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Article

The Mechanism of Leader-Expressed Humility on a Physical Education Teacher’s Work Engagement—Exploring the Chain Mediation Effect of Teacher Efficacy and Felt Obligation

by
Wenjuan Cheng
1,
Zhonghua Wang
1,
Rui Fang
1,*,
Sumaira Kayani
2 and
Michele Biasutti
3,*
1
Institute of Sports Science, Qufu Normal University, Qufu 273165, China
2
Department of Psychology, Zhejiang Normal University, Jinhua 321004, China
3
Department of Philosophy, Sociology, Education and Applied Psychology (FISPPA), University of Padova, 35139 Padova, Italy
*
Authors to whom correspondence should be addressed.
Sustainability 2023, 15(12), 9297; https://doi.org/10.3390/su15129297
Submission received: 28 April 2023 / Revised: 2 June 2023 / Accepted: 7 June 2023 / Published: 8 June 2023
(This article belongs to the Section Health, Well-Being and Sustainability)
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Abstract

:
Motivating a teacher’s work engagement has been brought into focus within the educational field, yet there has been deficient detail on how leader-expressed humility may influence a physical education teacher’s work engagement. Based on social information processing theory and trait activation theory, the study investigates the potential effects of leader-expressed humility on a physical education teacher’s work engagement within the organizational situations of primary and secondary schools in China. Data were collected from 579 physical education teachers using self-reported questionnaires. Results fully supported the proposed chain mediation model that leader-expressed humility is a strong predictor for a physical education teacher’s work engagement, and leader-expressed humility could indirectly affect a physical education teacher’s work engagement through the independent mediating effect of teacher efficacy and felt obligation, as well as the chain mediating effect of the two. Implications for management and practice, limitations, and future research are discussed.

1. Introduction

A teacher who always works well and strives for organizational success is one of the keys to the success of an educational organization [1]. As assets in educational organizations and the principal force of physical education (P.E.), teachers play a vital role in physical and educational practice and are responsible for students’ physical and educational achievements. However, undesirable phenomena, for example, insufficient work engagement and a lack of responsibility, still exist in primary and secondary schools in Chinese physical education practice, although the Chinese government has issued and implemented a series of policies emphasizing improving physical education teachers’ professional literacy. Meanwhile, researchers have recently revealed the same trouble: up to 85% of employees are not engaged at work [2], and work disengagement has become a universal concern in the organizational context [3].
Considering the realistic problem of P.E. teachers’ low-level work engagement, previous literature found that factors from individual and contextual variables such as personal resources (i.e., emotional intelligence) [4], caring relationships [5], organizational culture [6] and support [7], job demands and resources [8] have been widely discussed. This research revealed the mechanism of single-level factors’ effect on teacher work engagement concretely but ignored the connecting role of school organization in the implementation of national policies and teacher work, and little attention has been paid to the association and mechanism between organizational context and P.E. teachers.
Leadership in an organization is one of the significant factors influencing work engagement [1]. The leader plays a pivotal role in the closed-loop communication path of the “employee organization” as organizational environments become more dynamic and unpredictable. As a bottom-up, supportive leadership style, humble leaders view themselves objectively, regard others more appreciatively, and are more open to new information and ideas [9,10]. Their expressed humility connotes three dimensions: manifested willingness to see the self accurately, that is, a desire to engage in an ongoing process of achieving accurate self-awareness through interactions with others; appreciation of others’ strengths and contributions, that is, being able to more readily identify and value the unique abilities and strengths of those with whom they work; and teachability, that is, showing openness to learning, feedback, and new ideas from others [10]. These components are tightly interrelated as the core reflective indicators of humility [11]. Leader-expressed humility, as an interpersonal characteristic that emerges in organizational contexts, comprises a pattern of behaviors that occur in interpersonal interactions and are observed by employees, exerting an influence on the quality of interpersonal work relationships and subsequent performance. Work engagement is a positive, fulfilling, work-related state of mind [12]. Similarly, a teacher’s work engagement refers to how much a teacher is occupied and excited by their work [13]. As the concrete implementer of education as well as the guide of students’ all-around development, a teacher’s work engagement is correlated to student engagement [14] and student learning engagement [15,16]. In the organizational context, the humble leader builds a free-developing organizational atmosphere and equal interpersonal relationships [9] to grow and produce positive organizational outcomes through behaviors of expressed humility, such as owning up to personal mistakes and weaknesses, being receptive to feedback, and acknowledging the contributions of other team members. Based on this, the study selected leader-expressed humility as the antecedent, employed social information processing theory and trait activation theory, and discussed the potential mechanism of how leader-expressed humility affects a P.E. teacher’s work engagement.

