The Challenge EFL Teachers Face in Turkey: Burnout

: Burnout is quite common in educational settings for a variety of reasons and may specifically affect the lives of teachers, especially English language teachers. Therefore, it needs to be analyzed in detail and resolved by policymakers in education. To reveal this significant drawback, this research aims to examine the research studies on the issue of burnout among English as foreign language teachers from primary schools to higher education that were carried out in the English language teaching context in Turkey between 2012 and 2022 through a systematic review. 19 research studies done in Turkey were obtained and the findings of the studies related to the burnout challenge of Turkish English language teachers were scrutinized. Based on the findings of the study, English teachers are the most prevalent demographic to have a variety of ailments due to burnout, which is caused by extended exposure to high levels of stress, chronic fatigue, unhappiness, and feelings of inefficacy. The unique finding of this study is that English teachers are mainly faced with challenging and stressful conditions in their daily teaching life as they are forced to adapt to changing student profiles and technological advancements as well as rising demands of society and as a result, they struggle with burnout even if they are still in their early years of teaching English. In the meanwhile, their commitment to in-service training and the support of their superiors are crucial and maintaining a healthy lifestyle is also important. Besides, a comprehensive strategy that includes regulatory modifications, encouraging work conditions, and professional development opportunities is required to address English teacher burnout in Turkish society and thus, by prioritizing teacher well-being, education policies can have a positive influence on the education sector by ensuring the availability of motivated and effective English instructors who can provide high-quality education to students and these policies could eradicate negative views and provide the respect for the teaching profession by fostering a resilient English teaching workforce while mitigating the risks of burnout.


Introduction
Teaching is a demanding occupation and one of the most stressful professions (Borg & Riding, 1991).Although teaching is a challenging job (Hepburn & Brown, 2001), teachers endeavor to fulfill their work, but they need motivation, energy, and a clear mind to be productive and proficient.Most of the teachers start off enthusiastically, but as time goes on, the teaching job becomes increasingly oppressive and exhausting.According to a survey conducted in 2001, almost a quarter of teachers stated that teaching is a very lamentable job (Kyriacou, 2001).When compared to other career fields, teachers have high degrees of exhaustion and cynicism (Maslach et al., 1996) and due to high level of stress in teaching, teachers are more likely to have psychological symptoms such as moderate irritation, impatience, and anxiety, as well as more significant depressive symptoms, which lead to burnout.
Burnout, which is multidimensional, long-term, and chronic in character, is a response to the challenges and complications people confront at work (Maslach et al., 2001).Burnout is defined by Merriam-Webster as "exhaustion of physical or emotional strength or motivation, frequently as a result of continuous stress or dissatisfaction," although multiple definitions concentrating on different parts of this term can be found in the literature review.
Burnout is widely prevalent in educational settings for a variety of reasons, including job overburdening on teachers in their early careers, classroom administration issues, institution obligations, teaching remunerations, management support, students' attitudes toward their teachers, insufficient job resources, unfavorable or destructive school environment, and a lack of coping abilities and emotional intelligence (Cephe, 2010;Chan, 2007;Kottler et al., 2005).In addition, sudden events like the COVID-19 epidemic have exacerbated the symptoms and causes of burnout (Pressley, 2021;Sokal et al., 2020).To concentrate on burnout, many studies have been carried out, and since burnout is a context-specific phenomenon, the results have varied.The causes, consequences, and relationships between burnout and other aspects of teachers' life have been sought in various research studies in the national and international arena (Atmaca, 2017;Ceylan & Mohammadzadeh, 2016;Genç, 2016;Erdag & Tavil, 2021;Kimsesiz, 2019;Özkara, 2019;Öztürk, 2013).
Even though burnout has inevitably influenced English language teachers, this notion has not been searched adequately to deal with English language teacher burnout.English language teachers nowadays face the challenge of adjusting to new teaching methodologies, integrating digital technology into the lesson, and meeting a variety of student expectations.These rapid changes driven by the advancement of technology also force English language teachers to change their pedagogical approaches, integrate digital resources, adapt to online education, create virtual classrooms, and manage remote learning as experienced during the period of the pandemic.Most importantly, English teachers struggle for their students' well-being and motivation as the teachers are expected to support their students' socialemotional development.Besides, the individual learning styles of learners need to be considered while preparing curriculum and forming teaching strategies, and as a result, all these responsibilities and shifting dynamics may contribute to increased stress levels and risk of burnout among English teachers, leading them to neglect their self-care and mental health support and their professional development.Overall, all these factors in the evolving educational system make English teacher burnout a crucial issue in the education sector with a necessity of providing new policies.To draw the attention of policymakers to burnout influencing English language teachers, education policies need to proactively address burnout issues and support systems that enhance job satisfaction and workforce in order to raise policymakers' attention to how burnout affects English language teachers.Regarding all these justifications, a better understanding of the phenomena of burnout among English language teachers is vitally important since there is a scarcity of literature regarding English ©Copyright 2023 by the author(s) This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.
language teacher burnout causing a potential gap that needs to be focused.Thus, in order to prioritize the English language teaching (ELT) context and English as a foreign language (ELF) teachers' well-being and to promote a resilient teaching workforce, it is crucial to especially focus on those concerns with the unique results in this systematic review study with the unique findings.

