Coronavirus incidence causes the adoption of strict restrictions by governments in most of the countries. There were and still are public areas that are affected more than others – services and schools. In Slovakia, the school closure happened in the middle of March 2020 and lasts until May 2021. This situation puts a huge demand on teachers on all stages. This paper was to describe the difficult situation that occurred worldwide during the spring in 2020. We have focused on 214 secondary school teachers (Mage = 46.9; SD = 11.2; 75.3% females) and their experiences of two dangerous syndromes connected with job performance – burnout and boreout syndrome. Maslach Burnout Inventory (Ráczová & Köverová, 2020) saturated by 3 subscales: depersonalization (α = 0,903), personal accomplishment (α = 0,624) and exhaustion (α = 0,883) and Boreout scale (α = 0,550) (Rothlin & Werder, 2014) were administered. The convenience and purposive sampling method has been used. The data were proceeded by descriptive and correlation analysis (Pearson correlation coefficient). Statistical differences were tested with T-test for independent samples. We found that the level of both syndromes was not high during the first wave of COVID-19 pandemic, but female teachers experienced significantly higher emotional exhaustion than their male colleagues. Currently, after the second wave of pandemics, the need for a second round of the research arises what would create the opportunity for comparison.

In Slovakia, the Covid-19 pandemic lockdown in the educational sector lasted for three months and caused unexpected changes with demands on pupils and their parents, students and teachers. The global school closure at all educational levels occurred suddenly and caught the school system and its actors unprepared. Teachers were forced to quickly adapt to the “new” work approach with minimal and/or confusing directions. Female teachers who predominate at primary schools in Slovakia, around 90%, faced even greater challenge and experienced stress, as many of them simultaneously took care of their own children and households. The aim of the presented paper is an examination of stress level that primary school female teachers experienced during the schools´ lockdown period. Two measures of stress were used: Teacher stressor questionnaire (Clipa, Boghean, 2015) and the Perceived stress scale (Cohen, Kamarck & Mermelstein, 1983). Additionally, an open question was added to learn about the teachers´ subjective perception of work pressure caused by the lockdown. The research sample consisted of 103 female primary school teachers (47 at the first primary education stage, 56 at the second primary education stage). Data were collected online in April 2020, with teachers being invited to participate via teachers´ online forums.

The Short Dark Triad is a scale used to capture three aversive personality traits—Machiavellianism, narcissism, and psychopathy on the subclinical level. The present study aimed to verify the psychometric properties of the Slovak version of the Short Dark Triad scale in three studies. The first two studies aimed to examine the reliability of the scale. The aim of Study 1 was to examine the factor structure of SD3. A three-factor model consisting of three latent intercorrelated factors in a unidimensional and bifactorial model were examined on a sample of 588 participants. Study 2 aimed to test the consistency of the results over time (test–retest reliability) on the sample of 117 participants. In Study 3, convergent and divergent validity was examined on the sample of 333 participants. For both kinds of validity examination, the Slovak version of NEO-FFI was used. The internal consistency of the subscales and test results, the same as the retest results, were satisfactory. The relationships between the scales were found to be significant. Confirmatory factor analysis (CFA) results supported the original three-factor model. Significant interrelations have been established between Machiavellianism and openness, agreeableness and conscientiousness; narcissism and neuroticism, extraversion and agreeableness; psychopathy and openness, agreeableness and conscientiousness. The Short Dark Triad achieved satisfactory values of reliability and validity; therefore, it can be used on the Slovak population.

The presented research is the part of a broader pilot study within exploration of the dark side of helping professionals; in this case we are focusing on current teachers and future teachers (pedagogy students). The aim of the current research was the exploration and comparison of the aversive personality traits that are inappropriate for performing helping professions. It is the concept called Dark Triad that includes machiavellism, narcissism and psychopathy at their subclinical level. The Dark Triad has been explored in the sample of 172 participants (Mage=34,3 years; SD=10,7) including 72 teachers (42,9%) and 100 pedagogy students (57,1%). We have used Slovak version of the Short Dark Triad Questionnaire (SD3; Jones & Paulhus, 2014) which includes machiavellism, narcissism and psychopathy subscales. The data were processed in SPSS 21 via analysis of variance (ANOVA). Significant differences in machiavellism were found among current teachers and future teachers, students were scoring higher. Machiavellism was identified as the most significant dark trait compared to narcissism and psychopathy in both samples. The results are not so surprising as teaching profession seems to provide opportunities to satisfy people´s needs for power, dominant status, authority and obtaining benefits from the others. For further intervention it is necessary to find a way how to deal with machiavellian people in the educational system who could influence their student´s personal and professional development.

The aim of present study was to explain the relationships of Dark Triad with decision-making styles. We assumed an association of decision-making styles with the Dark Triad traits that represent aversive personality traits, because previous studies identified relationships between the Dark Triad and the Big Five features and similarly, the relationships of the Big Five traits with decision-making styles have been confirmed. The research was conducted on a sample of 127 participants (M = 40.65 years; SD = 4.68). The sample consisted of 55.1% women (n = 70) and 44.9% men (n = 57). The data were subjected to correlation analysis and structural equation modeling. Machiavellianism correlated significantly positively with avoidant, dependent, and spontaneous decision-making styles. Narcissism correlated significantly positively with spontaneous decision-making style and significantly negatively with rational decision-making style. Psychopathy correlated significantly positively with avoidant and spontaneous decision-making style and significantly negatively with rational decision-making style. The value of the results lies in revealing what decision-making strategies are used by people with different socially aversive personality traits. Finding explanations for why some people use non-adaptive decision-making styles and experience the negative results of their decisions in real life, which cause their overall discomfort, can be explained by their dark features.