Relationship of Religiosity and Depression and Anxiety of K-12th Grade Educators

As more people suffer from a decline in mental health, the education profession is especially vulnerable to anxiety and depression. K-12th grade teachers face a plethora of job-related stressors that impact their mental health, which often affects the quality of education and student outcomes. Public school teachers face the daily challenge of managing student behavior, responding to parent, community, and administrator demands, high-stakes testing, and the responsibility of designing rigorous lessons. They must face these challenges while balancing personal stressors such as financial struggles with minimal pay. Additionally, teachers’ mental health influences the culture and climate of the school environment for students. While some teachers utilize healthy coping strategies, including exercise, others turn to unhealthy habits such as substance abuse. The purpose of this quantitative nonexperimental cross-sectional study is to investigate the relationship between the religiosity of teachers and their depression and anxiety, as well as how school environments affect the mediation relationship between religiosity and mental health. Teachers in the Houston area participated in this quantitative research.