Literature Review
Individuals are under pressure to offer their best practice and keep up to date with their knowledge due to the current demanding job environment and competitive working area, as well as fast-evolving technologies.The pressure created by such phenomena, if left unabated and consistent, leads to burnout; as Freudenberger (1974) points out, the pressure from within and outside to show better performance, as well as the push from the authorities to accomplish more, and all these combine to form burnout (Kazimlar & Dollar, 2015).Freudenberger (1974) coined the term "burnout" first in the context of social sciences, while he was attempting to identify his own burnout symptoms and conducting a study to explain them.According to his study, burnout leads to feeling weariness and his study further justifies that burnout is long-term in nature, representing that symptoms typically appear a year after an individual begins working in such an environment, and it manifests itself through a variety of physical and behavioral signs, and it occurs as a result of the work being done for an excessive amount of time, frequency, and intensity.
Burnout is also defined as a progressive retrogression of early enthusiasm, vitality, and drive that employees may experience in the fields where assistance services are provided (such as teaching) because of their work environment.This description is also consistent with the World Health Organization's (WHO) definition of burnout, which categorizes burnout as an "occupational phenomenon" rather than a medical disease (World Health Organization, 2019).
According to Maslach et al. (1997), burnout is defined as a multidimensional phenomenon characterized by psychological syndromes that are emotional exhaustion, depersonalization, and decreased personal accomplishment, whereas Schaufeli emphasizes the chronic nature of burnout, claiming that it remains significantly stable over time and that stressful job-related elements are strong predictors of burnout than an individual's personality characteristics.
Maslach Burnout Inventory (MBI) (Maslach et al.,1997) is a standard tool for measuring burnout by focusing on the characteristics specifically mentioned in the definition of burnout such as emotional fatigue, disengagement or cynicism related to work, and decreased personal efficiency.Though the MBI is still the most extensively used measure of burnout, an alternative measure called the Oldenburg Burnout Inventory (OLBI) can be used to target different aims and overcome some of MBI's shortcomings, such as the scale's psychometric and conceptual constraints (Halbesleben & Demerouti, 2005).The underlying model for both measures is the same, but OLBI only considers two elements of MBI studies: fatigue and dissociation, leaving out the third element, personal achievement.On the other hand, it expands the fatigue element to include both mental and physical fatigue, taking a more expansive approach to conceptualization (Shirom, 2005).In addition to OLBI, Danish researchers used the Copenhagen Burnout Inventory (CBI) (Kristensen et al., 2005) to determine burnout when they were having difficulty in using MBI in Denmark.CBI perceives burnout as a feature of three interrelated spheres: life, work, and client service, and moves one step further than MBI, which focuses primarily on employees in the human service sector.The other scales used in the current research studies are the Teacher Burnout Scale by McCroskey et al. (2001), the Teacher Burnout Scale by Kaner et al. (2008), and the Teacher Burnout Scale by Richmond et al. (2001).Nonetheless, MBI is the most widely used scale in burnout investigations.
According to research studies, teachers are more likely to experience burnout than other professions (Stoeber & Rennert, 2008), which occurs for a variety of causes, including demographic and job-related variables (Bümen, 2010;Cemaloglu & Sahin, 2007;Demirel & Cephe, 2015;Hismanoglu & Ersan, 2016;Unaldi et al., 2013;Mede, 2009).A study conducted in Turkey (Atmaca, 2017) reviewed extensive literature to find sources, symptoms, and effects of burnout in Turkish teachers and concluded that teachers feel job overburdening even in the early stages of their careers due to classroom administration issues, institutional obligations, the remuneration for the teaching profession, managerial support, students' attitude toward their teachers, insufficient job resources, undesirable or destructive school environments.Burnout is a serious issue that forces instructors to leave their jobs because of a lack of coping abilities and emotional intelligence.According to certain research (Chirico, 2016), instructors with a higher level of education are more prone to feel burnout than those with a lower level of education, implying that those with a higher level of education have more responsibilities and tend to experience more stress.
Teachers' burnout specifically can cause more adverse impacts on students' education and motivation (Cephe, 2010;Demirel & Cephe, 2015;Egyed & Short, 2006).As stated, it is more difficult for teachers to avoid situations that lead to burnout because their day-to-day job involves interactions with a variety of stakeholders, including students, colleagues, parents, and management staff, among others, all of whom affect their social situation directly or indirectly.An examination of national surveys of university personnel in the United Kingdom (Watts & Robertson, 2011) revealed that the education department is no longer a stress-free work environment and that excessive work burden, an accumulating strain to issue research work and secure financial aid for research are some important determinants.
As proven, "burnout" has a variety of detrimental effects on an individual's health (physical and emotional), general lifestyle, and job performance.It has been linked with a variety of job withdrawal behaviors, including nonattendance and plans to terminate the job, with those who choose to stay on the job experiencing decreasing proficiency and production.As a result, burnout reduces job satisfaction and decreases commitment to the job.Burnout does not affect just one person; it is contagious in nature and propagates itself through informal interactions.As a result, those who suffer from this condition can have a negative impact on their coworkers by having more personal difficulties with them or by messing with them (Maslach et al., 2001).Due to the significance of drawing attention to burnout, there is a necessity to carry out a study that only concentrates on English language teacher burnout.