2. Literature Review and Hypotheses

2.1. Leader-Expressed Humility and Work Engagement

The effectiveness of leader-expressed humility in organizations has been widely confirmed: humble leaders confirm subordinates’ career developmental demands and lead them to believe that their developmental journeys and uncertainty feelings are legitimate in the organizational context [17], provide positive reference information for subordinates to evaluate their self-value and ability through recognition, appreciation, and praise, which further effectively facilitate their attitudes and organizational outcomes, such as stimulating employees’ engagement motivation [18], positive personality qualities, job satisfaction, and teamwork performance [19].
According to social information processing theory [20], context and the consequences of past choices are more likely to influence an individual’s attitudes, behavior, and beliefs than individual predispositions or intellectual decision-making processes. As adaptive organisms, individuals would adapt their actions and attitudes according to the social context in which they operate and the reality of their past and present behaviors and situations. Among many information sources in a work situation, a leader’s statement and behavior are usually regarded by subordinates as important cues to understand organizational norms and expectations [21], as well as construct and interpret events.
Humble leaders examine and reflect on themselves with a conscious and self-conscious style, affirm and encourage employees with a respectful and appreciative attitude, and consult employees for suggestions with an inclusive and open mind. This series of humble behaviors provides employees with a clear career development path, thus positively affecting their job engagement [22]. Current studies have emphasized the influence of leader-expressed humility on subordinates’ work engagement in management and economics, while few studies have paid attention to the benefits of leader-expressed humility on teachers’ work engagement in the educational field. In the new era of vigorously promoting physical education teaching reform, it is of great practical significance and application to explore the mechanism of leader-expressed humility on P.E. teachers’ work engagement.

2.2. The Mediating Role of Teacher Efficacy

Teacher efficacy refers to a teacher’s belief in their ability to produce a positive classroom, complete the specific teaching task in the specific situation, and bring about the expected outcomes of student engagement and learning, even among those students who may be unmotivated [23,24,25], which is one of the subordinate concepts of self-efficacy. Self-efficacy is “belief in one’s capabilities to organize and execute the courses of action required to produce given attainments” [26]. Self-efficacy reflects an individual’s perception of whether they can complete a certain job or task and is mainly influenced by mastery experiences, vicarious experiences, social persuasion, and physiological states (“mastery experiences” refers to a personal experience of success; “vicarious experiences” refer to self-efficacy increasing if we see someone succeeding; “social persuasion” refers to direct encouragement or discouragement from others; “physiological states” refer to one’s belief in the implications of the physiological response that alters self-efficacy, rather than the physiological response itself). A series of studies have shown that self-efficacy mediates leadership humility and employee behavior [27]. Teachers with high self-efficacy would have high job satisfaction and engagement in education [28].
According to social information processing theory, the social environment will affect an individual’s emotion, attitude, and behavior along the path of “situation-cognition-behavior” [29,30]. Humble leaders are good at using encouraging utterances in organizational context and actively identify with individual development, providing employees with an equal, positive, and united working atmosphere through appreciation of work contributions and understanding of work mistakes, which could reduce employees’ negative emotions and provide positive reference information for self-worth and competence evaluating from the aspects of physiological states, mastery experiences, and social persuasion [10]. This positive organizational context can further strengthen P.E. teachers’ self-efficacy and belief in their skills and experience to effectively enhance their teacher efficacy.

2.3. The Mediating Role of Felt Obligation

Felt obligation, as a personality trait, is an authoritarian belief regarding whether one should care about the organization’s welfare and help the organization reach its objectives, which could lessen employees’ withdrawal behaviors and positively relate to job performance [31]. Few empirical studies have paid attention to the mediating effect of felt obligation between leader-expressed humility and work engagement, but related studies provide useful enlightenment, such as the mediating effect of felt obligation between inclusive leadership and employee presenteeism [32], spiritual leadership and employee voice behavior [33], strengths-based leadership and turnover intention [34], trust in supervisors and job engagement [35], and psychological empowerment and personal initiative [36].
Trait activation theory points out that situational trait relevance is the moderator between personality traits and behavior. Potential personality traits may be activated and have shown related behaviors when the opportunity for trait expression appears [37,38], and they may operate to increment and sustain both team and individual motivation [39]. By delegating management, adopting opinions, and helping employees to pinpoint career development paths, humble leaders are skilled at strengthening employees’ intrinsic motivation to master work tasks and improve workability, thus enhancing their internal felt obligation.

2.4. The Chain Mediation Effects of Teacher Efficacy and Felt Obligation

According to social information processing theory, individuals with different personality traits have different understandings of certain situational information and then show different attitudes and behavior choices. That is, personality traits will regulate the chain of “information cue-cognitive processing-behavior choice” of individuals [40]. Trait activation theory points out that the activation of personality traits depends on whether the social situation can provide related cues. Therefore, by integrating social information processing theory and trait activation theory, it is necessary to incorporate the trait of felt obligation into investigating the potential mechanism of leader-expressed humility on P.E. teachers’ work engagement. In addition, previous studies have shown that employees with high self-efficacy will have more positive working emotions, directly affecting their sense of responsibility [41,42]. In this regard, the study tries to explore if teacher efficacy and felt obligation could jointly play a chain mediation role between leader-expressed humility and P.E. teachers’ work engagement.
Given the findings of previous research and the theoretical framework, we propose the following hypotheses:
Hypothesis 1 (H1).
Leader-expressed humility significantly positively affects P.E. teachers’ work engagement.
Hypothesis 2 (H2).
Teacher efficacy mediates between leader-expressed humility and P.E. teachers’ work engagement.
Hypothesis 3 (H3).
Felt obligation mediates between leader-expressed humility and P.E. teachers’ work engagement.
Hypothesis 4 (H4).
The “teacher efficacy → felt obligation” combination is an intermediary chain between leader-expressed humility and the P.E. teachers’ work engagement.
To summarize, a chain mediation model based on the effects of teacher efficacy and felt obligation was constructed in this study, as presented in Figure 1.

