1. Introduction
In today’s world, communication is one of the most sought-after skills for those in managerial and leadership positions [
1]. Previous studies have shown that people in leadership roles spend about 80% of their day communicating in some form or another [
2]. In a study on Swedish CEOs, Tengblad [
3] found that the CEOs spent 62% to 80% of their time performing verbal leadership work. Within the area of educational leadership, school principals spend up to 84% of their time engaged in verbal leadership communication [
4]. These rates will continue to increase due to current developments in communication technologies and the recent surge of interest in how leaders use communication as a tool to motivate their followers [
5,
6]. It is highly likely that ineffective communication leads to low performance, whereas inspirational communication produces sustainable results, which exceed expectations [
7]. Leaders’ strategic use of verbal communication in motivating forms enhances followers’ satisfaction and sustainable performance [
8] and significantly improves employee behaviours [
1,
9] and subordinates’ outcomes [
10]. A recent study by Binyamin and Brender-Ilan [
11] provides strong evidence that effective leaders use their communication skills and adopt motivating language as a sustainable mechanism to motivate employees with the goal of achieving organisational outcomes. However, the particular emphasis on the language used by leaders to motivate their followers has received relatively less attention than either communication or leadership scholarship [
12]. To date, few attempts have been made to examine the impact of language use on leaders’ effectiveness in communicating with their followers in general [
13] and the specific language used by school principals in motivating teachers in schools in particular.
The motivating language theory (MLT), which is the main theory on which this study is based, describes the effect of the language and, more precisely, the speech acts, strategically and intentionally used by leaders to enable organisations to reach expected sustainable outcomes [
9,
13]. Given that leaders spend most of their time communicating with their followers, the strategic use of speech acts [
8] has become critical to obtain results within an organisation. A preliminary glance at the vast literature on leadership studies reveals that the research is largely focused on leaders’ behaviour, characteristics, skills, and leadership styles without an adequate understanding of the everyday language they use [
9,
12,
14]. This insufficiency is paramount in school settings where school principals’ linguistic communication skills are critical to the motivation of teachers and their self-efficacy in the classroom [
1,
9]. A recent study by Moradkhani and Haghi [
15] indicated that verbal persuasion is the most powerful source in enhancing teachers’ self-efficacy in the Iranian context.
As far as the effect of leaders’ use of ML on teachers’ self-efficacy, a gap exists in the educational research literature; as a potentially important link, this relationship deserves further scholarly attention in the context of how school principals can motivate teachers. To the best of our knowledge, no research has thus far explicitly measured the effect of school principals’ use of ML on teachers’ self-efficacy via cultural context. The present study is an attempt to partially address this gap. In this article, the culture was framed by [
16] classification of high and low context based on teacher participants’ own styles of communication and their shared understanding and perception regarding the ML use by their principals. The current study aims to contribute to the relevant stream of literature by investigating whether teachers are motivated by the daily language school principals use in communicating with them and examining the mediating role of cultural context in the relationship between ML and teachers’ self-efficacy. Based on the results of this study, school principals are expected to support the development of teachers using motivating language within the appropriate cultural context in order to contribute to education for sustainable development. Despite the fact that a significant body of literature and discussion surrounding education for sustainable development exists, the language and linguistic communication skills school principals have to sustain the motivation of teachers and enhance their self-efficacy has received scant attention. In our study, we partially address this gap in the literature by clearly highlighting the aspects of motivational language use by school principals to enhance teachers’ self-efficacy in the light of cultural context. School principals’ influence on teachers through motivational language use is substantial as the level of teachers’ self-efficacy increases, teachers’ burn out and attrition can be lessened and hence, this may result in more motivated, committed, and sustained workforce of teachers as well as higher students’ academic achievement [
17,
18] and teaching effectiveness [
19] that are all likely to contribute to education for sustainable development. While education for sustainable development enables people to understand the influences of their own actions by encouraging them to take responsible decision [
20], enhancing teachers’ self-efficacy through motivational language use by school principals can serve this purpose as teachers with high self-efficacy hold the sense of being able to achieve a certain task in a specific situation. More specifically, teachers with high self-efficacy believe that they can teach even the most difficult and unmotivated students so that they can improve student achievement [
21].
