JOB SATISFACTION AMONG UNIVERSITY TEACHERS WITHIN PAKISTAN

Muhammad Imran Malik

PhD Scholar.
im4imranmalik@yahoo.com
0333 9156828.
FUIMCS
Foundation University Islamabad, Pakistan.
Muhammad Ali Tirmizi
PhD Scholar.
m5alitahir@gmail.com
FUIMCS
Foundation University Islamabad, Pakistan.
Beenish Chaudhary
PhD Scholar.
benishch@yahoo.com
FUIMCS
Foundation University Islamabad, Pakistan.
This study has been conducted with a view of ascertaining the level of job satisfaction among the university
teachers within Pakistan, specifically with in the areas of Rawalpindi and Islamabad, emphasizing the public
sector universities, which has the lions share in imparting education, beside private sector universities. This
study probes how much satisfied are the university teachers within Pakistan by looking at different aspects like
the relationship of age, gender and highest level of education, with the satisfaction level of the teachers. The
study has been conducted by using an adopted questionnaire survey. The questionnaires were distributed among
the university teachers, on the basis of convenience sampling. A sample of 200 university teacher was
considered and 130 respondents responded to the questionnaires, by producing 65.0% response rate. Among
which 69.2% were male respondents and 30.8% were female respondents. Analysis and evaluation was done
using SPSS. Major findings of the study showed that the male respondents are more satisfied than female
respondents and as a whole as the age increases the job satisfaction level increases and with the increase in the
education level, the level of overall satisfaction increases. Moreover due to the government policies, rules and
regulations, such as introduction of the Tenure Track System, the job satisfaction is effected.
Keywords Job satisfaction, University teachers, Islamabad, Rawalpindi, Pakistan.
INTRODUCTION
Literature shows that, there have been several job satisfaction studies and among them very few are about the
university teachers or academics. This paper looks into the level of Job satisfaction among the university
teachers of the public sector universities in Pakistan, especially in the areas of Rawalpindi and Islamabad.
Pakistan has many universities in the public as well as in the private sector, which are playing a pivotal role in
spreading higher level of education in Pakistan. These universities are contributing towards the economic
growth of the country by producing skilled intellectual human capital. The present study is based on the data
collected from the university teachers. The total welfare of the society is associated with the satisfaction of the
academic staff of the university, as they inculcate the precious wealth of knowledge among the youth of the
country. Job satisfaction is the area which had and has been researched by many people. Locke (1976) estimated
that, as of 1976, about 3,350 articles or dissertations had been written on this topic. In 1992, Cranny et al.,
suggested that more than 5,000 studies of job satisfaction have been published. In a more recent estimate,
Oshagbemi (1996) suggested that, if a count of relevant articles and dissertations was made would probably be
doubled and Lockes estimated this figure 20 years earlier to the estimation of Oshagbemi.
Classically, Job satisfaction is conceptualized as a general attitude towards an object that is the job. The
definitions of Job satisfaction given by Locke (1976, p.1300) stated as a pleasurable or positive emotional
estate, resulting from the appraisal of ones job experiences.
In general, job satisfaction refers to an individuals positive emotional reaction to a job that results from the
persons comparison of actual outcomes with those that are desired, anticipated or deserved. The topic of job
satisfaction is an important area because of its relevance to the physical and mental well being of employees.
It is clear that the majority of the dominant theoretical and empirical work in this field has been done in the
West such as North America and Western Europe (e-g Hagedorn, 1994; 1996; Johnsrud and Heck, 1998; Kanji
and Tambi, 1999) seldom has any research been done in other parts of the world, that is in the developing and
underdeveloped countries on this subject. Therefore, more research is needed to understand the satisfaction of
the university teaching staff in the developing country like Pakistan. The results of this study will give a new
perspective to the findings of the previous studies, (Wisniewski; 1990, Ward and Sloane: 1999, Okpara,

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Squillace and Erondu; 2004, Bender and Heywood (2006), on the issue of University teaching staff satisfaction
in a developing country in a somewhat different culture.
Purpose of the Study
Many researches have been conducted on the matter of job satisfaction, but the segment of university teachers,
which is the important contributor of the moral, social and economic values, was ignored and no or very less
research have been conducted to see the job satisfaction level of the university teachers, especially in the
developing country like Pakistan. Thus, this study explores the degree to which, the different demographic
variables like age, gender and the highest level of education of teachers affect the job satisfaction level of the
university teachers.
LITERATURE REVIEW
Stapples and Higgins (1998) found that, Employee satisfaction reflects the degree to which the individuals
needs and desires are met and the extent to which this is perceived by the other employees, it is generally
perceived as: . . . . .the scope of work and all the positive attitudes regarding the work environment.
Job satisfaction is an attitude that people have about their jobs and the organizations in which they perform these
jobs. Mosadeghrad (2003) found that, methodologically, we can define job satisfaction as an employees
affective reaction to a job, based on a comparison between actual outcomes and desired outcomes.
Manger and Eikeland (1990) examined factors that influence academics intention to leave the university, and
found that, although salary and economic resources did not appear to influence intentions to stay or go, general
employee satisfaction and relations with colleagues were the strong predictors of an intention to leave.
Hagedorn (1994) examined the satisfaction of academic staff as a result of a number of variables including
salary, perceived support of colleagues, satisfaction with the administration, enjoyment of student interaction,
and perceived level of stress. The results indicated that satisfaction with the salary, total number working hours,
and the perceived support of colleagues directly influenced the level of stress, which in turn, directly affected
satisfaction.
Several researchers have examined the relationship between job satisfaction and gender (Mottaz, 1986; Mason,
1995). However, the results of the many studies concerning the relationship between job satisfaction and the sex
of the employees have been contradictory. Researchers of (Bartol and Wortman, 1975; Murray and Arkinson,
1981; Clark, 1996; Ward and Sloane, 1998) found that, woman are more satisfied than men. Few other
researches conducted by (Shapro and Stern, 1975; Forgionne and Peters, 1982) found that men are more
satisfied than women.
METHODOLOGY
Sample of the study consisted of 130 public sector university teachers who responded to the questionnaires.
Data was collected from different public sector universities in Rawalpindi and Islamabad. The questionnaires
were distributed among the public sector university teachers, on the basis of convenience sampling. A sample of
200-university teacher was considered and 130 respondents responded to the questionnaires, by producing
65.0% response rate. Among which 69.2% were male respondents and 30.8% were female respondents.
Cronbachs Alpha was calculated to confirm its reliability, which resulted into a score of 0.835.
Different dimensions of the satisfaction of teachers were taken into consideration to get the maximum output
regarding job satisfaction such as salary, working conditions, promotions, benefits, authority, job security,
relationship with subordinates and seniors, rewards, etc. Independent variables considered in this paper were
age, and highest level of education among both the sexes.
The questionnaire was adopted from the study of job satisfaction within the Scottish Academic Profession by
(Ward and Sloane, 1999). Each of the scales employed in the questionnaire was measured from a range
representing (1) extremely dissatisfied to (7) extremely satisfied. Thus, (4) on the scale represented indifference,
i.e. neither satisfied nor dissatisfied.
To study how satisfied are teachers within the universities, with their job, the relationship of age, gender, highest
level of education, was checked by applying regression. The analysis enabled us to examine the individual
impact of the independent variables on the level of satisfaction.
FINDINGS AND DISCUSSION
There were three demographic independent variables that are age, gender, and highest level of education, which
were discussed and compared with the dependent variable of job satisfaction.