3. Method

3.1. Research Participants

A total of 636 questionnaires were received for this study. After excluding 57 invalid questionnaires, 579 valid questionnaires were obtained, with an effective rate of 91.04%. These 579 participants include 425 (73.4%) male teachers and 154 (26.6%) female teachers, 378 (65.3%) undergraduates and 201 (34.7%) postgraduates, 216 (37.3%) primary school P.E. teachers, 235 (40.6%) junior high school P.E. teachers, and 128 (22.1%) senior high school P.E. teachers. Further, 104 (17.9%) P.E. teachers have been teaching for less than 5 years, 176 (30.4%) for 6–15 years, 217 (37.5%) for 16–25 years, and 82 (14.2%) for more than 25 years. In addition, 195 (33.7%) have a primary professional title, 248 (42.8%) have a secondary professional title, and 136 (23.5%) have a senior professional title.

3.2. Measurements

The online survey has five sections containing measures of leader-expressed humility, work engagement, teacher efficacy, felt obligation, and demographic variables. The instruments used in this study, as well as the variables by which they are composed, are as follows:
Expressed Humility Scale. To measure leader-expressed humility, developed by Owens et al. [10], there are 9 items that measure three components: a manifested willingness to view oneself accurately, a displayed appreciation of others’ strengths and contributions, and teachability. Each component is measured by 3 items. Answers to items were given in a five-point Likert format, with a response range of 1 to 5, in which 1 means strongly disagree and 5 means strongly agree with the item statement. The Expressed Humility Scale has shown high reliability in Chinese-localized applications [43]. The instrument demonstrated good reliability in this study with Cronbach’s α = 0.944 for the scale and Cronbach’s α = 0.867, Cronbach’s α = 0.867, Cronbach’s α = 0.881 for sub-dimensions, respectively.
Utrecht Work Engagement Scale (UWES-9). To measure work engagement, as developed by Schaufeli et al. [44], there are 9 items that measure three dimensions: vigor, dedication, and absorption. Each dimension is measured by 3 items. Answers to questionnaire items were given on a five-point Likert scale, with a response range of 1 to 5, in which 1 means disagree and 5 means agree with the statement. UWES–9 has been proven as a reliable and valid indicator of work engagement that can be used as an alternative to the longer version [45] and has shown high reliability in Chinese-localized applications [46]. The instrument demonstrated good reliability in this study, with Cronbach’s α = 0.940 for the scale and Cronbach’s α = 0.890, Cronbach’s α = 0.884, Cronbach’s α = 0.881 for sub-dimensions, respectively.
Ohio State Teacher Efficacy Scale (OSTES-12). To measure teacher efficacy, developed by Moran et al. [47], there are 12 items that measure the three dimensions of efficacy for instructional strategies, classroom management, and student engagement. Each dimension is measured by 4 items. Answers to questionnaire items were given on a five-point Likert scale, with a response range of 1 to 5, in which 1 means nothing and 5 means a great deal. OSTES-12 has shown high reliability in Chinese-localized applications [48]. The instrument demonstrated good reliability in this study, with Cronbach’s α = 0.930 for the scale and Cronbach’s α = 0.847, Cronbach’s α = 0.865, Cronbach’s α = 0.882 for sub-dimensions, respectively.
Felt Obligation Scale. To measure felt obligation, developed by Eisenberger et al. [30], composed of 7 items that measure one dimension. Answers to questionnaire items were given on a five-point Likert scale, with a response range of 1 to 5, in which 1 means disagree and 5 means agree with the statement. The last item of the scale is the reverse scoring item, entitled “I feel that the only obligation I have to the school is to fulfill the minimum requirements of my job.” Exploratory factor analysis of the scale data shows that the common factor variance of this item is 0.044, which indicates the item’s ability to extract principal components to explain variables is weak. That may be because all the previous questions were positive-scoring questions, which led participants to form a mindset when filling out the questionnaire and answer the last item according to the positive scoring, resulting in poor results for the questions. Therefore, we dropped the last item during the later statistical analysis of the data. After elimination, confirmatory factor analysis was performed on the scale data with AMOS24.0. Fit indexes were acceptable (χ2 = 5.749, df = 4, χ2/df = 1.437, TLI = 0.997, CFI = 0.999, SRMR = 0.032, RMSEA = 0.028). Therefore, only 6 items were used to measure felt obligation in this study. The instrument demonstrated good reliability with Cronbach’s α = 0.901.
Demographic variables included gender (male, female), educational level (undergraduate, postgraduate), work unit (primary school, junior high school, senior high school), teaching age (less than 5 years, 6–15 years, 16–25 years, more than 25 years), and professional title (primary, secondary, senior).

