Educating to Exhaustion: Intention to Leave Among US Full-Time Nursing Faculty

Abstract

AIM

The aim of this study was to examine the relationships between work efforts and rewards with intention to leave and burnout among full-time nurse educators.

BACKGROUND

The nursing faculty shortage is a contributor to the nursing shortage. Poor balance between work efforts and rewards may contribute to intention to leave.

METHOD

A cross-sectional survey of US nurse faculty examined work efforts, rewards, burnout, and intention to leave. Structural equation modeling was used to evaluate the relationships among variables.

RESULTS

Among 588 participants, efforts and rewards both had significant effects on burnout. Burnout and rewards had significant effects on intention to leave. Relationships between efforts, rewards, and intention to leave were significantly mediated by burnout. Efforts, rewards, and burnout all had significant total effects on intention to leave.

CONCLUSION

Interrelationships linking effort, rewards, and burnout require thoughtful solutions focusing on balancing efforts and rewards while addressing dissatisfaction with the nursing faculty role.

The nursing labor shortage in the United States has reached crisis levels. More than 200,000 new nurses are needed each year through 2031 to replace nurses leaving the workforce, but nursing education institutions are only able to educate about 155,000 new nurses annually due to a concurrent shortage of nursing faculty (Bureau of Labor Statistics, 2024; Salsberg, 2018). In 2023, more than 65,000 qualified applicants were denied admission to nursing programs due, in part, to faculty shortages (American Association of Colleges of Nursing [AACN], 2024). The nurse faculty shortage has created a bottleneck in which educational institutions are unable to educate sufficient nurses to meet demands. The dual shortages of nurses and nurse faculty are described as a public health emergency that must be addressed to preserve current health care systems (Buchan & Catton, 2023). The nurse faculty workforce is expected to shrink further due to aging and retirements (AACN, 2024); one third of full-time faculty are expected to retire by 2025 (Fang & Kesten, 2017).

Intention to leave the full-time faculty role for reasons other than retirement may be an underacknowledged contributor to the faculty shortage. The balance between effort (obligations required of a worker, such as job duties or deliverables) and rewards (benefits received in exchange for work) is believed to be a contributor to the faculty shortage. For example, salary dissatisfaction and burnout (a syndrome of exhaustion and cynicism with one’s work) are believed to be two prominent and preventable contributors to intention to leave the faculty role (Jarosinski et al., 2022; Leiberg et al., 2025).

There is a need to more deeply explore the relationships between effort, rewards, burnout, and intention to leave among full-time nurse faculty. The aim of this study, therefore, was to examine the relationships linking work efforts and rewards to intention to leave and burnout among full-time nurse educators in the United States.

BACKGROUND AND THEORETICAL FRAMEWORK

Currently, there are not enough nurse faculty in the United States to meet demands to educate qualified prelicensure students (AACN, 2024). One possible contributor to the faculty shortage is high faculty burnout and consequent intention to leave the faculty role (Jarosinski et al., 2022; Leiberg et al., 2025). One third of university faculty and more than 50 percent of nurses are estimated to suffer from burnout (Alves et al., 2019; Marques et al., 2018). Research on both K-12 teachers and university faculty (of multiple disciplines) indicates that poor balance between work efforts and work rewards is linked to burnout (Calkins et al., 2019; Coll et al., 2019; Hamilton, 2019; Seibt & Kreuzfeld, 2021). Despite these findings, the relationships among work efforts, work rewards, burnout, and intention to leave have not been thoroughly evaluated in nursing faculty.

The effort-reward imbalance framework serves as the foundation for this study. This framework describes burnout and intention to leave as outcome variables with a relationship to both the effort one puts into work and the rewards one derives from work (Siegrist, 1996; Siegrist & Li, 2020). Efforts are believed to be a contributor to the effort-reward imbalance in nurse faculty; only 18 percent of faculty reported feeling satisfied with their workloads (Boamah et al., 2021). Effort is best characterized as extrinsic or intrinsic. Extrinsic efforts are the external responsibilities or demands of one’s job (e.g., number of working hours or responsibilities a nurse educator is expected to fulfill); extrinsic efforts are believed to be problematic for nursing faculty, who work an average of 56 hours weekly in their faculty jobs (Ludwig-Beymer et al., 2022). Intrinsic efforts are referred to as “overcommitment” and have to do with internal motivation and engagement with one’s work (Siegrist & Li, 2020). Nurse faculty often report feeling overcommitted to their work, with at least 23 percent to 27 percent of faculty describing a “spillover effect” in which excessive work interferes with personal time (Farber et al., 2020).