Aim and Significance of The Study
EFL teachers are expected to supervise their students to help them study and improve their spirits, which may make them more sensitive to negative consequences as a result of greater interpersonal interactions.Moreover, due to the large number of students who demand teachers' services, especially if they demonstrate apathy, this vulnerability may be magnified.So, in addition to the general causes of burnout among teachers, EFL teachers face additional sources of burnout and distinct factors and determinants unique to the school context.This existing challenge makes the completion of an independent study crucial to examine the impact of burnout on EFL teachers in the Turkish context.Therefore, this occupational phenomenon requires to be examined for further studies and practices not only for English language teachers but also for other stakeholders in ELT to provide significant education policies to deal with burnout.
In line with this aim, the goal of this study is to review the articles that were conducted in the ELT context on EFL teachers' burnout problem between the years 2012 and 2022, to scrutinize the findings related to the burnout drawback of EFL teachers, to underlie some suggestions for further research as well as to highlight the need for proactive policies in Türkiye and in the world.

Research Questions
To reach the aims of the study, the following research questions were addressed: 1. What research trends are seen in the burnout examination of Turkish EFL teachers in terms of research foci, research methods, participants, context, and burnout scales in the studies conducted between 2012 and 2022? 2. Based on the studies conducted between 2012 and 2022, what are the main factors experienced by Turkish EFL teachers that cause burnout?

Methodology
This study is a systematic review that brings together the quantitative studies on the burnout levels of primary school, secondary school, and high school English teachers as well as English teachers working in higher education between 2012-2020 in Turkey on EFL teachers' burnout in the Turkish context with content analysis.To analyze relevant data extracted from each article, identifying themes or categories within selected articles are overviewed and identified and a coding framework in content analysis is developed based on the literature via specific concepts, ideas, or themes.Also, in education research, descriptive studies are important since they tend to depict the real situation, and many studies rely on descriptive study findings, in other words, "unless researchers first generate an accurate description of an educational phenomenon as it exists, they lack a firm basis for explaining or changing it" (Gall et al., 2003, p. 374).From this standpoint, in this study, the research studies employing quantitative and mixed methods research design (only articles) that concentrate mostly on Turkish EFL teachers' burnout in the Turkish context were examined, and their findings were analyzed to offer a thorough review.
To search for the studies, the following keywords were used: Burnout, EFL instructor, Burnout Level, Turkish EFL teachers' burnout, and EFL lecturers' burnout.In addition, while searching for the research topic, the online databases and indexes utilized to compile the most pertinent research studies are as follows: Education Research Information Center (ERIC), Google Scholar, and Research Gate.As there are numerous studies concerning burnout in the literature, the eligibility criteria included, (i) the studies that were conducted in the Turkish context, (ii) only research articles that were published between 2012 and 2022, (iii) full-text articles, (iv) the studies written in English, and (v) the studies that utilized "Burnout scales".
The analyses of the articles were presented in the tables.Table 1 shows the selected articles on EFL teachers' burnout with their codes (A1, A2, A3, and so on), authors, publication year, the aim of the study, educational context, research methods, and the scales utilized.

