Professional autonomy of scientific and pedagogical workers as an indicator of their subjective well-being

The article presents the problem of subjective well-being of scientific and pedagogical workers and its factors, which include, in particular, the professional autonomy of educators. The results of empirical research are shown of features of professional autonomy of scientific and pedagogical workers and specificity of influence of its indicators on professional subjective well-being. The distribution are investigated of scientific and pedagogical workers depending on the level of their professional autonomy is established; the gender-age and organizational-professional features of the manifestation of professional autonomy of scientific and pedagogical workers. The conducted empirical research allowed to state that a significant number of researched scientific and pedagogical workers are characterized by insufficiently expressed professional autonomy, limited in the manifestations of independence, flexibility and emotionality in activity. The results of analysis of variance revealed the features of professional autonomy of research and teaching staff depending on gender, age and organizational and professional characteristics. Relatively higher rates of professional autonomy were found in men than in their female colleagues. At the same time, a higher level of professional autonomy was recorded in cohorts aged 30 to 50 and teachers holding senior positions in the service hierarchy. It is shown that the professional autonomy of male scientific and pedagogical workers has a positive effect on the expression of their subjective well-being. The expediency of development and testing of specially organized psychological training in postgraduate education, which will promote the development of professional autonomy of research and pedagogical workers, thus ensuring individual self-organization and subjective well-being of all participants in the educational process. Prospects for further research are outlined in the context of creating a model of professional subjective well-being in order to further develop a program of empirical research of professional subjective well-being of research and pedagogical workers.