Occupational Health and Performance Among Chinese University Teachers: A COR Theory Model of Health-Promoting Leadership and Burnout

With the rapid expansion of higher education in China, university teachers are facing increasing workloads and mounting performance pressures, posing significant threats to their occupational health. Consequently, how to enhance job performance while safeguarding faculty well-being has become a critical issue for higher education administrators. This study aims to explore the role of health-promoting leadership (HPL) in addressing the dual challenge of enhancing university teachers’ job performance while maintaining their occupational health. Drawing on the Conservation of Resources (COR) theory, this study conceptualizes job burnout as both a core indicator of occupational health and a mediating variable, as well as proposing a dual-path model to examine the direct and indirect effects of HPL on teachers’ job performance. A survey of 556 university teachers in Jiangxi Province, China, was conducted; the data were analyzed using IBM SPSS Statistics version 22.0 and AMOS version 26.0 (IBM Corp., Armonk, NY, USA). The findings suggest that HPL is positively associated with job performance, both directly and indirectly through reduced burnout, supporting a dual-pathway mechanism consistent with COR theory. These results contribute to a better understanding of the potential role of HPL in balancing teacher well-being and performance in the context of Chinese higher education. This study also extends the cross-cultural application of COR theory and provides theoretical and practical insights into how HPL may help alleviate teacher burnout and support the development of health-promoting universities.