Contextualising High School English Teachers’ Well-Being in China: Validating and Extending PERMA in the Chinese School Context

Yanyun Zhou, Yongcan Liu

doi:10.32038/ltrq.2025.48.10

European KnowledgeDevelopment Institute

Original Research

Contextualising High School English Teachers’ Well-Being in China: Validating and Extending PERMA in the Chinese School Context

Yanyun Zhou

Yongcan Liu

Language Teaching Research Quarterly, Volume 48, Pages 153-170, https://doi.org/10.32038/ltrq.2025.48.10

Abstract
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As language teacher well-being research has grown in popularity in the past decade, different models of conceptualisation and measurement have emerged, with PERMA being one of the most widely cited in the literature. However, its validity and suitability for the Chinese school context remain unclear. This study aims to validate and extend PERMA by contextualising it among high school English teachers in China. Data were collected from 408 teachers through an online questionnaire that included demographic information, the PERMA Profiler, and an open question. Confirmatory factor analysis was conducted to examine the cross-cultural validity and reliability of PERMA, and thematic analysis was used to identify new elements in well-being conceptualisation. The findings revealed complex results of the cross-cultural validity of PERMA. Answers to the open question extended the original conceptualisation of PERMA and revealed three new well-being concepts: low-arousal emotions, security and mindfulness. Implications for enhancing the use of PERMA among language teachers and for improving language teacher well-being are discussed.

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Keywords

Well-Being Conceptualisation; Language Teacher Well-Being; PERMA; Cross-Cultural Validation; Teacher Professional Development

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Author(s) Information

Yanyun Zhou

Yanyun Zhou is a researcher at the University of Cambridge. Her work explores the intersection between psychology and applied linguistics, with a particular focus on positive psychology, well-being in language learning and teaching, and language teacher professional development. She specialises in mixed-methods and qualitative research, employing methodologies such as surveys, interviews and diary studies.

Yongcan Liu

Yongcan Liu is Professor of Applied Linguistics and Languages Education at the University of Cambridge and co-directs the Centre for the Study of Global Human Movement in the School of Humanities and Social Sciences. He has published widely on language of schooling and the knowledge base of teaching in contexts of mobility and diversity. He is co-author (with Leung et al.) of the Bell Foundation’s EAL Assessment Framework for Schools which won a British Council ELTons award. His book (co-authored with Evans et al.), entitled ‘language development and social integration of students with EAL’, was published with CUP in 2020.

Acknowledgments

We would like to thank the three professional translators, Sa Wang, Jiaqi Shang and Xipeng Liu, for their support in validating the Chinese translation of the PERMA Profiler.

Funding

Not applicable.

Conflict of Interests

No, there are no conflicting interests.

Open Access

This article is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License, which permits use, sharing, adaptation, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, as long as you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons license, and indicate if changes were made. You may view a copy of Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License here: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/