The Context Specificity of Teachers’ Emotional Experiences

• In Event: Sometimes My Teaching Just Flows: Emerging Research on Teachers’ Emotions and Motivation

Abstract

Theoretical framework and objectives. A consistent, recent finding in educational research is that students’ motivation and emotions are domain-specific (Bong, 2001; Frenzel & Götz, 2007; Goetz, Frenzel, Pekrun, & Hall, 2006; Goetz, Frenzel, Pekrun, Hall, & Lüdtke, 2007; Marsh, 1993). What is largely unknown, however, is whether teachers’ emotional experiences are context specific, i.e. whether they vary across different subjects or across different groups of students they teach. In two studies we attempted to shed light on this widely unexplored question. Specifically, we sought to analyze the variability of teachers’ emotional experiences resulting from (1) differences between teachers and (2) differences within teachers due to different subjects and classes taught.
Method. Participants were N = 220 (70% female)/90 (29% female) teachers in Studies 1 and 2, respectively. In both studies teachers filled out lesson diaries assessing their experienced enjoyment, anger, and anxiety in each of their lessons over the course of two weeks. The two studies differed in terms of teacher types (Study 1: classroom teachers; Study 2: subject teachers), subjects taught (Study 1: mathematics, social studies, and German; Study 2: mathematics and science), and number of classes taught (Study 1: one class in three different subjects; Study 2: two classes in two different subjects).
Results and Discussion. Study 1 focused on classroom teachers and examined the variability in emotional experiences between and within teachers; namely between subjects and lessons. The variance proportions between teachers/subjects/lessons were 13%/5%/82% for enjoyment, 17%/5%/78% for anger, and 24%/0%/76% for anxiety. Thus for all emotions, there were rather strong between-teacher differences and fluctuations of experience across lessons, and rather low between-teacher differences and fluctuations of experience across subjects (math, German, and social studies).
Study 2 focused on subject teachers and examined the variability in emotional experiences, between- and within teachers; namely between subjects, classes, and lessons. The variance proportions between teachers/subjects/classes/lessons were 28%/10%/0%/62% for enjoyment, 19%/16%/0%/65% for anger, and 30%/9%/0%/76% for anxiety. Related subjects (math and science) thus were not systematically related to any of the teachers’ emotional experiences. However, teachers’ enjoyment, anger and anxiety varied in relation to the groups of students they taught.
Overall, our data show that teachers’ emotions are indeed context specific in that subject teachers feel differently when teaching different classes. In addition, the degree to which teachers’ emotions are domain specific differs across subjects and across emotions. Teachers’ emotional experiences vary significantly across different domains (mathematics, German and social studies) for enjoyment and anger. In contrast, these effects could not be found for anxiety or for more related subjects (mathematics and science). As such, subject seems to play less of an important role for teachers’ emotional experiences than it does for students' emotional experiences (Goetz, et al., 2006; Goetz, et al., 2007). Our results imply that, depending on the emotion being addressed, interventions should be designed in a more person-specific or more context-specific way.

Authors

• Betty Becker-Kurz, Betty Becker-Kurz Leopoldstraße 14

• Anne C. Frenzel, University of Augsburg