Findings
The findings of the data gathered through the selected research studies are discussed in detail in response to research questions.The aims of the research studies in the scope of this review are listed in Table 2 to address the first research question: Table 2 illustrates that 10 of 19 research studies included in this review were aimed at determining the relationship between the burnout levels of EFL teachers and various major causes that contribute to burnout, as well as the expectations for reducing burnout and promoting job satisfaction among English teachers (A1, A3, A4, A5, A8, A10, A11, A15, A16, A19).In addition, these studies targeted investigating the extent of teacher burnout of Turkish-English instructors at universities via demographic variables.At the same time, instructors' recommendations for preventing burnout were searched.Besides, the other three studies (A2, A9, A13) examined EFL teachers' attitudes toward written corrective feedback and their self-efficacy beliefs and their written corrective feedback preference, teacher efficacy, and burnout levels.While one study (A6) investigated the relationship between EFL teachers' social problem-solving skills and their burnout levels, another study (A12) tried to analyze the links between learned resourcefulness and burnout.Also, some of the studies (A7, A14, A17, A18) attempted to examine the EFL teachers' occupational burnout and the degrees of occupational burnout among Turkish EFL teachers using a variety of variables, to determine whether there are any organizational differences between low and severe burnout EFL teachers/instructors, and to search for the connection between occupational burnout and Turkish EFL teachers' personality qualities, their engagement in professional learning activities, personality qualities, and organizational socialization and to look into whether there is any effect of school type on burnout levels.
The categorization of chosen studies according to their research methods was also another focus of the first research question.The following table summarizes the findings linked to that category:

Table 3
The research methods of the selected studies
Another focus of the current study is to identify the participants and their numbers involved in these studies and the context in which they work in response to the first research question.Table 4 summarizes the findings in terms of educational context and participants:  4 illustrates that the studies coded A3, A4, A5, A6, A7, A8, A9, A10, and A11 concentrated on Turkish EFL instructors from private, state, foundation, and charity universities in many different universities in Turkey.On the other hand, studies A1 and A2 included 118 Turkish EFL teachers in elementary, secondary, and high schools, as well as universities from various cities.Apart from these studies, the other eight studies were carried out with EFL teachers working at different types of schools from primary, secondary to high schools in different regions of Turkey (A12, A13, A14, A15, A16, A17, A18, and A19).In the context of primary, secondary, and high school-based studies, information about some places (cities) where the studies were conducted is also presented.These cities are Malatya, Gaziantep, Tekirdağ and Kırşehir.
In fact, two separate studies were conducted on EFL teachers' burnout in Gaziantep.Concerning the number of participants, A1 was conducted in a state primary school with 12 participants, a state high school with 6 participants, a state university with 6 participants, and a private university with 1 participant.A2 was done with 118 participants working in primary, secondary, and high schools, and universities.A3 included 139 participant instructors from 8 different state universities.A4 was conducted at the university with 37 participants.A5 was carried out with 164 participants from public universities and 52 participants from charity universities.116 participants from the university were involved in A6.For A7, 224 participants from the university contributed to the study.A8 was done with 64 participants from the university.36 EFL teachers from the university participated in A9. 81 participant EFL instructors working at a foundation university were involved in A10.70 EFL instructors working in three different state universities were the participants of A11.Apart from these, A12 included 163 participants from Malatya and A13 was composed of 163 participants from Gaziantep.A14 participants were 365 EFL teachers working in primary, secondary, state, and private high schools.From primary schools in Tekirdag city, 108 EFL participants were involved in A15.74 Public school EFL teachers in Kırşehir were the participants of A16.From Gaziantep, 260 EFL teachers working in 70 schools participated in A17.507 EFL teachers from public schools were involved in A18 and 224 EFL teachers from state and private schools took part in A19.
Maslach Burnout Inventory (Maslach et al., 1997) was employed in A9.Apart from the Maslach scales, the Teacher Burnout Scale by McCroskey et al. (2001) was used in A3.A14 implemented the Teacher Burnout Scale by Kaner et al. (2008).Additionally, A15 and A18 utilized the Teacher Burnout Scale by Richmond et al. (2001).
The second research question in this study focused on the identification of the main factors that lead to burnout depending on the studies conducted between 2012 and 2022.These factors are listed in Table 6: As seen in Table 6, the prime factors leading to burnout as the findings of the research studies are presented.When these factors are examined in detail, burnout -a very individualized experience-is regarded to be influenced by numerous factors.Nevertheless, teacher burnout can mainly occur due to two paramount factors.These are internal factors and external factors that can contribute to teacher burnout.
The former, internal factors, include teacher's personality (neuroticism, extraversion, agreeableness, conscientiousness, and openness), teacher's preferences (written corrective feedback preferences), teacher's skills (teachers' learned resourcefulness skills, organizational socialization skills, problem-solving skills), teacher's strategies (teachers' problem-solving strategies) and demographic variables such as age, marital status, seniority, contract type, total work experience in the institution, workload, job satisfaction, salary, colleagues and administrators, participation in professional learning activities) are reported to have an impact on burnout.The latter, external factors, could be listed as school type/institutions, heavy workload, students, financial problems, social life, department, administrative duty, school principals, living in a big/small city, organizational stress, shareholders, educational policy, physical circumstances, the sociocultural atmosphere at schools, and students and parents' behaviors toward teachers.
Apart from these factors, the research studies underline the burnout components which are composed of three important dimensions of the Maslach Burnout Inventory (MBI).These are emotional exhaustion, depersonalization, and reduced personal accomplishment.Emotional exhaustion (workload, psychological pressure when working with people, feeling of disappointment, administrative issues, personal characteristics), personal accomplishment (positive and negative feelings) and depersonalization (caring, seeing students and colleagues as objects or work to do, feeling of being accused) lead teachers to feel burnout.

