Teachers' emotions in the classroom play a critical role in how students learn, according to research published in the Journal of Educational Psychology. When teachers experience enjoyment, they deliver higher-quality instruction that boosts students' confidence in their abilities, interest and academic performance, while teacher anger is linked to poorer teaching and worse student outcomes.
"We decided to conduct this research because teaching is not only an intellectual activity but also an emotional one," said lead author Marina Elena Pfeifer, Ph.D., of Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität München. "We wanted to understand this full chain of events connecting how a teacher feels to how a student performs."
The study analyzed data from 679 mathematics teachers and more than 17,500 students across eight countries: Chile, China, Colombia, Germany, Japan, Mexico, Spain and the United Kingdom. During the study, students studied the same math lesson, which allowed researchers to fairly compare classrooms across different countries.
Teachers reported their levels of enjoyment and anger, while students rated their teachers' teaching quality, reported their own confidence and interest in the subject and completed a performance test. Researchers focused on three key aspects of teaching quality: classroom management, supportive teacher-student relationships and cognitive activation, which involves encouraging students to think critically.