Within the effort-reward imbalance framework, high effort jobs may be sustainable if commensurate rewards are also available (Siegrist & Li, 2020). However, the rewards associated with nurse faculty work may be insufficient to retain the highly educated professionals required to meet demand. Poor salary parity between nonacademic nursing roles and the academic nurse faculty role is believed to be a preeminent driver of the nursing faculty shortage. Many faculty note their new graduate nurses are paid more than faculty (Christianson et al., 2024; Jarosinski et al., 2022; Malin et al., 2024).

Nonsalary rewards, such as employer contributions to retirement funds, health insurance, tuition reimbursement, and/or student debt forgiveness, may also influence job satisfaction and, by proxy, intention to leave (Arian et al., 2018). Although nurse faculty may find the teaching, research, and service requirements of their roles to be psychologically rewarding (Evans, 2018; Miner, 2019; Singh et al., 2020), nonsalary benefits, including satisfaction with different aspects of the faculty role, have not been previously quantified as rewards together with salary rewards for work. In this study, we aimed to address this gap in the literature by examining the relationships linking work efforts and rewards with intention to leave and burnout among full-time nurse educators. Improved understanding of the balance between all work rewards, efforts for work, faculty burnout, and intention to leave may provide needed information to prevent potential worsening of the downstream nursing workforce shortage.

METHOD

Sample and Recruitment

The study sample consisted of full-time nurse faculty who worked in US nursing education institutions. Participants met the following inclusion criteria: 1) age >18 years, 2) current full-time employment as faculty at an accredited nursing education institution that prepares students for registered nurse licensure, 3) speaks and understands English, and 4) has access to an electronic device with Internet. An a priori power analysis found that a minimum sample size of 370 participants would result in power of .80 for a root mean square error of approximation of .04 (less than the .05 suggested indication of good model fit) for the proposed structural equation model with 52 degrees of freedom. This number was inflated by 25 percent to account for a potential survey drop rate and missing data (Julious, 2010). The final recruitment goal was 463 participants. Previous research has demonstrated the feasibility of collecting large representative samples of self-reported US nursing faculty salary data via anonymous surveys (Malin et al., 2024).

Recruitment took place via targeted email campaigns through nursing education organizations (AACN, National Organization of Nurse Practitioner Faculties, American Association for Men in Nursing) and snowball sampling via direct emails to deans of accredited nursing education institutions. Survey data were collected using Qualtrics (2024), a secured survey platform, and downloaded to a secure university server. Following the survey, participants were offered the option to enter their email address in a drawing for one of 250 pieces of $25 gift cards. Email addresses were collected in a separate survey to protect participant anonymity. Bot detection took place via use of reCAPTCHA, review of the speed of survey completion, and manual matching of participant self-entered ZIP codes to reported state of residence (Storozuk et al., 2020; Teitcher et al., 2015). The study protocol was reviewed by the Marquette University Institutional Review Board for ethics in human research and was approved with exempt status.

Measurements

INDEPENDENT VARIABLES AND COVARIATES

Demographic data collected included age, gender, race, ethnicity, state of residence, relationship status, years in nursing clinical practice, years in the faculty role, faculty contract length, highest nursing education attained, type of nursing education institution (e.g., technical college, community college, or university), types of nursing programs taught, work outside contract hours (e.g., compensated work, uncompensated work, both compensated and uncompensated work, and none), work settings (e.g., classroom in-person, classroom online-only, clinical, simulation), faculty role (e.g., tenured, tenure track, clinical, administrative), and estimated years until retirement. State/territory of residence and ZIP code were collected for bot detection purposes.

