jao-Nan Cheng, Department of Education, National Taitung University, Taiwan
Dr. Yigean Chen, Department of Early Childhood Caring and Education, Chung Hwa
University of Medical Technology, Taiwan

ABSTRACT
There is difference in vocational environment between kindergarten teachers and childcare center
teachers in Taiwan, in which, generally, public are superior to private ones. We hope through nationwide
samples (in Taiwan) to explore the kindergarten teachers job satisfaction, and the effect of the intrinsic demand,
external reward, and organizational treatment. The results show: the results show the external reward (that it is
the material reward) is the most important effective factor to teachers satisfaction. The second effective factor is
the perception of organizational treatment (that it is the distributional justice), in which the perception of justice
that teachers are treated is the second option if the kindergartens principals hope to raise teachers job
satisfaction. The third effective factor is the intrinsic demand, including the feeling exchange, value fitness.
Keywords: teachers job satisfaction, external reward, organizational treatment, intrinsic demand.
INTRODUCTION
There is difference in vocational environment between kindergarten teachers and childcare center teachers
in Taiwan, in which, generally, public are superior to private ones. For example, some private schools offer
well-design policies of reward, reasonable workload. On the contrary, some private ones havent sensible
treatment as above. Therefore, the kindergarten teachers job satisfactions were affected by the treatments, and
the lower job satisfactions affect childrens learning (Coyle & Witcher, 1992; Lee, 2003). There is a lack of
nationwide samples to study about kindergarten teachers job satisfaction, and so is the model of integrated
theories and variables. We hope through nationwide samples (in Taiwan) to explore the kindergarten teachers
job satisfaction, and the effect of the intrinsic demand, external reward, and organizational treatment.
LITERATURE REVIEW
The present studies of job satisfaction focused on the relationship between teachers background and job
satisfaction (Yang, 1997), but lacked an overview of studies frame. The researcher reviewed the current
references and discovered the psychological need was a main influence factor to job satisfaction. For example,
ChenHus results (1994) showed personal values were in consistency with organizational values that the
members job satisfaction would rise, and Cheng & Liao (2000) appointed the social feeling exchange would
influence job satisfaction. The value consistency or value fitness, and the social feeling exchange relationship
are as the intrinsic demand which was a main variable.
The external reward was the other factor for job satisfaction. For example, Netemeyer, Boles, McKee,

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and McMurrian (1997) appointed the salary could influence job satisfaction, the more money reward the higher
satisfaction. Lees2003results supported the above result for the kindergartens and childcare centers teachers.
Therefore, some kindergartens managements implement accountability system based on teachers performance.
The external reward could influence job satisfaction that the researcher gets the salary and the material exchange
as predicted factors for job satisfaction.
Another factor was the organizational treatment. For example, Chengs (2004) result appointed the
distributional justice was relevant to job satisfaction: the more fairness, the better job satisfaction. The last factor
was the organizational one, the workload and commute-hours: the more workload, the lower job satisfaction
(Lee & Chen, 1999), and long commute-hours unsatisfied teachers.
The references combined, the studys purposes are as follows: 1. Understanding of kindergarten
teachers and childcare center teachers job satisfaction. 2. Understanding of feeling exchange, value fitness,
salary, material exchange, distributional justice, workload, and commute-hours. 3. Integration of feeling
exchange, value fitness, salary, material exchange, distributional justice, workload, and commute-hours and job
satisfaction as a model to explore the fitness through nationwide samples.
METHODOLOGY
According to the literary reviews above, the structure of this study was listed below. (Figure 1)

Intrinsic Demand:
1.feeling exchange 2.value fitness
Predictor
variable

Criterion variable

External Reward:
1.material exchange 2.salary

Predictor
variable

Organizational Treatment:

Job Satisfaction

Teachers back ground

Control
variables

1.distributional justice 2.workload

3.commute-hours
Figure 1: A research structure of this study
We conducted a random sampling in three different levels, which were 1.kindergarten and childcare
center, 2.urban and rural areas, 3.public and private schools. According to the percentage of the numbers of
kindergarten and childcare center, in sampled schools, every teacher had to fill in the questionnaire. The valid
samples were 1424 from 22 counties and cities in 229 schools.Department of Statistics of Ministry of the
Interior, 2005; Department of Statistics of Ministry of Education, 2005

The measurement tool in this study was the Questionnaire of Preschool Teachers Work Situation
which was modified from questionnaires by Netemeyer et al.(1997), Price and Mueller(1986), Cheng and
Liao(2000), Cheng(2006). For each question, the options were very true, true, somewhat true, untrue,
and very untrue, and each was assigned a score of 5 to 1, respectively. After revisions through this study, the
validity and the reliability value were good and all subscales results were as follows (Table 1).

