Probing the bond between EFL teachers’ emotional literacy skills and professional development

Abstract

he emotional side of second/foreign language (L2) education has been widely explored in the past decade. However, the way English as foreign language (EFL) teachers’ emotional literacy (EL) influences their professionalism has remained unaddressed. Against this shortcoming, this study examined the association between EFL teachers’ EL skills and professional development. To do so, two online questionnaires were disseminated among 350 Iranian EFL teachers. The results of structural equation modeling (SEM) and correlation analysis revealed that all the five components of teacher EL skills were significantly correlated with teacher professional development, with social skills (r = .419) and emotional awareness (r = .417) having the strongest correlations. Moreover, the results of regression analysis indicated that teacher EL predicted 25.0% of the variance in teacher professional development. Of the components, three significant predictors were detected, namely emotional awareness, social skills, and self-regulation. Emotional awareness was the best predictor (β = .268, p = .000 < .01) that uniquely explained 7.18% of the variance in teacher professional development. Social skills and self-regulation were the other significant predictors of teacher professional development. The study ends in some conclusions, implications, and suggestions for further research on teacher emotions in L2 teaching and professional development.