The Nursing Faculty Satisfaction Questionnaire (NFSQ) is a 24-item survey instrument that measures faculty satisfaction with five subscales: Academic Atmosphere, Benefit Satisfaction, Service Components of Faculty Role, Research Components of Faculty Role, and Teaching Components of Faculty Role (Martin, 1991). Academic atmosphere includes attributes of the workplace described as psychologically rewarding in the literature (e.g., collegiality with colleagues, autonomy within the faculty role). Participants were asked to rate their satisfaction with 24 different attributes of their job on a five-point Likert-style scale, with scores ranging from very satisfied to very dissatisfied; a sixth option indicates not applicable to my role. Two examples of attributes on the survey include “Opportunity to work independently” and “Medical/health insurance benefits available.” Higher scores indicate greater dissatisfaction within each subscale. The instrument was validated among US nurse faculty using exploratory and confirmatory factor analysis and demonstrated strong internal consistency (Cronbach’s alpha = .92 in both the original validation study and in this data set) (Martin, 1991).

The Effort Reward Imbalance Questionnaire (ERIQ) (short version) is a 16-item survey instrument that measures three constructs: Work Effort (3 items), Work Rewards (7 items), and Overcommitment (6 items) (Siegrist et al., 2019). Each item includes a single statement and is scored on a four-point Likert-style scale: strongly disagree to strongly agree. Participants were asked to rate their agreement with statements regarding their full-time faculty job. Examples of statements include: “I have a constant time pressure due to a heavy workload” and “Considering all my efforts and achievements, my job promotion prospects are adequate.” Each subscale demonstrated acceptable internal consistency with subscale Cronbach’s alphas of .80 to .85 and the instrument has satisfactory test-retest reliability (Cronbach’s alphas .5 to 0.81 for our sample) (Siegrist et al., 2019; Tornroos et al., 2014). In our sample, Cronbach’s alphas were .81 for the Work Effort and Work Rewards subscales and .87 for Overcommitment.

Several additional individual items were included to measure efforts and rewards not captured by the above instruments. Items measuring efforts included: 1) self-reported number of hours worked in the faculty role per week, 2) presence of a secondary (e.g., nonfaculty) job, 3) conditional numeric slide-bar question evaluating number of hours worked in secondary job(s), and 4) conditional multiple-choice question asking for top reason for holding secondary job(s). Participants who answered “yes” to having secondary nonfaculty job(s) were given two conditional questions about reasons for holding secondary job(s). Options for top reason included: “maintain connection to clinical nursing practice,” “required for my teaching position,” “required to maintain nursing license/certification(s),” “financial need for basic living expenses,” “financial need for more disposable income,” “personal enjoyment/” and “other” with free text to specify.

One additional item was included to measure rewards, that is, categorical self-reported faculty base salary. Options were <$39,999; $40,000 to $64,999; $65,000 to $79,999; $80,000 to $99,999; $100,000 to $119,999; $120,000 to $149,999; $150,000 to $199,999; and $200,000+. These measures were selected based upon findings from a pilot survey of full-time nurse faculty that evaluated the feasibility and acceptability of similar survey questions (Malin et al., 2024).

OUTCOME VARIABLES

The Oldenburg Burnout Inventory is a 16-item survey that measures the construct of burnout (Demerouti & Bakker, 2008). Each survey item includes a single statement describing the full-time nursing faculty job; examples include the following: “There are days where I feel tired before I arrive at work” and “I can tolerate the pressure of my work very well.” Statements are scored on a four-point Likert-style scale, strongly disagree to strongly agree, with higher scores indicating greater burnout. The scale had good internal consistency with an overall Cronbach’s alpha of .84 and alphas of .85 for each subscale; it has been used in nurse faculty populations (Demerouti & Bakker, 2008; Zangaro et al., 2023). For our sample, Cronbach’s alpha was .81. Burnout was measured as a mediator variable for intention to leave.

