Over the past two decades, teacher turnover has emerged as a critical challenge for educational systems worldwide. This study aims to map and integrate the intellectual structure, thematic evolution and scholarly impact of research on teachers’ turnover intentions.
A bibliometric analysis of 198 peer-reviewed articles indexed in the Web of Science (2003–2023) was conducted. VOSviewer was employed to examine publication performance, co-citation networks and thematic clustering.
Three dominant themes were identified: (1) job satisfaction, burnout and organizational commitment as core predictors of turnover intention; (2) the rising salience of psychological constructs such as resilience and psychological capital and (3) contextual influences including school climate and socioeconomic disparities. The literature shows a clear shift toward integrated explanatory models and a notable increase in empirical studies from Asian contexts.
This study highlights the need for cross-national comparative research to address contextual variability in turnover drivers. Practically, the findings underscore the importance of targeted interventions – such as enhancing workplace support, fostering psychological resilience and aligning policy frameworks – to reduce turnover. For researchers, the thematic clusters identified provide a road map for exploring understudied areas, including the impact of digital transformation and intersectional inequalities on teacher retention.
This is the first bibliometric synthesis to systematize two decades of fragmented research on teacher turnover intention, providing a rigorously quantified knowledge structure that explicitly links individual, organizational and situational factors.