Discussion
This review paper yielded 19 research studies, all of which give a comprehensive understanding of the state of the burnout levels of Turkish English teachers.The preset issues on this study promote the findings to be assessed and could help the literature to provide a deep insight to the increasing challengeburnout-for EFL teachers working in different levels of schools in Turkey.Nonetheless, it would be ©Copyright 2023 by the author(s) This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.appropriate to compare English teacher burnout studies discussed in this study with the studies that have been conducted in previous years in Turkey and other contexts and present the responses to the research questions.
The first research question investigates the burnout examination of Turkish EFL teachers in terms of research foci underlining research results in the studies conducted between 2012 and 2022.Many studies in this review paper sought to determine the distinct factors of burnout among Turkish EFL teachers and attempted to find the association between EFL teachers' burnout levels and distinct causes of burnout, as well as English teachers' goals for avoiding burnout and boosting job satisfaction by utilizing demographic data to investigate the level of teacher burnout experienced by English teachers (Atmaca, 2017;Öztürk, 2013;Ceylan & Mohammadzadeh, 2016;Hismanoğlu & Ersan, 2016;Bal, 2019;Kazimlar & Dollar, 2015;Demirel & Cephe, 2015;Erdağ & Tavil, 2021;Kimsesiz, 2019;Karanfil & Yeşilbursa, 2021).
In her research, Atmaca (2017) found that there was no connection between burnout and the variables gender, marital status, major, educational status, the type of institution, teaching hours, working in the same institution/school, and the number of students, and only a weak correlation between teaching experience and job satisfaction.The findings of Atmaca are different from Öztürk and Ceylan and Mohammadzadeh's studies as well as Deryakulu's study (2005) in which that male teacher was found to have a higher level of burnout than female teacher.On the contrary, many research studies have revealed that gender influences burnout and that female instructors are more emotionally exhausted (Baysal, 1995;Karakoç, 2011;Tuna & Çimen, 2013;Yavuz, 2019).Also, according to the findings of Öztürk's study, the leading causes of teacher burnout were identified as severe workloads, students, and institutional issues (Öztürk, 2013).Moreover, Ceylan and Mohammadzadeh (2016) discovered that there was a significant relationship between burnout and independent variables of gender, marital status, contract type, total teaching experience in the institution, and weekly course load, and no significant relationship was discovered between burnout and independent variables total teaching experience and monthly income which is also different from the study of Hismanoglu and Ersan (2016).In their study, a survey of English instructors' burnout in relation to demographic characteristics was conducted, using the Maslach Burnout Inventory as a metric.They discovered a striking link between seniority and subscales of personal success and emotional weariness and there was a strong association between teaching experience and institution and Turkish EFL instructors' burnout and there was a substantial association between monthly salary and living place (a big or small city) and their burnout levels.Also, there was a strong association between these factors regarding department and administrative duties.However, in their study, there was no significant association between age, gender, workload (weekly), or educational background, which is consistent with the study Atmaca (2017).
Regarding burnout levels between state and private universities, Bal (2019) pointed out that the level of burnout among teachers for emotional exhaustion and depersonalization was significant.For these two variables, there was a substantial difference in burnout levels of state and private university lecturers, although there was no significant difference for personal accomplishment.Besides, Kazimlar and Dollar (2015) concentrated on the dimensions of burnout influencing various work environments and discussed that many of the teachers had moderate to high degrees of emotional weariness and depersonalization.Only a quarter of the participants reported a stronger sense of personal success.EFL teachers stating high degrees of burnout, on the other hand, had a considerably unfavorable impression of their working place.The findings of this study are parallel with Cephe's (2010) findings, which confirmed that approximately half of all instructors suffer from burnout.In contrast, the previous research studies demonstrate that English instructors or teachers have a low degree of burnout feelings ©Copyright 2023 by the author(s) This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.
or very few instructors experience burnout (Özgür, 2007;Güven, 2010).In addition, Maslach's emotional fatigue, depersonalization, and personal achievement elements of burnout were examined by Khezerlou (2017) who conducted research on EFL instructors in Iran and Turkey.In his study, emotional weariness and depersonalization exhibited a negative relationship with occupational self-efficacy, although personal achievement had a positive relationship among these instructors.Furthermore, while job resentment was a prominent factor in teacher burnout, emotional tiredness was another leading cause of burnout among Turkish EFL instructors.
