@TeacherToolkit
Ross Morrison McGill founded @TeacherToolkit in 2007, and today, he is one of the ‘most followed educators’on social media in the world. In 2015, he was nominated as one of the ‘500 Most Influential People in Britain’ by The Sunday Times as a result of…
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What if working long hours reshaped the structure of your brain?
This new neuroscience study suggests overwork might structurally change areas of the brain linked to problem solving and emotion, providing some preliminary evidence that the association between teachers being overwork results in them becoming emotionally drained.
This new neuroscience research, Overwork and changes in brain structure (Jang et al., 2025) explores how working more than 52 hours per week can alter brain regions linked to thinking and emotions—raising urgent questions for school and college leaders.
Teacher workload research suggests teachers in England, work on average, 60+ hours per week during term time, rising to 80 hours for school leaders.
Teachers know the emotional and cognitive drain of overwork, but this study from South Korea adds a new layer to the debate. It involved 110 healthcare workers (n = 110), divided into those working over 52 hours weekly (n = 32) and those who didn’t (n = 78). MRI scans revealed that those working longer hours had greater brain volume in areas responsible for executive function and emotional regulation.
The research examined structural brain differences. The overworked group showed increased volume in the middle frontal gyrus, superior frontal gyrus, insula, and superior temporal gyrus—regions involved in planning, decision-making, and stress response.
While it’s not yet clear whether this increase is helpful or harmful, what’s certain is this: working long hours appears to have a measurable effect on the brain’s structure.
This matters because teaching is cognitively and emotionally intense. Whether dealing with behaviour, juggling multiple tasks, or managing data, teachers rely daily on the very brain regions highlighted in this study.
If overwork physically affects the brain areas responsible for thinking clearly and regulating emotions, this raises serious safeguarding concerns—not just for teacher wellbeing, but for decision-making and classroom performance too.
Credit: Jang et al., 2025
Long working hours are not just unsustainable—they may also be neurologically unsafe. Recognising this helps reframe workload discussions as something beyond policy: it becomes a matter of professional brain health.
What can schools do?
School and college leaders can take small but significant steps. Begin by identifying how many staff exceed the 52-hour threshold. Consider ways to triage tasks: What’s essential? What’s just tradition? What’s eating into recovery time?
Streamline meeting schedules, reduce duplication in planning, and create protected time for genuine rest during term time—not just during holidays. Most importantly, shift the culture. Being “busy” shouldn’t be a badge of honour.
Use CPD to explain why brain health matters. Teachers perform best when their prefrontal cortex is firing well—not frazzled from chronic overload. This study offers the neuroscience to back up what most teachers already feel in their bones.
CPD questions for teachers:
- How many hours per week do teachers in your setting work—honestly?
- Do school leaders monitor workload peaks across the academic year?
- What tasks take up the most time outside the classroom?
- How often do teachers experience genuine recovery time during term?
- Is there a culture that praises overwork or supports sustainability?
- How could workload policies be restructured with brain health in mind?
- Are current CPD offers addressing cognitive overload and stress?
- How often do school leaders reflect on their own work patterns?
- Could staff surveys be used to shape more supportive systems?
- What would change if brain scans were part of Ofsted reports?
The research concludes:
“This pilot study provides preliminary evidence of the association between overwork and structural changes in the brain, offering insights into the potential neurobiological consequences of excessive working hours on workers’ health.”
Download the full paper to explore the research in detail.
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