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Table- 1
Regression coefficient, standard errors in parenthesis, t- values in brackets and p- values in italics.
Constant

IV 1

IV 2

IV 3

6.114

-.071

-.331

-.203

(.271)

(.061)

(.144)

(.100)

[22.559]

[-1.161]

[-2.294]

[-2.029]

.000

.248

.023

.045

R square
.105

F stat
4.951

.003

Legend: IV-1: Measure of Frequency of respondents with respect to their Age.

IV-2: Measure of Frequency of respondents with respect to Gender.
IV-3: Measure of Frequency of respondents with respect to their Highest Level of Education.
ANALYSIS AND INTERPRETATION OF RESULTS
The Table 1 clearly indicates that, there is statistically significant relationship between the gender and highest
level of education whereas the age has non significant relationship with the dependent variable, which is evident
from the probability of F statistics (4.951), for the overall regression relationship (p<0.05). In-addition, the
Durbin-Watson analysis shows that there exists a relationship between the independent and dependent variables
but this relationship is weak as it is predicted by the value of R square which is (0.105). This value of R square
is also supported by the values of un- standardized coefficients (Beta) which have negative values for the
independent variables. These negative Betas predict that there is all the independent variables have negative
relationship with the dependent variable. The higher numeric value for strength of affiliation of the frequency of
respondents with respect to their Age is associated with the lower numeric value for the frequency of
respondents with respect to their Gender as well as Higher level of Education. The t-value of higher level of
education shows that it is relatively important variable as compared to the rest of the independent variables
involved in this study.
The p values for the independent variables shows that, gender and highest level of education have (p < 0.05)
whereas, age as an independent variable resulted in (p > 0.05), which concludes that there is no significant
relationship between the independent variable of age but a significant relationship is established between gender
and higher level of education with the dependent variable that is job satisfaction of university teachers in
Pakistan.
There were definite effects of age, gender and highest level of education on the level of job satisfaction, as many
researches have earlier shown the results somewhat similar to this study. In the study of age, rank and gender to
see the level of job satisfaction, Oshagbemi Titus (2000), found that the people having age 45 years and above
are more satisfied rather than people of age less than 45 years.
In another study it has been found that the faculty having age 60 years or older are tend to be more satisfied, as
reported by Leafy Tu, Michel Plaisent, Prosper Bernard and Lassana Maguiraga (2005), which is again in
accordance to our study. In our study the higher significance value is due to the a limitation which is the small
number of responses collected by highly aged and experienced faculty members and thus, less satisfied young
and middle aged faculty dominated the SPSS results. Hence, this result is overcome by the general perception
prevailing in the university teaching sector that older the faculty member is, the more satisfied he or will be. The
reason for more satisfaction may be the pecuniary and non pecuniary rewards attached to the job and the
position held by the faculty member. Experience is another factor that may count towards the job satisfaction of
the faculty members of universities.
CONCLUSION
After going through the data we can say that as a whole the male segment of the teaching staff of the universities
are satisfied as compared to the female staff, one reason for this may be the culture of Pakistan, as male are
considered as the bread winners of the family so, they have to work rather than female, as this is evident from
the number of responses collected by the respondents.
Teachers having age Under 30, contributed 46.2 percent of the responses and found unsatisfied because they are
willing to contribute towards the character building, knowledge sharing and creating skilled workforce but
unfortunately they get less opportunities to avail them as compared to the older universities teachers and their
influence on the functionality of the public sector universities. The people with high education specially masters,
or above were found more responsive towards the job satisfaction survey. As mostly our teachers at university

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have got masters degree or the higher. There are very few who are competing with the people having higher
education. Moreover there are different responses observed from the people who opt for tenure track system.
Further Researches
Further studies may be conducted on the different dimensions of the job Satisfaction of university teachers like
the effect of marital status and the number of children on the job satisfaction level, similarly the effect of
colleagues and family on the satisfaction level of the employees etc. or studies may be conducted to check the
job satisfaction level in the public and private sector organizations in Pakistan.
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