Between vocation and wear: configurations of resilience and mental health among beginning teachers in Chile

Introduction This study examined how teacher resilience, eudaimonic well-being, and mental health symptomatology are related among beginning teachers in Chile during labor-market entry, with the aim of identifying configurations that help explain early professional adjustment and retention challenges. Methods A mixed-methods QUAL–quant longitudinal design was employed. At the end of the first semester of their first year of work, 107 teachers who had graduated from six universities completed instruments assessing resilience, eudaimonic well-being, and symptoms of depression, anxiety, and stress, and participated in semi-structured critical-incident interviews. K-means cluster analyses and ANOVA contrasts were used to identify quantitative profiles, while qualitative data deepened the interpretation of these patterns. Results Two eudaimonic well-being profiles were identified—relational eudaimonia (positive relations, autonomy, and environmental mastery) and vocational eudaimonia (life purpose and self-acceptance)—together with two symptomatology profiles (high/low). Relational eudaimonia was associated with higher emotional and social resilience, whereas high symptomatology was associated with lower motivational resilience, showing that well-being, symptomatology, and resilience are interrelated but not reducible to one another. Demographic variables did not differentiate the profiles. Qualitative findings clarified these relationships by identifying four configurations: protected vocational resilience, high-cost resilience, relational resilience, and overstrained resilience. Discussion The findings show that resilience is heterogeneous, context-dependent, and may coexist with significant distress. By making explicit how well-being and symptomatology combine into distinct resilience configurations, the study addresses its objective of clarifying the relationships among key variables and highlights the need for multilevel interventions during induction, including mentoring, collaboration, and sustainable working conditions.