International Journal of Emotional Education

3 - 18

Authors: Michael Savage and Vera Woloshyn

This causal comparative study explored K-12 educators’ and school staff’s self-reported levels of well-being, perceived stress, and use of coping strategies. An online survey was administered to 686 educators consisting of teachers, school administrators, professional support staff, administrative support staff and other school staff in a medium-sized schoolboard in Southern Ontario, Canada. The results show that educators reported overall low scores of wellbeing and higher levels of perceived stress as compared to the general population. Female educators reported significantly higher perceived stress than their male colleagues. A k-means cluster analysis of the educators’ coping strategies identified four unique clusters which were significantly different from each other. It was shown that participants in two of the clusters, consisting of approximately 32% of the participants in this study, used maladaptive coping strategies more frequent and that the participants in these two clusters exhibited significantly poorer wellbeing and significantly more perceived stress than their colleagues in the other two clusters. The limitations and practical implications of this study are discussed.

36 - 52

Authors: Segun Emmanuel Adewoye

Indications are that cyberstanders can be negatively affected by witnessing cyberbullying incidents and are even more likely than direct victims of cyberbullying to report symptoms of stress. However, cyberbystanders are understudied in the cyberbullying literature because most research predominantly focuses on perpetrators or direct victims of cyberbullying. This study aimed to explore the lived experiences of adolescent cyberbystanders who witnessed cyberbullying in the COVID-19 era. Twenty adolescent cyberbystanders were purposely selected to participate in this study. The qualitative data was analysed using inductive thematic analysis. The findings demonstrated that cyberbullying has various detrimental effects that include educational, psychological, and emotional consequences for those exposed to it. It is recommended that anti-cyberbullying programmes should be incorporated into the curriculum so that teachers and educational psychologists can emphasise the negative impact of cyberbullying on bullies, victims and bystanders. With more awareness of the detrimental consequences of cyberbullying on all parties involved, adolescents may become more competent in respecting people’s rights and privacy within cyberspace.

68 - 87

Authors: Ana I. Vergara, Natalia Alonso-Alberc, June Gutiѐrrez and David Schultz

Emotion knowledge has attracted scientific interest in recent years due to its relevance to children’s adjustment. Although there is some controversy as to its definition and components, the term is often used to describe the set of abilities to process emotional information. We need rigorous tools to assess it in multiple languages and contexts. The Assessment of Children’s Emotional Skills-ACES was administered to 255 Spanish 8-to-11-year-old children along with, measures of adjustment and language. The Spanish ACES confirmed its three-factor structure; emotion recognition in faces, behaviours and situational emotional knowledge, and a second-order factor (i.e., overall emotional knowledge). The validity of this Spanish version of ACES was demonstrated in emotion knowledge relating to receptive vocabulary, age, sex and adjustment, with age, language and sex moderating relations between emotion knowledge and adjustment. The Spanish ACES can contribute to a greater understanding of the development of emotion knowledge in Spanish-speaking children; and help evaluate social and emotional intervention programmes.

93 - 97

Authors: Ayesha Akram and Tehreem Arshad

This study investigated the relationship between alexithymia and depression amongst university students and how it is mediated by anxiety. Data was collected from a sample of university students (n= 74, Men = 41, Women = 33) aged 18 to 25 (Mean = 22.05, SD = .38). The findings revealed a statistically significant gender difference with men being more alexithymic than women. There was a significant positive correlation between the alexithymic subscales difficulty identifying feelings (DDF) and difficulty describing feelings (DIF), depression and anxiety. DDF and DIF along with anxiety predicted depression. Anxiety partially mediated the relationship between DIF and depression but completely mediated the relationship between DDF and depression. Alexithymic features DDF and DIF predict depression in the sample but Externally Oriented Thinking (EOT) did not. Anxiety was found to be an underlying mechanism operating in the between alexithymic features and depression.

3 - 19

Authors: Danielle R. Hatchimonji, Esha Vaid, Arielle C.V. Linsky, Sam J. Nayman, May Yuan, Marisa MacDonnell and Maurice J. Elias

In the current study, we sought to understand relations among the key intervention targets of social-emotional and character development (SECD) interventions: character virtues, Positive Purpose, and social-emotional learning (SEL). Sixth, seventh, and eighth grade students (n = 1011, ages 11 to 16, M = 12.94, SD = 1.00) from five urban middle schools in the mid-Atlantic US completed self-report surveys containing measures of five supporting character virtues (diligence, gratitude, forgiveness, future-mindedness, and generosity) and Positive Purpose. Teachers rated students’ social-emotional strengths. Hierarchical regressions found a constellation of five character virtues was associated with Purpose and SEL, thereby providing empirical support for the framework for SECD interventions. Exploratory analyses found higher student-reported virtues were associated with a steeper increase in teacher ratings of SEL for males and White students, compared to female students and students of color. The current study contributes to both SEL and character education research by demonstrating positive associations among SEL, character, and Positive Purpose in the context of mid-Atlantic US urban middle schools. Future directions for research include examining how these SECD intervention targets and relations among them develop over time, the ability of SECD interventions to cultivate these skills and virtues, and how differences in teacher ratings by student race/ethnicity and sex may occur.

38 - 52

Authors: Alberth

Whereas the role of anxiety and enjoyment in predicting learning outcomes is well documented in the literature, the role of these two emotion dimensions in predicting perceived sense of classroom community is rarely discussed in the literature despite the fact that classroom community serves as a good predictor of learning outcomes. Conducted in a sociocultural context which is under-represented in the international literature, the present study was designed to predict participants’ perceived sense of classroom community based on their reported enjoyment and anxiety scores. A total of 402 senior high school students (male: 153, female: 249) participated in the study. Participants were invited to complete the questionnaires measuring foreign language enjoyment, foreign language anxiety, and perceived sense of classroom community. Multiple regression analysis indicated that foreign language classroom anxiety and enjoyment concurrently explained 39% of the total variance in sense of classroom community. Foreign language enjoyment turned out to be a stronger positive predictor, whereas anxiety was a negative predictor. Both variables were significant predictors for sense of classroom community regardless of gender. Whereas males and females were comparable in terms of perceived sense of classroom community and foreign language enjoyment, females were more anxious than males.

69 - 75

Authors: Helen Cowie

Book Reviews Volume 14 Issue 1