Impacting a diverse range of outcomes, from effectiveness of teaching and student achievement to teacher retention rates in profession (Wartenberg et al., 2023), teacher job satisfaction is among the crucial factors impacting teaching and learning environments. While a recent OECD report draws attention to teacher shortages for 18 of the 21 countries, as recent as, at the beginning of the 2022/23 academic year, scholars points to declining teacher job satisfaction rates as the main driving reason for these shortages (Sims, 2020). Explicitly, job satisfaction is defined as the sense of fulfillment that teachers experience when they feel their work allows them to achieve or support their personal and professional values (Locke, 1969). This sense of fulfillment, when achieved, contributes to greater participation in professional development activities by teachers, increased effectiveness of their teaching practices, and enhanced provision of effective support for their students’ learning (OECD, 2019; Price & Carstens, 2018; Toropova et al., 2021). Given its wide-reaching implications for teachers, teacher job satisfaction remains a critical area for exploration (Price & Carstens, 2018). Therefore, exploring the determinants of teacher job satisfaction is crucial for ensuring a well-supported and sustainable teaching workforce (OECD, 2024).

However, this sense of fulfillment, i.e. teacher job satisfaction in this study, is unfortunately experienced differentially depending on teacher demographics, motivation and self-efficacy, professional development, and school environment and wellbeing. Regarding teacher demographics, factors such as teachers' gender and years of teaching experience, along with other factors such as their professional qualifications and personal characteristics, play an important role in their job satisfaction levels (Toropova et al., 2021). Some studies point no significant impact of teacher gender on their job satisfaction (Crossman & Harris, 2006), while others argue female teachers having the tendency to indicate higher levels of job satisfaction (Toropova et al., 2021). Additionally, research shows that job satisfaction can be particularly distinct for teachers working with special education needs (SEN) students, often facing unique challenges, such as higher levels of classroom frustration, more intense work-related stress, and a need for additional leadership support (Olsen & Mason, 2023). Along with teacher demographics, these highlight the importance of considering experiences of teachers working with SEN students when examining overall job satisfaction.

For motivation and self-efficacy, research shows that teachers with social utility motivation to teach, e.g. the desire to teach to help others and make a positive impact on society, are more likely to report enjoyment and to be resilient to possible negative impacts on their job satisfaction (Parr et al., 2021) and teachers with higher self-efficacy for teaching tend to report higher job satisfaction (Cayupe et al., 2023). Apart from these impacts, Smet (2021) points to the significant association between teacher job satisfaction and various professional development aspects; positively with the need for development in teaching diverse student group and special education needs and negatively with the need for development in subject matter and pedagogy. Nevertheless, the school environment determines the working conditions of teachers, designating it as a crucial context to examine. Scholars underline school environment factors, such as teacher collaboration and support among different stakeholders, among the prominent impacts on teacher job satisfaction (Addimando, 2019; Dreer, 2024; Minghui et al., 2018).

Despite the extensive research on various factors influencing teacher job satisfaction, the number of studies utilizing multilevel modelling to examine how the teacher variables, including the presence of SEN students in classrooms, and school context shape teacher job satisfaction across nations is limited. Given this context, this study aims to address this existing research gap by providing a comprehensive analysis of the factors contributing to differential teacher job satisfaction.

Using a multilevel modeling approach, this study aims to examine the determinants of teacher job satisfaction based on the latest available data from the 2018 Teaching and Learning International Survey (TALIS) (OECD, 2018). While the analysis accounts for the nested data structure, the study further explores differences in job satisfaction between teachers working with students with special education needs (SEN) and those who are not, even after controlling for several teacher- and school-level predictors. The analyzed dataset consists of 185812 teachers across 14826 schools in 45 countries, with School-ID and Country-ID functioning as clustering variables. The outcome variable for the multilevel model is teacher job satisfaction. Individual-level predictors include teacher demographics (gender, years of teaching experience, and whether the teacher works with SEN students), teaching motivation and self-efficacy (personal and social motivations to teach, and teacher self-efficacy), and professional development (self-reported effectiveness, barriers, and needs in SEN teaching, and subject matter and pedagogy). School-level predictors include perceived school environment and wellbeing from teachers’ perspectives, with seven key predictors: stakeholder participation, team innovativeness, teacher-student relations, workplace and workload stress levels, disciplinary climate, and teacher cooperation. The multilevel model is estimated using maximum likelihood and available case analysis. Maximum likelihood estimation was chosen due to its efficiency in handling complex data structures with missing values, while available case analysis ensured that only complete cases were included in the final model. Moreover, model fit is assessed using Akaike and Bayesian Information Criteria (AIC and BIC) for model comparison and Intraclass Correlations (ICCs) to represent the proportion of variance in the outcome variable explained by the group-level variations. During multilevel model development, each variable domain is introduced to the model sequentially. While the estimated ICCs remained stable at less than 1% for the country level across the introduction of all domains, the ICCs for the school level decreased from 8.71% in the initial model to 2.52% in the final model, with a considerable decrease of 5.42% after introducing the contextual variables regarding school environment and wellbeing. The decrease in the ICC for the school level indicates that a considerable portion of the variance in job satisfaction attributable to the school level can be explained by included school-level factors.

The final model revealed intriguing results. This study aimed to examine the multilevel determinants of teacher job satisfaction, focusing on teacher demographics, teaching motivation and self-efficacy, professional development at the individual level, and perceived school environment and wellbeing at the school level. Regarding teacher demographics, the results showed no significant differences in job satisfaction based on gender. However, years of teaching experience were found to have a negative impact on job satisfaction. For teaching motivation and self-efficacy, while personal motivation to teach was negatively associated with job satisfaction, both social motivation to teach and teaching self-efficacy had a positive impact. As for professional development, teachers’ self-reported effectiveness of professional development initiatives was positively associated with job satisfaction, while perceived barriers to professional development had a negative effect. Interestingly, no significant impact was found for professional development needs in teaching SEN students, or in subject matter and pedagogy. At the school level, factors related to the perceived school environment and wellbeing also showed significant associations. Teachers working in schools with greater stakeholder participation, higher workload stress, and more positive teacher-student relations reported higher levels of job satisfaction. Conversely, teachers in schools with higher workplace stress, less discipline in the classroom, and more frequent teacher cooperation reported lower levels of job satisfaction. No significant relationship was found between team innovativeness at the school level and job satisfaction. Additionally, the study explored differences in job satisfaction between teachers working with SEN students and those who are not. The results indicated significantly lower, although slightly, job satisfaction of teachers working with SEN students, even after controlling for several teacher- and school-level predictors. This association between SEN teaching and job satisfaction calls for further investigation into the specific challenges faced by teachers working with SEN students, and potential support strategies to enhance their job satisfaction.

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