Pathways to Low Turnover Intention Among Social Work Supervisors in China: A Configurational Perspective

Recent years have witnessed escalating turnover intention among Chinese social workers, posing systemic challenges to workforce stability in the sector. Intriguingly, social work supervisors demonstrate comparatively low turnover intention despite this trend, necessitating an investigation into its causal mechanisms. Leveraging the "individual-organization-family triad model" and data from the 2019 China Social Work Longitudinal Survey (CSWLS), this study applies fuzzy-set Qualitative Comparative Analysis (fsQCA) to decode how configurations across personal, organizational, and familial dimensions jointly shape supervisors’ low turnover intention. Findings reveal three key insights: (1) Low turnover intention emerges only through synergistic interactions of cross-level conditions, no single factor suffices as a necessary cause. (2) The driving pathways for low turnover intention among social work supervisors can be categorized into two primary categories: individual-organization-driven pathways and organization-family-driven pathways. (3) Family support serves as a critical buffer, mitigating the negative effects of external stressors on sustaining low turnover intention. The findings of this study not only delineate the configurational conditions underlying low turnover intention among social work supervisors but also reveal pathways of protective factor combinations that enhance workforce stability in the social work profession. These insights provide an empirical foundation for addressing the talent retention crisis in the sector and advancing the quality of professional services.