The paper is organised as follows: The second section presents the literature review in six subheadings that are ‘motivating language theory’, ‘self-efficacy in teaching’, ‘relationship between motivating language and self-efficacy’, ‘cultural context’, ‘relationship between motivating language and cultural context’, and ‘the mediating role of cultural context’. The third section explains the methodology part in greater details including research design, sample, and data analysis (‘common method variance’, ‘measures’, ‘validation of the measures’, ‘results of hypothesis tests’). The fourth section discusses the results in the light of literature. The fifth section presents practical implications derived from this study. The sixth section offers suggestions for future research. The last section presents the concluding remarks of the manuscript.
4. Discussion
The increasing expectations placed on teachers can lead to requirements of further qualifications in their subject areas. Due to teachers’ acceptance as the main actors of education, expectations of them are not only increasing but also diversifying. A school’s performance may depend on its teachers’ qualifications. Through effective interactions with school principals who use ML, teachers can better internalise the goals of the school and sustainable education policies. Indeed, the main element of ‘the school principal’s work is primarily verbal communication that is both interpersonal and informational’ [
72] (p. 858). If school leaders regularly adopt ML, they may even enhance teachers’ commitment to the teaching profession. The recent study by Akça [
24] also points to the fact that the beliefs of prospective teachers regarding education for sustainable development are influenced by their self-efficacy levels as well as ability to focus on solutions. Given this potential, the current study presents the analytical importance of school principals’ language use in motivating teachers via cultural context and provides support for Skaalvik and Skaalvik’s [
25] findings. Motivating language use by school principals is crucial to enhance positive and sustainable school climate [
44], offer clear work expectations for teachers particularly in high context cultures as well as to improve teachers’ self-efficacy [
73]. Teachers with high self-efficacy use appropriate techniques and exert extra effort in order to teach unmotivated students, whereas teachers with low or without any self-efficacy believe they can do little or nothing to teach unmotivated students [
26]. Additionally, teachers’ self-efficacy beliefs can facilitate handling disciplinary matters and ensure sustainable learning environment in the classroom [
74]. Ball [
75] suggested that teachers with high self-efficacy dedicate themselves to maintaining interactive, sustainable relationships with parents and colleagues, which in turn contribute stimulating and motivating learning contexts.
We can understand that teachers from low-context cultures are more inclined to open communication and are motivated by it, and they have higher self-efficacy beliefs compared to those from high-context cultures. This study also shows that school principals need to consider teachers’ different cultural backgrounds and should not refrain from turning to implicit communication methods specific to Turkish culture while using open communication channels. As Moradkhani and Haghi [
15] claimed, the potency of different sources of self-efficacy, such as verbal persuasion, can be a function of the significance that teachers of a particular culture attach to them. Thus, our findings in this study are also likely to challenge the assertion put forward by Bandura [
76], namely, that self-efficacy beliefs work in a similar way across cultures.
On the other hand, it was also observed that individuals with high self-efficacy are less (but significantly) affected using ML (the impact factor was found to be as small as 0.16). One of the reasons for this effect might be the high intrinsic motivation of such individuals. Studies have confirmed that high-performing individuals are affected by intrinsic rather than extrinsic motivation [
77], and self-efficacy is suggested to be one of the antecedents of intrinsic motivation [
78]. There are even studies claiming that verbal motivation is not as effective on self-efficacy [
39]. For example, a beginning teacher may be more affected by ML than an experienced teacher. If the high number of experienced teachers that participated in this study prevented us from making such a comparison, future studies should take this issue into consideration. One of the rare studies [
39] that investigated this difference found existing ‘teaching resources and interpersonal support’ affected novice teachers’ self-efficacy beliefs, whereas for the experienced teachers, mastery experiences seemed to be more important. Additionally, Bandura [
23] himself posited that self-efficacy remains stable over time once acquired. Among Iranian teachers, however, verbal persuasion was identified as the most important source of self-efficacy, more than mastery experience [
15], which is also in line with the major findings of our study. Furthermore, instead of measuring teacher self-efficacy with a general self-efficacy scale, it would be more fruitful to measure it with the educator-specific ‘Teacher Self-Efficacy Scale’. Tschannen-Moran and Hoy [
39] argued that different self-efficacy scales can provide inconsistent results since the teacher self-efficacy scale incorporates measures based on teaching-related self-efficacy beliefs. In a similar vein, as Bellibas and Liu [
27] indicated, the current literature has largely neglected the multidimensional aspects of self-efficacy and approached it as a single and unitary construct.
