Levels of Organizational Alienation of Private and Public High School Teachers

Abstract

The concept of organizational alienation reflects a feeling of disappointment with career expectations and professional development as well as the disappointment over the inability to fullfill professional norms (Aiken & Hage,1966). The aims and objectives of this study were to investigate the organizational alienation perception levels of public and private high school teachers in the central districts of Ankara, Turkey. It also aimed to determine the differences between teachers’ perceptions of alienation levels in terms of some independent variables. The survey instrument factors were determined by Seeman (1959) as (1) powerlessness, (2) meaninglessness, (3) normlessness, (4) social-isolation and (5) self isolation. The participants of the study (362) were administered “ The Scale of Organizational Alienation”, developed by the researcher on the basis of the scales and researches obtained from the relevant literature. As a result of the study, teachers’ perceptions of organizational alienation were determined at a moderate level (2.04). Finally, the highest percentages of organizational alieantion factors were identified as; “normlessness and powerlessness” whereas the lowest mean scores of organizational alienation were determined as “meaninglessness and social isolation”.