Effects of Mental Workload on University Faculty Members at a Higher Education Institution in Mexico

In today’s world, mental workload (MWL) is one of the main reasons that university faculty members leave their profession. They are exposed to conditions that favour MWL, such as teaching 20 or more hours per week, attending five or more students per semester, leading research projects, and performing administrative activities. All this favours the increase in MWL levels, causing adverse effects on their well-being and performance. A hypothetical model was proposed to determine the MWL level to which university faculty members are exposed to. Subsequently, a questionnaire containing the items and scales of the NASA Task Load Index (NASA-TLX) method was administered via e-mail to 44 university faculty members. The data were captured in Excel ® and subsequently in SPSS Statistics ® 25. A mediation analysis of Andrew Hayes’ model 4 was performed for hypothesis testing. As a result, it was observed that MWL only directly affected the variables Stress and Mental Fatigue of 0.0154 and 0.0117, respectively. However, Stress had direct effects on Headache (0.5225), Mental Fatigue (0.6822), Irritability (0.5286), Depression (0.3132), Anxiety (0.6582), and Weight Gain (0.7459). In conclusion, university faculty members are exposed to working conditions that can generate a high MWL, affecting their performance and well-being.