Intention to leave the faculty role was addressed by the following question: “In the next three years, how likely are you to leave your full-time nursing faculty role?” A four-point Likert-style scale was used, ranging from very unlikely, unlikely, to very likely. Participants who answered likely or very likely were given a conditional multiple-choice question to rate their top reason for intention to leave. Options included the following: burnout, lack of advancement, non-work-related factors (e.g., family circumstances), opportunities for higher salary elsewhere, poor job satisfaction, retirement, and other (free text). This method for measuring intention to leave was previously piloted by the study team (Malin et al., 2024) and was selected to minimize survey fatigue in an otherwise lengthy survey.

Data Analysis

Analyses were conducted using Stata Version 18 (StataCorp LLC, 2023). Descriptive statistics including mean and standard deviation (continuous variables) and frequencies and percentages (categorical variables) were calculated for each variable. Little’s missing completely at random test was used to evaluate missing data patterns, and evidence for missing completely at random was found, χ²(64) = 62.09, p = .544; therefore, pairwise deletion was used throughout. Individual confirmatory factor analyses using maximum likelihood estimation were conducted to evaluate the proposed latent variables (efforts and rewards) in our model (see Figure 1). Finally, we used structural equation modeling with maximum likelihood estimation to test the relationships presented in Figure 1. Model fit was assessed using chi-square test, comparative fit index, Tucker-Lewis index, and root mean square error of approximation. Indirect effects were assessed with a Sobel test of the product of the coefficients using bootstrapped standard errors with 100 replications.

Figure 1.

Hypothesized variable relationships.

RESULTS

Participant Demographics

Of 588 participants, most reported a 9- or 10-month contract (57.4%), worked in a public institution (64.8%), were not tenured or tenure-track (62.9%), held a doctorate (52.5%), and earned between $65,000 and $99,999 (53%). Nearly half of participants reported they had a second job (49%) where they worked an average of 5.7 hours (SD = 8.8) per week during their faculty contract months. Most participants (80.1%) reported they worked when they were not under faculty contract (i.e., outside of their contract period).

Many participants (40.3%) reported they were likely or very likely to leave their full-time faculty job in the next three years; of these, 58.1 percent attributed their top reasons for intention to leave to opportunity for higher salary elsewhere (22.9%), burnout (19%), or poor job satisfaction (16.2%). Demographic characteristics obtained for this study are consistent with national demographic statistics for nurse faculty reported by the National League for Nursing (Mazinga, 2023) (see Supplementary Content for demographic details, http://links.lww.com/NEP/A694) (Table 1).

Table 1.