Regarding experience, the study by Demirel and Cephe (2015) revealed that burnout is more likely to occur at younger ages and in groups with less experience, which is akin to results of Güneş and Uysal (2019).Moreover, Demirel and Cephe's findings of the qualitative data collected through semi-structured interviews unveiled that academic factors such as teaching hours, student proficiency levels, and the instructors' offices, and teaching materials all play a role in the emergence of burnout among instructors.Likewise, Kimsesiz (2019) inquired into teachers' burnout levels concerning school type, which was also examined by Bal (2019) who discovered that working at a primary school has a significant impact on burnout.The data proved that EFL teachers frequently suffer from burnout.Furthermore, it was shown that the kind of school substantially impacted three burnout dimensions.The results show parallelism with Genç's (2016) study, in which the independent factors were not found to be significant (age, gender, and marital status).However, only "the school type" was determined to be important.In addition, the study found a correlation between learned resourcefulness and the dimensions of burnout as learned resourcefulness increases, emotional exhaustion, depersonalization, and personal accomplishment decrease.On contrary to the studies that show a high level of burnout among EFL teachers, Erdağ and Tavil's (2021) study presented very different results and even gave analytical examples of how to deal with burnout.According to them, the participant EFL teachers had a low degree of burnout, and their problem-coping techniques were beneficial to dispose of severe burnout.
Unlike other studies, Karanfil and Yeşilbursa (2021) obtained very interesting findings as a result of their research.The findings of their studies revealed that single teachers reported higher levels of emotional exhaustion than their married or divorced colleagues opposing many studies in which marital status is unimportant (Atmaca, 2017;Özkanal & Arıkan, 2010;Kurtoğlu, 2011;Öztürk, 2013).In addition, teachers at state schools reported higher levels of emotional exhaustion than those at private schools, which is similar to the study conducted by Kimsesiz (2017).However, private school teachers reported a higher sense of personal accomplishment as Kulavuz-Önal and Tatar (2017) stated.A different variable was focused on by Kulavuz (2006) who investigated the relation between burnout and attendance at learning activities among Turkish EFL instructors working in private and public university preparatory programs.The data revealed that public university lecturers had a low feeling of personal accomplishment and attendance in occupational activities.
In addition, three more studies (Özkara, 2019;Savas et al., 2014;Köksal et al., 2018) examined EFL instructors' views toward written corrective feedback, as well as the link between preferences for written corrective feedback, self-efficacy beliefs, teacher efficacy, and burnout levels.According to Özkara (2019), self-efficacy and personal success had a substantial positive link, but emotional weariness and selfefficacy had a negative relationship depending on the findings.However, the findings revealed a negative correlation between emotional tiredness and personal success and between personal accomplishment and depersonalization.Teachers, on average, who were satisfied, had a strong sense of achievement.Furthermore, age had a substantial impact on self-efficacy.Similarly, Savas et al. (2014) indicated that teacher self-efficacy predicted burnout negatively, which is in accordance with some studies in the literature (Bümen, 2010;Mede, 2009;Saricam & Sakiz, 2014).Moreover, Köksal et al. (2018) showed a correlation between the participants' burnout levels and their preferences for written corrective comments and discovered a link between instructors' preferences for written corrective feedback and their self-efficacy levels.In Ulum's (2019) study, the association between social problem-solving skills and EFL instructors' burnout was investigated.The research demonstrated that those with social problem-solving abilities are less likely to experience occupational burnout.
Moreover, the studies (Deneme, 2021;Güneş & Uysal, 2019;Kulavuz-Önal & Tatar, 2017;Unaldi et al., 2013) scrutinized the association between occupational burnout and the personality traits of Turkish EFL instructors and their participation in professional learning activities.Turkish EFL instructors working at state institutions reported a weaker sense of personal success and participated in less professional learning activities than their counterparts at private universities.Because there was a correlation between instructors' sense of personal accomplishment and their involvement in professional learning activities as suggested by Maslach et al. (2001).