The literature [
39] regarding teacher self-efficacy found a strong relationship with ‘many meaningful, sustainable educational outcomes such as teachers’ persistence, enthusiasm, commitment, and instructional behaviour, as well as student outcomes such as achievement, motivation, and self-efficacy beliefs’ (p. 783). On the other hand, the substantial evidence showing the power of motivational variables on teaching effectiveness is even greater than the effect of personality traits [
79]. Thus, it is essential to keep searching for the factors that may increase teachers’ perception of their self-efficacy beliefs.
Other antecedents of general self-efficacy of employees exist in the literature. For example, the causal relationship has been founded regarding the role of self-efficacy on motivating individuals. The other way of such relationship has been rarely subject to scholarly investigation. By referring to Lunenburg, ref. [
80] argues that goal-setting theory and self-efficacy theory are complementing each other. Setting difficult goals for employees by their managers could lead them to have a higher level of self-efficacy. However, the issue of whether each employee reacts the same to difficult tasks and stays motivated is still questionable. Here, then, ML could be resourceful for managers when they are confronted with this type of case. If they realize that the employee is about to give up, they could use ML to encourage them to not to give up and continue.
Certain studies have underlined that training in ML could help leaders to yield benefits such as innovation, job performance, self-efficacy, job satisfaction, decision-making, and leader effectiveness along with sustainable organisational accomplishments [
5] (p. 4). School principals should take these potential benefits into consideration and, in order to create a difference with the use of ML, as Holmes and Carr [
5] further argued, they should make use of situational awareness. The context where cultural differences are important could be considered such a situation, and the current study found some evidence regarding the mediating effect of cultural context on the relationship between school principals’ use of ML and teacher self-efficacy.
Lastly, like other studies, this study is not exempt from limitations. The first limitation is data collection procedures. We have collected all the data from one source. The reason for that was the notion of understanding multiple realities that are socially constructed based on how the teachers perceive the reality of motivating language of their principals. According to Munhall [
81] “perceptions are interpretations, and for most individuals, interpretations become their truth. Thus, perceptions are extremely powerful and influential in human thought and behaviour.” (p. 606). Although we have indicated that CMB is controlled as much as possible both in the administration process and after post-hoc analyses, it would be appropriate to collect data from two different sources separately: Principals and teachers. Therefore, a multilevel theoretical model could provide different perspectives. Second, the convenience sampling method is not adequate to infer generalization. Future studies should consider randomized sampling techniques. As for the strengths of our study, we provide evidence that theories from culture, language, and communication disciplines could enrich educational management and leadership studies. Thus, by highlighting the importance of multi-disciplinary approaches to theoretical and our proposed research model, we set a preliminary example to encourage scholars for future studies in the field.
6. Suggestions for Future Research
Future studies should examine the effect of implicit communication methods, together with ML, on teachers’ self-efficacy beliefs in high-context cultures. The effects of low-context cultures on positive interactive language [
58] were observed in this study. In order to reach more generalizable results, it is crucial to conduct and replicate similar research in high-context cultures. Future research in other contexts with high- and low-context cultures is also needed to formulate theoretically relevant and statistically meaningful generalisations in this regard.
Arslan and Yener [
83] found in their study of paternalistic managers and employee individualism-collectivism (Among Hofstede’s 5 D) relationship that employees with individualistic tendencies do not like paternalist features of their managers whereas the others find relatedness and closeness. Individualistic employees prefer to be explicit in their encounters, and this reminds us they can fit best to low-context culture. As a further research avenue, it would be interesting to research how teachers from individualist and collectivist tendencies will respond to motivational language use by their principals.
Hofstede proposed that individuals who are prone to power distance and uncertainty avoidance talk less either because they fear their superiors or because talking might put them into troubles in which they could not know how to handle [
84]. Instead, they choose symbols and gestures/mimics similarly as high-low context individuals would do. Previous studies have shown that in low power-distance cultures, organisational members consider less rich (lean) communication media more effective whereas organisational members in higher power-distance societies consider rich communication more effective [
85]. In high power-distance cultures, managers are likely to communicate using different media than in lower-power-distance cultures and use them with high interactivity [
85]. It would be subject to a future research to investigate the moderating influence of communication frequency and the choice of communication medium on the relationship proposed in the current study. Lastly, we did not consider whether the participants worked at the same schools. Clusters might affect the outcomes. It would be beneficial to investigate the school-level effects through multilevel models.