Demographic Characteristics of Participants

Characteristic	n (%)
Gender
Female	530 (91.7)
Male	40 (6.9)
Nonbinary	3 (0.5)
Race
African American/Black	44 (7.6)
Asian	5 (0.9)
Caucasian/White	493 (85.3)
Native American/Alaskan Native	4 (0.7)
Multiracial	16 (2.8)
Ethnicity
Hispanic	16 (2.8)
Not Hispanic	539 (93.3)
Region
New England	47 (8)
Middle Atlantic	71 (12.1)
South Atlantic	60 (10.3)
East North Central	133 (22.7)
East South Central	31 (5.3)
West North Central	79 (12.5)
West South Central	80 (13.7)
Mountain	43 (7.4)
Pacific	39 (6.7)
Nonstate U.S. territory	2 (0.3)
Relationship status
Single	91 (15.5)
Married	433 (73.6)
Widowed	13 (2.2)
Long-term partnership	24 (4.1)
Other	23 (3.9)
Highest nursing degree
Associate	5 (0.9)
Bachelor’s	15 (2.6)
Master’s	231 (39.5)
Doctorate of nursing practice (DNP)	168 (28.7)
PhD	139 (23.8)
Nonnursing or other	27 (4.6)
Contract length (months)
<8	8 (1.4)
8	3 (0.5)
9	205 (36)
10	122 (21.4)
11	18 (3.2)
12	213 (37.4)
Institution type
Technical or vocational school	20 (3.5)
Community college	146 (25.2)
University or college	400 (69.1)
Other	13 (2.2)
Private or public institution
Private	204 (35.2)
Public	375 (64.8)
Tenure
Tenured	114 (19.8)
Tenure-track	99 (17.2)
No	206 (35.8)
Institution does not have a tenure system	156 (27.1)
Program typea
LPN	51 (8.7)
Diploma (RN)	4 (0.7)
Associate	188 (32)
Bachelor’s	299 (50.9)
Master’s	148 (25.2)
Doctorate (DNP)	117 (19.9)
Doctorate (PhD)	32 (5.4)
Work outside of contract hours
Yes, compensated work	79 (22.2)
Yes, uncompensated work	88 (24.7)
Yes, both compensated and uncompensated work	118 (33.1)
No	63 (17.7)
Uncertain	6 (1.7)
Work settingsa
Classroom in-person	399 (67.9)
Classroom online-only	227 (38.6)
Classroom hybrid online/in-person	183 (31.7)
Simulation	286 (48.6)
Clinical	289 (49.1)
Research	149 (25.3)
Administrative (no teaching duties)	30 (5.1)
Administrative (has teaching duties)	175 (29.8)
Ageb	60 (10.7)
Years of nursing experienceb	23.2 (11.3)
Years of faculty experienceb	10.1 (7.9)
Faculty hours worked weeklyb	43.7 (9.9)
Estimated years until retirement
0–5	125 (23.3)
6–10	94 (17.5)
11–15	78 (14.6)
16–20	84 (15.7)
>20	121 (22.6)
Do not anticipate being able to retire	33 (6.2)
Faculty base salary
<39,000	1 (0.2)
40-64,999	83 (15.7)
65–79,999	137 (25.9)
80–99,999	143 (27.1)
100–119,999	95 (18)
120–149,999	50 (9.5)
150–199,999	15 (2.8)
200,000+	4 (0.8)
Second job
Yes	280 (49)
No	291 (50.9)
Top reason for second job
Maintain connection to clinical practice	63 (22.7)
Required for job	7 (2.5)
Maintain licensure	24 (8.6)
Financial needs for basic income	98 (35.3)
Financial needs for disposable income	48 (17.3)
Personal enjoyment	19 (6.8)
Other	17 (6.1)
Intention to leave
Very unlikely	145 (27.7)
Unlikely	167 (31.9)
Likely	121 (23.1)
Very likely	90 (17.2)
Prefer not to answer	65 (11.1)
Top reason for intention to leave
Burnout	40 (19)
Lack of advancement	6 (2.9)
Nonwork related factors	5 (2.4)
Opportunities for higher salary elsewhere	48 (22.9)
Poor job satisfaction	34 (16.2)
Retirement	57 (27.1)
Other	18 (8.6)
Prefer not to answer	2 (1)

“Region” is divided into the following regions aligned with the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics regions: New England (ME, VT, NH, MA, CT, and RI), Middle Atlantic (NY, PA, and NJ), South Atlantic (WV, MD, DE, VA, NC, SC, GA, and FL), East North Central (MI, OH, IN, WI, and IL), East South Central (KY, TN, AL, and MS), West North Central (MN, IA, MO, ND, SD, NE, and KS), West South Central (AR, LA, OK, and TX), Mountain (MT, WY, CO, NM, ID, UT, AZ, and NV), Pacific (WA, OR, CA, AK, and HI), and nonstate U.S. territory (Puerto Rico, Guam, and American Samoa). Weekly faculty work hours and weekly second job hours refer to self-reported hours during months in which the participant is contracted to work in their full-time faculty role. Top reason for second job was measured only among participants who reported they had a second job. Top reason for intention to leave was only measured among participants who reported they were “likely” or “very likely” to leave their full-time nursing faculty role.

^aVariable in which participants could select more than one option.

^bVariables in which mean (standard deviation) is presented instead of n (%).

Confirmatory Factor Analysis

Confirmatory factor analyses were performed for each latent variable: efforts and rewards (Table 2). For the latent variable efforts, all variables except for second-job hours worked weekly (p = .633) were significant (other variables, p < .01). This variable was kept in the model because only 49 percent of the sample had data to report, which may have contributed to its lack of significance. The model for the latent variable rewards did not converge with inclusion of the NFSQ Atmosphere subscale, which was therefore excluded from the model. For the latent variable rewards, all included variables, except for base faculty salary (p = .925), were significant (other variables, p < .01). Base faculty salary was ultimately excluded from the structural equation model due to lack of significance.