Concerning the burnout scales used by the selected research studies, it is seen that Maslach Burnout Inventory (MBI) was a leading scale which has three sub-dimensions addressing working life.These are Emotional Exhaustion (indicating lack energy, rising unpleasant emotions) (Maslach & Jackson, 1984), Depersonalization (showing negative emotions towards students and school workers due to stress) (Maslach & Jackson, 1981) and Reduced Personal Accomplishment (an individual feeling the emergence of failure for an individual's job gradually) (Maslach & Jackson, 1984).While examining the selected studies, Maslach Burnout Inventory (Maslach et al., 1996) was chosen by 7 research studies and hence, it was the most prevailing scale which involves subdimensions.The other 6 research studies utilized Maslach Burnout Inventory (Maslach & Jackson, 1981).Also, the Occupational Burnout Inventory (Maslach et al., 1986) was applied in one study.Similarly, Maslach Burnout Inventory (Maslach et al., 1997) was employed in another study.Except for Maslach scales, the Teacher Burnout Scale by McCroskey et al. (2001), the Teacher Burnout Scale by Kaner et al. (2008), and the Teacher Burnout Scale by Richmond et al. (2001) were other scales used in the selected studies.
The second research question was to investigate the prime factors experienced by Turkish EFL teachers that cause burnout in the selected studies of this paper.One of the points that attract attention, especially in burnout studies is the creation of demographic information depending on the context.The variables in these studies constitute the common factors that pave the way for the formation of burnout.These are gender, age, marital status, contract type, teaching experience, job dissatisfaction, low selfefficacy beliefs, shareholders, the school's physical environment, and its sociocultural environment, heavy workload, students' attitudes and demands, institutional demands, financial problems, absence of social activities, education policy, total teaching experience in the institution, weekly course load, monthly income, working departments, living area (small or big city), absence of problem-focused techniques, lack of professional learning activities, the type of university and school, feeling psychological pressure, feeling of disappointment, administrative issues, personal characteristics (neuroticism, extraversion, agreeableness, conscientiousness, openness) and low self-esteem, reduced personal accomplishment (positive and negative feelings), depersonalization (caring, seeing students and colleagues as objects or work to do, feeling of being accused), teachers' written corrective feedback preferences, control, lack of rewarding, role of community for fairness and values, academic factors (longer hours of teaching, and lower academic levels of the students), administrative duty and administrative factors (lack of institutional support, academic support of the colleagues, ideal working conditions), lack of professional development activities, working with the same levels of learners and lack of resourcefulness skills (Atmaca, 2017;Özkara, 2019;Ceylan & Mohammadzadeh, 2016;Hismanoglu & Ersan, 2016;Ulum, 2019;Kulavuz-Önal & Tatar, 2017;Bal, 2019;Köksal et al., 2018;Kazimlar & Dollar, 2015;Demirel & Cephe, 2015;Genç, 2016;Savas et al., 2014;Deneme, 2021;Erdağ & Tavil, 2021;Kimsesiz, 2019;Unaldi et al, 2013;Günes & Uysal, 2016;Karanfil & Yeşilbursa, 2021).As seen in these studies, various demographic, ©Copyright 2023 by the author(s) This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.professional, and psychological characteristics were explored in burnout research with a diverse group of educators, including academicians based on the burnout feelings of instructors from universities, teachers from high schools, secondary schools as well as primary schools.Apart from these, there are many studies carried out in order to investigate the burnout levels of teachers working in special education and rehabilitation centers and their life satisfaction (Yavuz, 2019), burnout levels of computer teachers (Deryakulu, 2005) and the working conditions of physical education teachers (Cihan, 2011).
In light of all these studies, the studies on burnout in Turkey are generally based on quantitative research methods and there are a few mixed-method studies.This finding proves that the notion of burnout has only been determined in these studies, but any qualitative studies have not been conducted.Therefore, many studies have not concentrated on how the teachers have experienced this problem, and what their thoughts are about the variables listed in all the studies.Also, it is predicted that the Maslach scale, which is used in burnout studies in most quantitative studies, is not a scale containing Turkish context-specific elements, and that survey fatigue may occur as a result of using the same scale.Moreover, since the studies are not based on the long-term, it has not been determined whether burnout notion is a short-term or long-term challenge.Besides these, since the studies have been carried out only in certain regions of Turkey, data covering the whole country might not be obtained.Furthermore, it should not be ignored that studies may create potential bias when they are generally performed in the places where researchers are present.The fact that the demographic information of the participants has not covered different regions has also reduced the generalizability.Overall, the studies selected have not comprehensively emphasized how burnout has impacted the work and private lives of English teachers and how this effect in the future can be reduced or eliminated with education policies to be made in Turkey, and with which strategies English teachers who experience burnout can deal with the burnout effect.