3.3. Control Variables

To reveal the influence of leader-expressed humility on P.E. teachers’ work engagement more accurately, according to previous literature [14,49], we used gender, teaching age, educational level, and professional title as control variables.

3.4. Data Analysis

We first conducted factor analysis, reliability analysis, and validity analysis of the obtained data to check the internal consistency of the questionnaire. Cronbach’s Alpha (α) (equal to or greater than 0.70) [50] was used to analyze reliability, and confirmatory factor analysis (CFA) was used to ensure the validity of scales. Descriptive statistical analysis was used to calculate each variable’s mean and standard deviation, to obtain the variables’ characteristics. Pearson correlation was used to examine the relationship between variables. The structural equation model (SEM) was used for integrity investigation research hypotheses. The goodness of model fit evaluation was conducted [51] to verify compatibility with the empirical data. We utilize Kline’s (2005) criterion [52] to test the goodness of the model fit which, is indicated by values greater than 0.90 for the Comparative Fit Index (CFI) and Tucker–Lewis Index (TLI), less than 0.08 for standardized root mean square residual (SRMR) and root mean square error of approximation (RMSEA). To examine whether teacher efficacy, felt obligation, and the combination of “teacher efficacy → felt obligation” mediate the effect of leader-expressed humility on P.E. teachers’ work engagement, a mediation test was conducted using a bias-corrected bootstrap based on 5000 resamples [53]. IBM SPSS® version 23.0 for Windows was used for the basic descriptive analysis and mediator effect testing. IBM AMOS® 24.0 was employed to analyze the associations between the relevant variables of the structural equation modeling.

3.5. Research Procedure

In the study, taking P.E. teachers in primary and secondary schools as subjects, combined with the current situation of prevention and control of the COVID-19 epidemic in China, we adopted sampling techniques of convenience sampling, purposive sampling, and random sampling, and published electronic questionnaires in an online chat group to collect data. The questionnaires were distributed between October and December 2020. We selected work groups of physical education teaching and research sections of primary and secondary schools in Jining City and Qingdao City, Shandong Province, as well as the influential QQ group chat and WeChat group chat of P.E. teachers in primary and secondary schools in China, such as the Super Group of Chinese P.E Teachers and Shunshi P.E. Teaching Group. In order to ensure the effectiveness of online data collection, at the beginning of the questionnaire, we indicated the research purpose, data anonymity, and confidentiality, and participants may receive a reward after completing the questionnaire. This study is non-experimental, in that the variables described have not been altered or manipulated, and what is presented is only by the participant’s independent answer. Likewise, it is located within quantitative empirical studies and refers to the descriptive study of populations through surveys [54].

4. Results

4.1. Assessing Common Method Variance

Since we use the Chinese version scale for self-reported data collection, all variables were collected from the same self-reported source simultaneously, the correlation of each variable might be inflated, and common method variance (CMV) is conducted to eliminate any possible accuracy of research results. Variance that is attributable to the measurement method rather than the constructs the measures represent [55]. Harman’s single-factor method [46] was employed to access CMV in this study. We ran principal component analysis (PCA) with no rotation of factor axes. Five factors with characteristic vectors greater than 1 were extracted, with a total of 40.852% of the variance explained via a single factor, less than the criterion of 50% of the total variance, which indicates that CMV is not a concern in this study [56,57].

4.2. Descriptive Statistics

Before verifying the research hypotheses, we conducted descriptive statistical analyses of the original scores of the corresponding items of each variable. Table 1 presents descriptive statistics and correlations. Results of correlation analysis showed that there is a significant positive correlation (p < 0.01) among leader-expressed humility, teacher efficacy, felt obligation, and work engagement; the correlation coefficient ranges from 0.381 to 0.623. SPSS 23.0 was used for descriptive analysis.