Table 2.

Descriptions and Study Variable Factor Loading

Latent (L) and Observed (O) Variables	Mean (SD)	Factor Loadings	Coefficient	95% CI
				Lower	Upper
Efforts (L)
ERIQ effort (O)	9.45 (2.1)	0.854	1.789	1.584	1.994
ERIQ overcommitment (O)	15.62 (2.9)	0.717	2.111	1.832	2.389
Faculty hours worked weekly (O)	43.65 (9.9)	0.541	5.275	4.387	6.163
Second job hours worked weekly (O)a	11.78 (9.4)	0.024	0.207	-0.641	1.053
Rewards (L)
ERIQ rewards (O)	16.91 (2)	0.209	0.42	0.21	0.63
NFSQ benefits (O)	12.09 (4.9)	−0.362	−1.76	−2.27	−1.25
NFSQ service (O)	8.84 (3.6)	−0.724	−2.63	−3.04	−2.22
NFSQ research (O)	6.90 (2.9)	−0.535	−1.57	−1.87	−1.27
NFSQ teaching (O)	3.89 (1.7)	−0.525	−0.87	−1.04	−0.70

^aObserved variable that did not demonstrate statistical significance within the model. All p values were <.01 unless otherwise indicated.

Structural Equation Model

The model had a significant fit with the data, χ² = 84.931, p < .01, CFI = .960, TLI = .946, SRMR = .078. While the initial model demonstrated adequate fit, modification indices suggested that model fit would be improved if correlation were allowed between latent variables. The model was therefore rerun with correlation between latent variables, which improved the model fit, χ²(df) = 47.389, p < .01, CFI = .993, TLI = .991, SRMR = .028. There was significant covariance between efforts and rewards (p < .01, 95% CI [.263, .485]). Efforts and rewards both had significant direct effects on burnout score, and both burnout and rewards had significant positive direct effects on intention to leave (see Table 3 and Figure 2). The relationships between both efforts and rewards with intention to leave were significantly mediated by burnout. The total effects calculations indicated that burnout and both latent variables efforts and rewards had significant positive relationships with intention to leave (Table 3).

Table 3.

Structural Equation Modeling Effects

Variables	Coefficient	Standard Error	Z	p	95% CI
					Lower	Upper
Direct effects on burnout
Rewards	2.17	0.34	6.29	<.001	1.49	2.84
Efforts	5.24	0.35	15	<.001	4.56	5.93
Direct effects on intention to leave
Burnout	0.02	0.01	2.39	.017	0.01	0.05
Rewards	0.23	0.07	3.29	.001	0.09	0.37
Efforts	0.07	0.07	0.89	.376a	−0.08	0.21
Indirect effects on intention to leave
Rewards	0.05	0.02	2.37	.018	0.01	0.10
Efforts	0.13	0.06	2.30	.021	0.02	0.24
Total effects on intention to leave
Rewards	0.29	0.06	4.44	<.001	0.16	0.41
Efforts	0.20	0.06	3.39	<.001	0.08	0.31

^aObserved variable that did not demonstrate statistical significance within the model. All p values were <.01 unless otherwise indicated.

Figure 2.

Results diagram.

DISCUSSION

The latent variables efforts and rewards were both directly correlated with burnout in this national study. Rewards and burnout were directly correlated with intention to leave. When we included both direct and indirect effects, efforts, rewards, and burnout were all significantly correlated with intention to leave. Burnout significantly mediated the relationships between efforts and rewards with intention to leave. These concepts have all been discussed in previous literature as individual contributors to intention to leave among clinical nurses as well as nurse faculty (Boamah et al., 2023; Christianson, 2023; Melanson, 2024). Our study identified that the three variables (efforts, rewards, and burnout) are related to intention to leave, similar to findings by Arian et al. (2018) and Jarosinski et al. (2022). Our findings add to the state of the science because we found that the three variables also have correlations with one another: Efforts and rewards are correlated significantly, and the effects of both efforts and rewards on intention to leave are mediated by burnout. Therefore, it is critical to consider efforts, rewards, and burnout together as they likely have a compounding effect and are important to consider as interconnected variables.