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Table 1: Summary table of factor analysis and the validity and the reliability of this studys subscales
Percentage Reliability
Feeling
Eigenvalue
Questions
Commonality
of total
Cronbach' validity
Exchange

variance
s value
I feel the principal is friendly.
.931
.867
4.049
80.974
.94
.86~.93
I feel the principal is kind to
.918
.843
teachers on work.
I feel the relationships between
principal and teachers are just
.909
.826
like family.
The principal cares about my
.882
.779
life or my family.
I have a good relationship with
.857
.734
the principal.
I think I get a good pay from this
.884
.782
3.185
63.690
.85
.81~.88
kindergarten.
I think this kindergarten provides
.852
.727
teachers with good welfare.
I think the salary of this job is
.805
.648
good.
When a teacher has higher job
performance, this kindergarten
.790
.624
will provide him (her) with a
reward.
In this kindergarten, teachers
salary and reward are decided by
.635
.404
their job performance or number
of students in their own class.
About students care and
education, my opinion is the
.933
.871
2.492
83.059
.90
.87~.93
same as the principals.
About class management, my
opinion is the same as the
.928
.759
principals.
About school management, my
opinion is the same as the
.871
.862
principals.
Teachers workload distribution
.893
.797
3.702
74.048
.91
.79~.89
in this kindergarten is fair.
The resource distribution in this
.873
.762
kindergarten is fair.
Teachers teaching hour
distribution in this kindergarten
.873
.761
is fair.
Compared with my colleagues,
my workload and reward are
.869
.755
fair.
According to the level of a
teachers effort, this kindergarten
.792
.627
will give him a fair reward.
I feel the workload is beyond
.875
.766
3.455
69.104
.89
.81~.88
my ability.

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I am too busy with my job that I

cant take care of my family.
I think my work hour is too
long.
I think this kindergarten
demands too much workload.
I feel exhausted about my job.
I am satisfied with my present
job.
I feel a great satisfaction to this
job.
I still feel satisfied about my job
after I consider every aspect of
this job.

.839

.704

.822

.676

.812

.660

.806

.650

.919

.845

.905

.819

.865

.749

2.412

80.412

.94

.87~.92

The researchers analyze the data through SPSS. The basic statistics is analyzed by F test and the OLS
regression is used to analyze predictor variables effect to criterion variable (job satisfaction).
RESULT AND CONCLUSION

job satisfaction
feeling exchange
material exchange
value fitness
distributional justice
workload
salary
commute-hours

Table 2: The means of variables in this study

Standard
Mean
Samples
Score range
deviation
10.05
2.31
1410
5-15
19.23
3.87
1419
5-25
15.25
4.12
1393
5-25
10.48
2.09
1414
5-15
17.12
3.73
1393
5-25
13.83
3.88
1402
5-25
NT 28060.45 NT 10674.02
1265
NT 10000-70000
17.84 min
13.41 min
1399

Average score
of every item
3.35
3.85
3.05
3.49
3.42
2.77

According to table2, the results showed: the kindergarten teachers and childcare center teachers job
satisfaction was not high. The feeling exchange, material exchange, value fitness, and distributional fairness
were at a middle degree. The workload was reasonable because it was not yet overloading. The average salary
for kindergarten teachers and childcare center teachers was NT 28000 every month and it was not good. The
kindergarten teachers and childcare center teachers liked to work closer to their homes because they only needed
fewer than 18 minutes to commute.
Table 3: The result of OLS regression
variables
Intrinsic Demand
Feeling exchange
Intrinsic Demand
Value fitness
External reward
Salary
External reward
Material exchange
Organizational Treatment
Workload
Organizational Treatment
Distributional justice
Organizational Treatment
Commute-hours

130

beta
.065*
.190*
1.582E-05
.125*
-.087*
.113*
.000

.108
.172
.070
.223
-.150
.182
-.001

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kindergarten(group compared: day care centers)

Public schools(group compared: private schools)
Schools urbanization
Numbers of classes
Teachers age
Teachers education
Teachers seniority
Single teachers (group compared: married teachers)
Class teachers of age-5 children
(group compared: class teachers of age-6 children)
Class teachers of age-4 children
(group compared: class teachers of age-6 children)
Class teachers of age-3 children below
(group compared: class teachers of age-6 children)
Class teachers of mixed-ages children
(group compared: class teachers of age-6 children)
Constant
Samples
R
Value F

.043
.365*
.028
.014
.010
-.050
.021
-.047

.009
.065
.027
.034
.037
-.035
.055
-.010

-.374*

-.073

-.315

-.052

-.194

-.026

-.239

-.038

3.900
1105
.427
42.534*

p< .05

According to table3, generally, people thought the kindergarten teachers and childcare center teachers had
low satisfaction because of salary but the empirical analysis revealed the salary no significant. The reason was
these teachers salary had no much difference to private schools when we contrasted on antecedent interview
study and then we could understand it. As we knew, if schools could provide better rewarding, it could
encourage teachers and rise job satisfaction.
Meanwhile, the results showed the external reward (that it was the material reward) was the most important
effective factor to teachers satisfaction. The second effective factor was the perception of organizational
treatment (that it was the distributional justice), in which the perception of justice that teachers were treated was
the second option if the kindergartens principals hoped to raise teachers job satisfaction. The third effective
factor was the intrinsic demand, including the feeling exchange, value fitness. It meant the principals needed to
kindness with teachers, and teachers would exchange their satisfaction, and the principals needed to teach and
construct teachers value and kindergartens as the similar one.
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Cheng, J. N. (2004). The influential model of teachers organizational citizenship behavior in elementary and junior high schools.
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Cheng, J. N. (2006). The perception of the organizational justice and performance for the public elementary and junior high schools teachers:
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