Snarky Teachers: Correlates With Teachers’ Social and Emotional Competencies and Occupational Health and Well-Being

• In Event: Developing Educators’ Social and Emotional Competencies to Advance Educational Possibilities

Abstract

Objectives. The present study tests the following research questions: RQ1) Are teachers’ social and emotional competencies (SECs) associated with their use of snark? RQ2) Are teachers’ experiences of occupational health and well-being (OHWB) associated with their use of snark?

Theoretical Framework. The Prosocial Classroom model and the Contemplative Social and Emotional Learning model of teacher professional development posit that teachers’ SECs and OHWB influence students’ development (Jennings & Greenberg, 2009; Roeser et al., under review). Indeed, teachers are known to struggle with their OHWB (Johnson et al., 2005), and empirical research indicates that teachers’ SEC and OHWB are associated with students experiences in the classroom (e.g., Braun et al., 2020). One possible explanation for this link is that teachers’ SEC and OHWB influence their patterns of interactions with students. The present study tests this model by focusing on a specific type communication thought to be maladaptive in the classroom: teachers’ use of snark towards students (Massey, 2021). This is the first study to focus on teachers’ use of snark, and to examine the correlates of this type of communication.

Methods and Data. Data for this study come from a sample of 516 K-12th grade teachers from across the U.S. Participants completed an online survey in April 2021 which assessed their: self-reported use of snark in the classroom (adapted from Massey, 2021); SECs as indicated by the CASEL-5 Framework, including: mindfulness skills (i.e., self-awareness; Gu et al., 2016), cognitive reappraisal skills (i.e., self-management; Gross & John, 2003), perspective taking skills (i.e., social awareness; Davis, 1980), forgiveness (i.e., relationship skills; Brown, 2003), and decision making skills (i.e., responsible decision making; Scott & Bruce, 1995); and their OHWB including: burnout (Maslach et al., 1996), job satisfaction (Weiss et al., 1967), depression (Lowe et al., 2010), and life satisfaction (Diener et al., 1985). Stepwise multilevel models to account for the nesting of teachers within states was used to test the association between SECs and OHWB and teachers’ use of snark.

Results. With regard to RQ1: Teachers with lower mindfulness skills (B = -0.38, SE = 0.15, p = .01), greater cognitive reappraisal (B = 0.33, SE = 0.08, p < .001), lower perspective taking skills (B = -0.42, SE = 0.12, p < .001), and lower forgiveness skills (B = -0.14, SE = 0.18, p = .10) reported greater snark use. Decision-making was unrelated to snark. With regard to RQ2: Teachers experiencing greater burnout (B = 0.58, SE = 0.08, p < .001), job satisfaction (B = 0.56, SE = 0.12, p < .001), depression (B = 0.18, SE = 0.05, p < .001), and life satisfaction (B = 0.24, SE = 0.07, p < .001) reported greater snark use. Results in the hypothesized and unhypothesized directions are discussed in relation to the guiding theoretical frameworks.

Scholarly Significance. Together, findings indicate that teachers’ SECs and OHWB are associated with their use of snark. These results provide one possible explanation for how teachers’ SEC and OHWB may manifest in the classroom.

Authors

• Summer Braun, University of Alabama

• Alison Hooper, University of Alabama

• Jeffrey G Parker, University of Alabama