Rewards had the greatest direct and combined effects on intention to leave. The rewards latent variable is negative; greater scores indicate less reward satisfaction. We found that faculty who had poorer satisfaction with rewards were more likely to indicate an intention to leave. This finding is consistent with previous research that found that dissatisfaction with rewards associated with the full-time faculty role is associated with both burnout and intention to leave (Boamah et al., 2021; Jarosinski et al., 2022). Our findings support the relationships hypothesized in our guiding effort-reward imbalance framework (Siegrist, 1996; Siegrist & Li, 2020), which suggests that poor balance between efforts and rewards is a key progenitor of both burnout and intention to leave. Our findings support use of the effort-reward imbalance framework as a tool for nursing administrators and leaders to understand intention to leave among current full-time faculty.

Overcommitment and Hours Worked Weekly

The subscale used to measure overcommitment within the ERIQ refers to the employee’s intrinsic work involvement, which reflects excessive participation in work and the perceived or actual inability to break from responsibilities at work (Siegrist et al., 2019). However, the subscale does not differentiate between work activities that are paid versus unpaid or between what is required versus what is done beyond required work responsibilities. Previous research by Farber et al. (2020) found that nurse faculty often felt pressured to take on extra workloads above the duties explicitly required of them. This can become problematic when work begins to outweigh personal life, disrupting the balance between the two. Previous research also noted that role ambiguity — lack of clarity around what is required, what is expected, and what behaviors are rewarded — may contribute to overcommitment, pushing faculty to feel obligated to perform more duties than are expected (Jarosinski et al., 2022; Wendler et al., 2021). Given previous research findings, it is possible that due to the culture of the workplace, faculty may feel obligated to perform extra tasks. This may explain the strong positive relationships found in our study between overcommitment and faculty hours worked weekly with the efforts latent variable.

Service

The NFSQ service subscale had the largest impact on rewards in this study. We found that dissatisfaction with the service components of the faculty role had the greatest impact on the rewards latent variable (there was a positive relationship; however, a greater rewards latent variable score indicates poorer perceived rewards). Our findings differ somewhat from previous literature that suggests that while faculty feel rewarded by self-reported service activities, chronic fatigue is higher among faculty with a greater reported number of activities (Poole & Spies, 2022). Service is time-consuming and is believed to be underacknowledged, particularly regarding promotion and/or tenure (Heiden-Rootes et al., 2024; Ludwig-Beymer et al., 2022). Service may be particularly stressful for junior faculty, who may be trying to balance multiple time-consuming academic activities with committee work (Hammoudi Halat et al., 2023). Tenure-track faculty, for example, are often novice educators who must develop teaching skills, create a program of research, and simultaneously engage in service to the university, with the looming threat of failure to achieve tenure if they do not succeed in all three areas (Boamah et al., 2021; Hammoudi Halat et al., 2023).

Role ambiguity may be particularly problematic with regard to the service aspect of the full-time faculty role. Service allocations vary between institutions and are inconsistently measured, and expectations for service workload may change based upon institutional needs (Jarosinski et al., 2022). Persistent faculty shortages, for example, may burden full-time faculty with additional service above what is typically required (Aldhafeeri & Alanazi, 2024; Lane et al., 2010). Methods of measurement for service may include percentage of time spent or unit-based models; however, the amount of time spent may not accurately reflect the intended commitment (Aldhafeeri & Alanazi, 2024; Johnson et al., 2024).

