Comprehensively understanding K-12 teachers’ occupational health: a convergent mixed-methods exploration of stress and wellbeing

A recent study explored K-12 teachers' occupational health, stress, and wellbeing using a convergent mixed-methods approach in one independent school district in the southern United States. The research found discrepancies between self-reported stress and occupational health measures and physiological stress markers (hair cortisol concentration). This highlights challenges in consistently defining and measuring occupational stress.

Why it matters

Understanding and effectively measuring occupational stress is critical for developing targeted interventions and support systems. Inconsistencies between subjective and objective stress indicators suggest that current assessment methods may not fully capture the complexity of stress, impacting resource allocation and policy effectiveness.

Key insights

• K-12 teacher stress significantly impacts occupational health.
• There is no clear consensus on how to define and measure teacher stress.
• The study employed both quantitative and qualitative methods, including self-reported surveys, interviews, and physiological hair cortisol measurement.
• Self-reported measures of stress and occupational health showed consistency with each other.
• Physiological measures (hair cortisol concentration) did not consistently align with self-reported stress and occupational health measures.
• The qualitative findings are not detailed in the provided summary.

Source

Frontiers in Education — https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/feduc.2026.1870113