4.3. Hypothesis Testing

In order to verify the hypothesis above, SEM was used to examine the specific relationship path among leader-expressed humility, teacher efficacy, felt obligation, and P.E. teachers’ work engagement. Moreover, bootstrapping was used to investigate the mediating role of teacher efficacy, felt obligation, and their joint chain between leader-expressed humility and P.E. teachers’ work engagement.
Firstly, in AMOS 24.0, we constructed model 1, in which leader-expressed humility is an independent variable and a P.E. teacher’s work engagement is a dependent variable, to test the direct effect of leader-expressed humility on P.E. teacher’s work engagement. The goodness of fit of model 1 (χ2 = 18.509, df = 7, χ2/df = 2.644, TLI = 0.991, CFI = 0.996, SRMR = 0.027, RMSEA = 0.053) was according to accepted values by Kline [50]. Combing with the Pearson correlation analysis, leader-expressed humility is positively correlated to P.E. teacher’s work engagement (β = 0.48, p < 0.001). Thus, H1 was supported.
Secondly, we constructed model 2, which added teacher efficacy as a mediating variable based on model 1, to test the mediating role of teacher efficacy between leader-expressed humility and a P.E. teacher’s work engagement. The goodness of fit of model 2 (χ2 = 101.452, df = 24, χ2/df = 4.227, TLI = 0.970, CFI = 0.980, SRMR = 0.039, RMSEA = 0.075) was accepted. Leader-expressed humility is positively correlated to teacher efficacy (β = 0.47, p < 0.001), and teacher efficacy is positively correlated to a P.E. teacher’s work engagement (β = 0.59, p < 0.001). Moreover, the scandalized path coefficient between leader-expressed humility and P.E. teacher’s work engagement decreases from 0.48 to 0.24, which indicates that the relationship between leader-expressed humility and P.E. teacher’s work engagement has been partially mediated by teacher efficacy. Thus, H2 was supported.
Thirdly, we constructed model 3, which has added felt obligation as a mediating variable based on model 1, to test the mediating role of felt obligation between leader-expressed humility and P.E. teacher’s work engagement. The goodness of fit of model 3 (χ2 = 226.625, df = 50, χ2/df = 4.533, TLI = 0.954, CFI = 0.965, SRMR = 0.047, RMSEA = 0.078) was accepted. Leader-expressed humility is positively correlated to felt obligation (β = 0.51, p < 0.001), and felt obligation is positively correlated to a P.E. teacher’s work engagement (β = 0.54, p < 0.001). Moreover, the scandalized path coefficient between leader-expressed humility and P.E. teacher’s work engagement decreases from 0.48 to 0.25, which indicates that felt obligation mediates the relationship between leader-expressed humility and P.E. teacher’s work engagement. Thus, H3 was supported.
Fourthly, we constructed model 4, which has added teacher efficacy and felt obligation based on model 1, to test the chain mediating role of the combination of “teacher efficacy → felt obligation” between leader-expressed humility and P.E. teacher’s work engagement and the global hypothesis model as well. The goodness of fit of model 4 (χ2 = 315.671, df = 83, χ2/df = 3.803, TLI = 0.953, CFI = 0.963, SRMR = 0.046, RMSEA = 0.070) was accepted, and standardized path coefficients among variables are statistically significant (p < 0.001). Moreover, the scandalized path coefficient between leader-expressed humility and a P.E. teacher’s work engagement decreases from 0.48 to 0.17 (p < 0.001), which indicates that teacher efficacy and felt obligation jointly play a chain mediation role between leader-expressed humility and a P.E. teacher’s work engagement, H4 was supported.
The overall goodness of fit for each model and the effects of leader-expressed humility on P.E. teacher’s work engagement are shown in Table 2 and Figure 2, in which the results of the relationship analysis were confirmed for all perspectives.

4.4. Mediating Effect Testing

In order to examine whether teacher efficacy, felt obligation, and the combination of “teacher efficacy → felt obligation” mediate the effect of leader-expressed humility on a P.E. teacher’s work engagement, besides path analysis, a mediation test was conducted using a bias-corrected bootstrap based on 5000 resamples and a 95% confidence level.
As shown in Table 3, leader-expressed humility had a direct effect on a P.E. teacher’s work engagement (β = 0.479, 95% CI = 0.400 to 0.556). Moreover, the total indirect effect is 0.894, which contains three paths: leader-expressed humility affects work engagement through teacher efficacy (β = 0.273, 95% CI = 0.217 to 0.340); leader-expressed humility affects work engagement through felt obligation (β = 0.271, 95% CI = 0.216 to 0.339); and leader-expressed humility affects work engagement through the chain of teacher efficacy and felt obligation (β = 0.350, 95% CI = 0.292 to 0.417). The confidence interval of each path does not include 0, indicating that the significantly direct effect of leader-expressed humility on P.E. teacher’s work engagement, the significantly mediating effect of teacher efficacy, felt obligation, and the chain “teacher efficacy → felt obligation” between leader-expressed humility and P.E. teacher’s work engagement have been verified. Hence, the hypotheses of H1, H2, H3, and H4 are all supported, and the chain mediating effect of “teacher efficacy → felt obligation” is significantly higher than their independent mediating effect.