The role of gendered division of labor may also be an underrecognized source of service-related dissatisfaction for nurse faculty. Most respondents to our study were women (91.7%), which is comparable to the average number of women in full-time faculty roles in other nationwide nurse faculty surveys (92.6%) (AACN, 2023). Previous research has noted that women are overrecruited for service-related activities across university faculty disciplines (Docka-Filipek & Stone, 2021; Järvinen & Mik-Meyer, 2024). The overall trend is that, in general, female university faculty are overburdened with service-related and “institutional housekeeping” activities (e.g., administrative tasks, committee work) relative to their male counterparts (Shalaby et al., 2021). However, the potential role of gender in service burden among academics in female-dominated disciplines, like nursing, is not well elucidated. Further research is needed to examine for potential gendered bias in service activities in nursing academia.

Implications for Education and Research

Efforts and rewards had a positive correlation with one another and with the measured variables overcommitment, faculty hours worked weekly, and satisfaction with the service component of the faculty role. These variables had the most substantial contributions to the effort and reward latent variables. Faculty leaders, including deans and assistant deans, should consider the potential role of overcommitment, particularly service-related overcommitment, in faculty burnout and intention to leave. Support structures, including coaching to help new faculty learn to navigate workload balance and service commitments, may be helpful (Candela et al., 2015; Young-Brice et al., 2022).

Future research must examine recruitment and retention of nurse faculty to improve the downstream impacts on the clinical nursing shortage. Previous research has identified salary as the preeminent issue driving the faculty shortage (Jarosinski et al., 2022; Malin et al., 2024). While salary was not a significant correlate of intention to leave among the faculty in our study, the role of salary should not be discounted when addressing the faculty shortage. In previous research involving nurse faculty, most had secondary sources of income to meet basic needs (Malin et al., 2024). Salary increases should be provided to all staff rather than simply as a recruitment tool, as unequal salary offers may induce greater dissatisfaction among existing faculty (Gan, 2022; Jarosinski et al., 2022). Salary considerations must address recruitment needs and honor the efforts and longevity of current faculty.

Further research is needed on how nurse faculty reconcile the choice between accepting a job with low salary in contrast to more lucrative private-sector jobs available to nurses with graduate degrees (e.g., clinical, leadership). Research is also needed to estimate what salary is required to entice a greater number of nurses with graduate degrees to consider full-time faculty roles. When we have greater understanding of the salaries needed to recruit and retain full-time faculty, we can better design advocacy strategies to target government officials and employers to fill the gap.

Limitations

Our study should be considered in light of several limitations. This study was cross-sectional and took place during the fall semester. We selected this time period because we believed it to be advantageous for recruitment; faculty on a seasonal contract who have summers off had recent time away from teaching. Perceptions of satisfaction with the components of the job may be different at a different time point.

Survey response and self-selection bias are also potential limitations of this study. While we believe our sample was representative of the national full-time nursing faculty body compared to similar surveys, men and people of color are underrepresented in the nurse faculty workforce (AACN, 2023). We employed a bot detection method that is conventionally accurate for detecting and removing bots, and our recruitment methods avoided common sources of bots (e.g., social media). However, it is possible that bot responses may remain in our data set.

Another limitation is the assumption that leaving the faculty role is viewed as a feasible option by most full-time faculty. Currently, there is an abundance of positions in clinical nursing that are more financially lucrative than faculty positions; however, it is unclear if most full-time faculty view transition to a clinical role as a viable option. Comfort in a clinical role, physical limitations and/or disability, and rotating shift schedules and/or flexibility of the faculty role may not be present in a clinical nursing position. These factors may reduce the perceived viability of transitioning from academia back to clinical practice. While the nursing faculty shortage is a global issue, results from this study may be poorly generalizable to the global faculty shortage. There are key differences in effort-reward imbalance in the nursing education environments in other countries.

CONCLUSION

It is necessary to first address the nursing faculty shortage to truly address the nursing shortage. The compounded interplay among efforts, rewards, burnout, and intention to leave will require thoughtful solutions that address all issues simultaneously. While solutions focused on decreasing burnout and increasing work rewards are needed, it is also important to consider the impact of the number of hours worked and service commitment. Future attempts to address the nurse faculty shortage must examine efforts, rewards, and burnout holistically as interrelated concepts.

Supplementary Material

nep-47-86-s001.docx ^{(29.1KB, docx)}