Conclusion & Suggestions
The purpose of this paper is to present a review paper on the studies conducted in Turkey between 2012-2022 and to focus on Turkish EFL teachers' burnout status.Based on the findings of these studies, burnout has been affecting the teaching profession in Turkey and especially English teachers are faced with difficult and stressful situations in their teaching lives even if they are still in their early years of teaching (Kolotoğlu, 2020).Thus, this gradually suffocates their idealism, making teaching English unpleasant and intolerable.All the selected articles present that there are many factors (internal and external) and demographic variables such as age, marital status, years of seniority, gender, and so on.which lead to burnout in Turkey.In fact, the determinants of burnout are regarded to have multifaceted factors (Maslach et al., 2001) as determined in the articles.
Since burnout is common among English language teachers, the studies of Ministry of National Education are vital to support teachers and to provide the best quality of the education.Without teachers' well-being, this cannot be possible.For this reason, the authorities are expected to support teachers and pay attention to in-service trainings to promote healthy lifestyles of teachers.Moreover, the society has an important role to remove the bad attitudes towards teachers and to reform the honor of the teaching profession in Turkey and help teachers respond to the changing student profiles and increasing expectations with the developing technology.

Suggestions for Future Research
Based on these study findings, there are some recommendations for further studies.As burnout studies mainly adopt quantitative research design, the number of qualitative research studies could be increased in order to obtain deeper insights.The mixed method design studies could extensively present the perspectives of teachers.In addition, the research studies may be expected to offer solution-oriented suggestions and comprehensive studies involving EFL teachers in primary, secondary and high schools across Turkey can be carried out by the Ministry of National Education.Also, the issue of EFL instructors' burnout at universities should also be thoroughly investigated.Including other countries into multidisciplinary and comparative studies can also provide serious determinations on this issue.
Meanwhile, the increasing use of technology in education is undeniable.Even though online teaching platforms and digital resources have become valuable tools in the field of ELT, there are potential challenges and implications for EFL teachers and learners, such as managing technology, maintaining student engagement, and balancing workload.All these might lead to increased work demands.In order to reduce the effects of burnout, coping strategies may be included into teacher training and professional development activities specifically adapted into technology integration and management.In conclusion, further research could delve into the specific challenges faced by EFL teachers in hybrid, synchronous and asynchronous classes and examine efficient strategies to diminish EFL teacher burnout.By addressing the potential difficulties and supportive measures, educational institutions could provide more sustainable English teaching environment for EFL teachers in Turkish context.

Table 1
The analysis of studies on EFL teachers' burnout in Turkish context: 2012' burnout in Turkish context:  -2022 ©Copyright 2023 by the author(s) This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.©Copyright 2023 by the author(s) This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.

Table 2
The aims of the research studies ©Copyright 2023 by the author(s) This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.

Table 4
The participants, context, and number of participants in research studies

Table 5
The Burnout Scales in the Selected Studies