5. Discussion and Implication

This study aimed to integrate the effect of leader-expressed humility on P.E. teachers’ work engagement based on social information processing theory and trait activation theory. We also discussed the mediating role of teacher efficacy, felt obligation, and the chain intermediary role of “teacher efficacy → felt obligation” to further explore the underlying mechanism, thereby exacerbating the evidence in physical education practice. The major findings of the study are as follows:
Firstly, the results of this study confirmed that Hypothesis 1 was supported, i.e., leader-expressed humility has a significant positive effect on a P.E. teacher’s work engagement, which is consistent with the research results of Li et al. [22] and Walters and Diab [58] in the management and economy domain. The study further confirmed the applicability of the predictive power of leader-expressed humility on work engagement, expanding its empirical basis in the education domain. According to social information processing theory, individuals can construct and explain events with the information contained in social context, and then show corresponding attitudes and behaviors. As an important clue in schoolwork situations, leader-expressed humility helps P.E. teachers understand the requirements and value orientation of school, affects the construction and understanding of work-related events, and then affects work attitude and behavior choices. This is mainly because (1) leader-expressed humility, such as engaging in an ongoing process of achieving accurate self-awareness through interactions with others, readily appreciating others’ abilities and contributions, and listening to ideas from others, has guiding and demonstration effects in organizational situations, which can encourage organization members to form a humble interaction mode. This humble interaction mode can alleviate P.E. teachers’ risk perception, free themselves from the psychological burden of covering up mistakes and inexperience, abandon unrealistic high self-image, and honestly face shortcomings, thus neglecting identity differences, and fully focusing on the work itself. (2) Leaders with humility would praise team members’ contributions and achievements, encourage them to actively discover the problems and solutions in the work, keep sensitive to changes in external information with an open attitude, and actively seek feedback, so that team members can actively explore ways and methods to improve team quality and work performance. This positive and enterprising atmosphere can make P.E. teachers realize that they can be encouraged by concentrating on work, and firmly believe that they can be applauded and appreciated by taking the initiative in their work duties [59], so that they are more willing to take the initiative to devote themselves to work and contribute to the school’s organizational well-being.
Secondly, Hypothesis 2 that teacher efficacy plays a mediating role between leader-expressed humility and P.E. teacher’s work engagement is also supported, which is consistent with the research results of Mao et al. [27]. According to social information processing theory and self-efficacy theory, individuals could form a sense of self-efficacy by cognitively processing various information relating to their abilities. This theoretical viewpoint has also been verified in this study, namely that leader-expressed humility can provide important situational clues for P.E. teachers to evaluate abilities and form teacher efficacy. This cognitive process is mainly reflected in: (1) Leaders with humility are skilled at using encouraging language, actively appreciating P.E. teachers’ virtues and contributions, providing leadership support and organizational resources, and inspiring P.E. teachers to cultivate learning orientation, to improve professional quality. Through the explanation and representation of leader-expressed humility, P.E. teachers would positively evaluate personal ability and self-value, eventually forming teacher efficacy. (2) Leaders could form a humble flow-on effect [60] in organizations through their model demonstration of humble behavior, to promote P.E. teachers to correctly attribute teaching tasks and teaching experiences, evaluate related resources and limiting factors, and consult and interchange with others, thus expanding and improving pedagogical skill. Furthermore, humility, approbation, and appreciation among colleagues can further promote P.E. teachers’ efficacy, and then positively influence the degree of effort put into teaching [42].
Thirdly, Hypothesis 3, i.e., that felt obligation plays a mediating role between leader-expressed humility and a P.E. teacher’s work engagement, is supported, which is consistent with the research results of Chen et al. [8] and Basit [35]. According to social information processing theory and trait activation theory, the fact that an individual possesses certain personality traits does not mean that they will be activated and show related behaviors; they need related situational clues. The study holds that leader-expressed humility, as an important clue of organizational situation, plays a virtual role in activating and promoting P.E. teachers’ felt obligation, which is mainly reflected in (1) a humble leader’s management style and practice of self-awareness, appreciating others, and teachability create a legitimate and relaxed platform for P.E. teachers to express personality traits and stimulate them to actively express felt obligation, by which they can devote themselves to a wider range of work tasks, to enhance P.E. teachers’ willingness to take the initiative, have more sense of acceptance and responsibility for goals and tasks because of their development opportunities and social emotional support. (2) A leader with humility pays attention to cultivating a high-quality and transparent “leader–employee” exchange relationship, which could, thus, strengthen P.E. teachers’ willingness to express felt obligation. When they perceive the trust, respect, and concern of leaders, P.E. teachers would generate obligation and responsibility in return, and then change their attitude towards the organization, which would be shown by their behavior, as well as having stronger perseverance and resilience to fulfill work-related commitments and making more effort to devote spare time to work when their felt obligation was strengthened [61].
Lastly, the study results further confirm that teacher efficacy can further influence a P.E. teacher’s work engagement through a significant positive predictive effect on felt obligation (p < 0.001); that is, teacher efficacy and felt obligation can jointly play a chain mediation role in the mechanism of leader-expressed humility affecting a P.E. teacher’s work engagement, which is consistent with the research results of Gunawan and Widodo [39]. The “signal” released by leader-expressed humility, as an important social situational factor that affects an employee’s behavior performance, can activate an employee’s related personality traits and behavior orientation. As an adaptive organism, a P.E. teacher will adjust attitudes and behaviors according to the relevant information in the work situation, which is embodied in the following aspects: (1) Self-efficacy awareness is the main cognitive variable, which leads to behavior intention [23] and affects an individual’s mode of thinking, behavior, and emotional activation [24]. Individuals with high self-efficacy will construct successful situations in their minds, which urges them to take more active actions to achieve goals and tasks [62]. Humble leaders actively approve a P.E. teacher’s work contributions and encourage them to be bold in educational practice, which can promote a P.E. teacher’s teaching confidence and self-realization desire, thus forming a higher sense of efficacy as a result. Individuals will evaluate whether they can carry out responsible behaviors and undertake the corresponding consequences when they are willing to take responsibility. That is, P.E. teachers with a high sense of efficiency would consider that they can undertake more due obligations to a greater extent. In addition, the supported atmosphere and relaxed self-trait expression platform created by leader-expressed humility can be combined with a P.E. teacher’s inner sense of efficacy, to activate a P.E. teacher’s felt obligation, and then motivate them to show greater enthusiasm and efforts in teaching [63]. (2) Teacher’s felt obligation refers to teachers’ self-commitment to their occupation role and educational results, which is closely related to contextual factors (i.e., position in the organizational hierarchy, availability and distribution of resources and information) and person influence (i.e., perceived organizational support, self-efficacy, trust, and work ethic) [25]. The formation process of a teacher’s felt obligation is the organic integration of their internal subjective perception and external role expectations. On the one hand, leaders attach importance to the bidirectional feedback with a P.E. teacher through expressed humility such as self-reflection, appreciation of contribution, and seeking for new ideas, so as to create and provide a supportive organizational atmosphere for a P.E. teacher, thus reducing the psychological burden of those who are worried about work mistakes and enhancing their willingness to undertake due obligations initiatively. At the same time, the bidirectional feedback enables P.E. teachers to obtain feedback about their work ability and performance from leaders directly, and then provides supportive resources for further vocational development. On the other hand, humble leaders are good at finding employees’ shining spots, providing opportunities and platforms for self-demonstration, encouraging employees to boldly try challenging jobs, and taking mistakes as part of their career development [13], which provides P.E. teachers with information sources for self-value identification and helps generate a sense of efficacy in their technique knowledge and skills. This sense of efficacy is the belief of P.E. teachers in their ability to achieve the expected results, which will directly affect their behavioral motivation [25], enhance their willingness and felt obligation to take responsibility initiatively, promote them to set career objectives, and then devote themselves to their work with a more optimistic attitude.

