Financial Gains and Moral Satisfaction as Key Factors for Greater Efficiency in the Field of Education
Round 1
Reviewer 1 Report
Dear authors I’ve read your article with interest. However, some aspect deserves a second review:
- I’ aware that the instructions of the journal ask mainly for a introduction section, but given the length of the literature revision, please consider to create some subchapters and present in a more compelling way your arguments;
- Your results sections if too long and gets confusing. In fact, you present the frequency tables for the answers, and after you do not explore that results. So why present it?
- The discussion deserves a better job using the literature reviewed.
Author Response
Dear reviewer,
Thank you for your comments. These were really important for the study to get improved. All necessary changes have been done according to all reviewers' comments.
Reviewer 2 Report
I would like to thank for the opportunity to revise this manuscript. I have read it with great interest, and I think it deals with a topic which is relevant for teachers’ professional education. Its findings may have potential educational implications, since they can offer insights for encouraging and sustaining teachers’ professional satisfaction and motivation.
However, in the current form, the manuscript does not be accepted for publication: major revisions are required. The article presents several critical points that need to be addressed more in detail. The review of the literature may benefit from a clearer structure, which may introduce in a more organized way the different topics involved in the research. There is a lack of information about the instruments for collecting data and their development and the procedure section (how participants were recruited and how the questionnaire was presented and proposed to them for the compilation) is totally missing, as well as the ethical statements of the research (voluntarily participation, participants anonymity, ecc.). The discussion section should contain more comparisons with previous literature findings.
Abstract
Please, specify what kind of motivation do you refer to (professional motivation?)
Introduction
The introduction lacks a clear and coherent structure, it seems that it jumps from one topic to another without fully introduces them or linking them with the main theme of the research project described.
- lines 29-38: while discussing about theory of motivation, I would suggest also to mention the self-determination theory of Deci and Ryan, which tries to explain the process of internalizing motivation. Referring to this theory may be very useful to better clarify, further in the introduction section, the differences between extrinsic and intrinsic motivation, and external and internal rewards. In my opinion it is very important to make this distinction clearly while discussing about teachers’ profession, since, on the contrary that happens for other jobs, often there are not only external rewards or motivation for choosing teaching: intrinsic values, interest and motivation have also a relevant impact and may affect the perception of external benefits.
-lines 65-67: this sentence should be supported by proper references.
- Lines 69-80: this paragraph should be moved to the Method section;
-lines 194-197: as stated in my previous comments, this is the core of research theme. Since this is a crucial statement, I would suggest to support it with more references.
Method
- Lines 203-204: I would suggest to replace the term “primary” with “exploratory”;
- -Lines 206-207: this sentence is a bit tricky, since research method should be chosen “a priori”, considering the research aim and questions, and not after having collecting data. I would highly suggest to replace it with an explanation related to the nature of the aims of the current research (for example, the need to find generalizable results, that can have possible practical and educational applications on a wide range).
Sample and demographics:
- This section should also report participants’ mean age and SD (not only the range); mean working experience and SD (not only range); mean monthly wage and SD (not only range).
- Line 217: the last sentence is redundant. Please, integrate it into the next quote (e.g. “Of the respondents, 158 (58.5%) were women and 112 (41.5%) men”).
A section about research instruments (description of the questionnaires/items used) is missing and it should be added to the report. If a questionnaire has been specifically developed for this study, its construction should be explained and discussed, with possible references to other already existing instruments that have been considered in this stage. This is necessary for support the reliability of the current findings.
A procedure section should be added, including how participants were recruited and how the questionnaire was presented and proposed to them for the compilation the ethical statements of the research.
Results
- Line 332: as reported in my previous comment, it is not clear if the questionnaire has been specifically developed for this study. If so, it would be advisable to compute a confirmative factorial analysis, and then reporting reliability analysis.
- Line 365: while reporting the results of the regression analysis, it should also indicate the adjustable R square, from which the percentage of explained variance of the results can be extracted. Please, also explain what kind of regression model has been computed (stepwise? Block?). These suggestions should be applied for all the regression models computed.
Discussion
The Discussion section should include more comparisons with previous literature findings.
- Lines 508-509: I am wondering on what basis the authors make this claim. It is true that results are generalizable to Greek primary teachers, but I think it is not possible to be so specific in defining the demographics characteristics of the population. I would suggest only to indicate “These results can be generalizable to Greek primary young teachers”, in my opinion it would be sufficient.
- Lines 510-511: while mentioning the limitation related to the evaluation of self-efficacy it is advisable to remember also that in the current study is not considered the dimension related to students’ evaluation of teaching efficacy, which is a relevant indicator that can influence teachers’ perception.
Author Response
Dear reviewer,
Thank you for your comments. These were really important for the study to get improved. All necessary changes have been done according to all reviewers' comments.
Reviewer 3 Report
After reviewing the manuscript, I consider that it is necessary for the author to make different changes to improve the quality and understanding of the document:
- Justification for the problem under study is well done.
- The research objectives and questions are well defined.
- The author does not describe or explain the instrument used: independent variables and dependent variables.
- The methodology section should include the quality criteria of the instrument: reliability (Cronbach's alpha) and validity, and not include it in the results block.
- Regarding the factors that the authors identify, it is not clear whether this is the result of a factor analysis carried out or factors that previously appear in the questionnaire. This should be explained. If it is not the product of a factor analysis, it is recommended to do so and from there perform the appropriate analyzes.
- The author should also explain why he performs correlations (which also do not give very significant correlation values) and does not use ANOVA (for example).
- Discussion is well argued
- Review and update the bibliographic references used.
Author Response
Dear reviewer,
Thank you for your comments. These were really important for the study to get improved. All necessary changes have been done according to all reviewers' comments.
Round 2
Reviewer 1 Report
N.a.
Author Response
N.a
Reviewer 2 Report
I have read with great attention the revised version of the manuscript, which has been really improved. However, some critical aspects remains and I would suggest the authors to make minor revisions before accepting the manuscript for publication.
I have reported them here below:
-Participants’ mean age and SD, mean working experience and SD, mean monthly wage and SD are still missing from the participant section; these data are necessary for integrate percentages about participants' demographics;
- In the Questionnarie section information about Spector (1985); Rosenberg (1965) and Duke (2017) should be properly integrated in the Reference section;- the data about the adjustable R square, from which the percentage of explained variance of the results can be extracted, and the kind of regression model has been computed (stepwise? Block?) are still missing. Without them is a bit difficult to understand the size of the statistical effect that the regression models measure.
Author Response
Dear reviewer,
Thank you for your comments. Both References section and Methods section have been updated according to your comments. Since other reviewers in previous rounds suggested to remove the descriptive statistics tables regarding the mean and the SD information regarding the sample,due to the length of the paper, and now accepted the paper for publication as it is, we added these data in the text in order to be compatible to all comments.
Reviewer 3 Report
The authors have made the appropriate changes and improved the quality of the manuscript.
It is important that the authors re-edit the numbering of citations in consecutive order within the text, taking into account the new bibliographic citations incorporated.
Author Response
Dear reviewer,
Thank you for your comments. The numbering of citations has been re-eddited.
