Lili Liu,1,* Feifei Li,2,3,* Xinyu Gu,2,3 Runkai Jiao4,5 

1School of Education, Changchun Normal University, Changchun, Jilin, People’s Republic of China; 2College of Education, Wenzhou University, Wenzhou, Zhejiang, People’s Republic of China; 3Center for Psychological and Behavioral Research, Wenzhou University, Wenzhou, Zhejiang, People’s Republic of China; 4School of Psychology, Northeast Normal University, Changchun, Jilin, People’s Republic of China; 5National Training Center for Kindergarten Principals, Ministry of Education, Changchun, Jilin, People’s Republic of China

*These authors contributed equally to this work

Correspondence: Feifei Li, Wenzhou University, Chashan Higher Education Park, Wenzhou, Zhejiang Province, 325035, People’s Republic of China, Tel +8615143003119, Email 20220053@wzu.edu.cn

Purpose: Possessing a calling to teach is a core and essential quality of good kindergarten teachers, and it is critical to explore which factors positively impact kindergarten teachers’ career calling. Developing a career calling is a meaning-making process that can be influenced by the actions of others in the workplace. During the frequent parent-teacher interactions, parent-initiated support may serve as significant interpersonal cues for kindergarten teachers in developing their career calling. Thus, the present study examined the effect of parent-initiated support on kindergarten teachers’ career calling. Further, we investigated the multiple mediating roles of global and specific basic psychological need satisfaction based on the self-determination theory (SDT).
Methods: Cross-sectional data were collected from 629 kindergarten teachers in China and analyzed using Mplus 8.3 software and the Process 3.5 macro of SPSS 26.0 software. Before testing the hypothesis, we used Mplus 8.3 to save factor scores from the Bifactor model of basic psychological need satisfaction and two uni-dimensional models of parent-initiated support and career calling. Subsequently, using the Process 3.5 macro within SPSS 26.0 software, we conducted path analysis to examine the total and mediating effects between parent-initiated support and kindergarten teachers’ career calling.
Results: The results revealed a positive effect of parent-initiated support on teachers’ career calling. Teachers’ global and specific competence need satisfaction partially mediated this positive effect, while the mediating effects of teachers’ specific autonomy and relatedness need satisfaction were non-significant.
Conclusion: These findings suggest that parent-initiated support is an important job resource for kindergarten teachers’ development of career calling. In addition to satisfying global psychological needs, satisfying specific needs (eg, competence need) provides additional benefits to kindergarten teachers’ experience of career calling.

Keywords: parent-initiated support, career calling, basic psychological need satisfaction, kindergarten teacher, self-determination theory