6. Research Implications

The study reveals that the improvement of a P.E. teacher’s work engagement is an interactive process between the external organizational context and P.E. teachers themselves. The free and relaxed organizational situation created by leader-expressed humility can provide sufficient clues for the stimulation and promotion of teacher efficacy and felt obligation, thereby improving the level of P.E. teachers’ work engagement. Based on this, it is implicated that the reciprocal relationship between the external organizational situation and P.E. teachers’ inner perception should be much considered in the practice of physical education management. Both leader-expressed humility and P.E. teachers’ internal motivation and enthusiasm should be emphasized so that they can work together to promote the overall improvement of P.E. teachers’ teaching quality and professional ethics. In view of the arguments above, we put forward the following suggestions:
Starting with a management perspective, attention should be paid to cultivating the humble attitude of school leaders, creating a humble organizational atmosphere, strengthening the humanist management concept, innovating incentive and evaluation mechanisms for P.E. teachers, and paying attention to the internal demands of P.E. teachers’ self-development and professional achievements, so as to improve P.E. teachers’ work enthusiasm and work engagement level form a virtuous circle of mutual encouragement and improvement between the P.E. teacher and school leader.
Secondly, a teacher’s sense of efficacy can be promoted by fully combining external organizational incentives with individual internal motivation. In consequence of the above, we propose that we change the single management mode, which relied mainly on administrative means, optimize the “culture medium” for P.E. teacher’s vocational development, provide more development opportunities and socioemotional support, so as to reduce P.E. teacher’s pressure perception when facing dilemma or frustration, encourage P.E. teacher to give full play to individual initiative, build professional self-confidence, and stimulate internal motivation to improve teaching skills and accomplishments.
Finally, occupational skill training and ideological education for P.E. teachers should be highly valued. By creating all kinds of situational information to promote professional ethics and professional norms, we can stimulate a P.E. teacher’s felt obligation, which is deeply related to the school organizational situation and teacher efficacy, so as to effectively promote the all-round improvement of a P.E. teacher’s teaching quality and professional ethics, encourage P.E. teachers to devote themselves to work with higher ability and fuller enthusiasm, and, thus, lay a solid foundation for students’ all-round healthy growth and high-quality development of physical education.

7. Conclusions

Given the vigorously promoted reform of physical education and teaching in the new era, the achievement of improving P.E. teachers’ teaching quality and the sustainability of the development of physical education are objectives of primary and secondary schools and the government. Drawing on social information processing theory and trait activation theory, the study serves as an advising tool to target improving P.E. teachers’ work engagement level by taking leader-expressed humility as antecedents and innovatively regarding teacher efficacy and felt obligation as the dual intermediary variables.
Based on theoretical analysis and empirical testing, the study explores the mechanism of leader-expressed humility on P.E. teachers’ work engagement. Results showed that leader-expressed humility has positive effects on P.E. teachers’ work engagement; teacher efficacy and felt obligation can moderate the effects of leader-expressed humility on P.E. teachers’ work engagement. Moreover, the chain “teacher efficacy → felt obligation” plays a mediating role between leader-expressed humility and a P.E. teacher’s work engagement. The study results provide interesting and useful information, and show which variables are influential in achieving higher work engagement: leader-expressed humility, teacher efficacy, and felt obligation, and the joint chain of “teacher efficacy → felt obligation” can positively predict P.E. teachers’ work engagement.
Meanwhile, several limitations in the research should be addressed and further improved. Firstly, all data in this study were gathered from the self-report of P.E. teachers through multivariate sampling and an electronic questionnaire, which overcomes the subjective tendencies of researchers and the regional differences of research samples. Therefore, in future lines of research, it would be interesting to further expand the research sample size and collect data by matching different levels, like leaders and teachers at the same time, to explore the explanatory power of the conclusions in this study. Secondly, this study only explores the mechanism of leader-expressed humility on P.E. teacher’s work engagement from the individual perspective of P.E. teachers without considering other influence factors. Hence, in future research, it would be interesting to combine qualitative and quantitative methods, by which we can consider more variables to profoundly reveal the P.E. teacher’s work engagement influencing mechanism in an all-round way and for the results to be more generalizable.

Author Contributions

Data curation, W.C. and Z.W.; Formal analysis, W.C.; Investigation, Z.W.; Project administration, R.F. and M.B.; Writing—original draft, W.C.; Writing—review and editing, W.C. and S.K. All authors have read and agreed to the published version of the manuscript.

Funding

This research was funded by the National Social Science Funds of China, grant number BLA210209.

Institutional Review Board Statement

The study was conducted in accordance with the Declaration of Helsinki, and the protocol was approved by the Ethics Committee of Qufu Normal University (2020200).

Informed Consent Statement

Informed consent was obtained from all subjects involved in the study.

Data Availability Statement

Not applicable.

Conflicts of Interest

The authors declare no conflict of interest.

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Sustainability 15 09297 g001 550
Figure 1. The research hypothesis model.
Figure 1. The research hypothesis model.
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Figure 2. Path analysis of structure mode. Note: ** p < 0.01, *** p < 0.001.
Figure 2. Path analysis of structure mode. Note: ** p < 0.01, *** p < 0.001.
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Table
Table 1. Descriptive statistics and correlations of variables (N = 579).
Table 1. Descriptive statistics and correlations of variables (N = 579).
MSD123
1. Leader-expressed humility3.6010.920
2. Teacher efficacy4.0050.7620.4592 **
3. Felt obligation3.9540.5520.3812 **0.6232 **
4. Work engagement4.3080.5680.3912 **0.6142 **0.5782 **
Note. M: mean, SD: standard deviation, ** p < 0.01.
Table
Table 2. Fit measures of each model.
Table 2. Fit measures of each model.
Modelχ2dfχ2/dfTLICFISRMRRMSEA95% CI
LowerUpper
118.50972.6440.9910.9960.0270.0530.0240.084
2101.452244.2270.9700.9800.0390.0750.0600.090
3226.625504.5330.9540.9650.0470.0780.0680.089
4315.671833.8030.9530.9630.0460.0700.0620.078
Table
Table 3. Effects of leader-expressed humility on P.E. teachers’ work engagement.
Table 3. Effects of leader-expressed humility on P.E. teachers’ work engagement.
PathsβSE95%CI
LowerUpper
leader-expressed humility → work engagement0.4790.0400.4000.556
leader-expressed humility → teacher efficacy → work engagement0.2730.0310.2170.340
leader-expressed humility → felt obligation → work engagement0.2710.0310.2160.339
leader-expressed humility → teacher efficacy
→ felt obligation → work engagement		0.3500.0310.2920.417
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Cheng, W.; Wang, Z.; Fang, R.; Kayani, S.; Biasutti, M. The Mechanism of Leader-Expressed Humility on a Physical Education Teacher’s Work Engagement—Exploring the Chain Mediation Effect of Teacher Efficacy and Felt Obligation. Sustainability 2023, 15, 9297. https://doi.org/10.3390/su15129297

AMA Style

Cheng W, Wang Z, Fang R, Kayani S, Biasutti M. The Mechanism of Leader-Expressed Humility on a Physical Education Teacher’s Work Engagement—Exploring the Chain Mediation Effect of Teacher Efficacy and Felt Obligation. Sustainability. 2023; 15(12):9297. https://doi.org/10.3390/su15129297

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Cheng, Wenjuan, Zhonghua Wang, Rui Fang, Sumaira Kayani, and Michele Biasutti. 2023. "The Mechanism of Leader-Expressed Humility on a Physical Education Teacher’s Work Engagement—Exploring the Chain Mediation Effect of Teacher Efficacy and Felt Obligation" Sustainability 15, no. 12: 9297. https://doi.org/10.3390/su15129297

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