"My teacher's emotional attitude made me love school" - Thesis

Emotions and what we learn from them

Since René Descartes' first treatise on emotions in 1649, a great deal of research has been carried out into the impact of emotions on our daily lives. Terms such as "bientraitance", "emotional intelligence", "positive psychology" or "positive education" can be found in books and in various fields of professional, educational and social life...

In education, the place of teachers in student engagement and motivation has long been the subject of reflections and practices that are, to say the least, contradictory. Jean-Michel MEYRE (2018), as part of his dissertation in educational science, has gathered cross-referenced quantitative and qualitative material proving that it is teachers' "socio-conative assertiveness curriculum" that remains in learners' memories, far ahead of the learning provided! [conative: which expresses the idea of effort].

Jacques Lecomte (2014, p4) gives us an interesting approach to this theme, pointing out that "interest in the positive facets of the human being is not new. The humanistic psychology movement, represented by Carl Rogers (2005) and Abraham Maslow (1972), among others, highlighted these themes. For them, human beings are not primarily the playthings of their inner drives (psychoanalysis) or the pressures of their environment (behaviourism), but individuals who want to achieve self-fulfilment through personal development and relationships with others".

Citing (Gable and Haidt, 2005, p. 104), he defines positive psychology as "the study of conditions and processes that contribute to the flourishing or optimal functioning of individuals, groups and institutions."

The themes of positive psychology are social and political (volunteering and humanitarian action, learning organizations, liberated enterprises, etc.), interpersonal (team coaching, emotional intelligence at the heart of human relations, cooperation and empathy, etc.) and personal (feelings of personal efficacy, resilience, self-determination, etc.).

In France, university laboratories such as "Personnalité, Cognition, Changement Social" bring together researchers like Rébecca Bègue-Shankland, who wrote a book on positive psychology in 2014, following a thesis in 2007 on comparisons between new pedagogies and the traditional higher education system. Her work "in positive psychology falls within the framework of the 'expand and develop' theory (Fredrickson, 2004), which considers that positive emotions broaden the attentional span, enabling greater creativity and improved problem-solving abilities."

A very recent discipline (1998), positive psychology is at the crossroads of many disciplines, as illustrated by the French and Francophone positive psychology congresses or the collective work edited by Martin-Krumm and Tarquinion (2019) bringing together 14 contributions from philosophy, sociology, psychology, medicine and economics.

Stop and go, emotion as a driving force

Jean-Michel MEYRE, who defended his thesis on " Impact de la personnalité de l'enseignant sur le ressenti des élèves - L'assertivité socio-conative comme déterminant de la relation éducative " ( The impact of the teacher's personality on students' feelings - Socio-conative assertiveness as a determinant of the educational relationship ), works in the field of education sciences.

A PE (Physical Education and Sport) teacher in a sensitive area of Paris, then in Montpellier, JM Meyre based his thesis on "the main hypothesis that there is a close link between empathic ability and the positive opinion left with former pupils. In other words, it seems interesting to us to verify that the higher the degree of empathy, the more the teacher leaves a positive opinion of him/herself with his/her pupils" (p. 25).

Her initial conceptual framework focuses on :

• Emotions as a state "leading the individual to interact with his or her environment. In this sense, it has a relational function, enabling interaction between man and the world around him" (p. 31).
  
• Communication according to different theoretical approaches, including those that define verbal, non-verbal or para-verbal communication.
  
• Empathy ("the ability to read the heart of others" p. 53) and assertiveness ("the relational ability to mediate open communication involving respect for others"): for JM Meyre, "to approach the theme of assertiveness in the pedagogic/social teacher/teacher relationship is to apprehend a mode of communication that contributes to the creation of a climate conducive to the existence of a positive memory trace of the teacher" (p. 60).
  
• Finally, conation is defined as the force "that drives people to act, directed by a system of embodied values" (p. 75). What interests Jean-Michel Meyre more specifically is the socio-conative interrelationship between teachers and their pupils, for if "conation is already expressed in the relationship with other living beings (...) during the act of teaching, the voluntary or forced exchanges, the imposed proximity, the relational bond created reinforce this social dimension".

This thesis is based on socio-conative assertiveness, i.e., on what teachers do (their relational practices in the educational profession) as a function of who they are (emotions, affects, values, etc.). His problematic will seek to "show that the stage of socio-conative assertiveness in which the teacher finds himself attests to the relationship he builds with his pupils" (p. 92).

The study was carried out over two years at a school near Montpellier, and gathered data from questionnaires for both teachers and pupils, video footage of 12 volunteer teachers, and targeted interviews based on the recordings made. The research defined "9 observable and objectifiable components of socio-conative assertiveness characteristics", and provided evidence that "the positive feelings a student has towards his or her teacher are directly related to the teacher's degree of socio-conative assertiveness" (p. 345).

In conclusion, despite the biases highlighted by Jean-Michel Meyre, the study has provided objective evidence of the effect of teachers' relationships and attitudes towards their pupils. His work reinforced by other research, he allows himself to "think that it seems possible, with such a model, to envisage the implementation of initial and in-service training capable of building the professionalization of teachers, all school disciplines taken together" (p 340).

Sources

Descartes, R. (1649). The Passions of the Soul.
https://www.decitre.fr/livres/les-passions-de-l-ame-9782080708656.html

Lecomte, J. (Sous la direction de, 2014). Introduction to positive psychology. Paris : Dunod.
https://www.decitre.fr/livres/introduction-a-la-psychologie-positive-9782100705337.html

Meyre, J-M. (2018) - " Impact de la personnalité de l'enseignant sur le ressenti des élèves - L'assertivité socio-conative comme déterminant de la relation éducative " - Doctoral thesis in educational sciences, University of Montpellier 3 (defense December 15, 2018).
https://theses.hal.science/tel-02134573v1

Martin-Krumm, C., Tarquinio, C. (Sous la direction de, 2019). Positive psychology. Paris : Dunod.
https://www.decitre.fr/livres/psychologie-positive-9782100794072.html

Shankland, R. (2012, new edition 2019). Positive psychology. Paris: Dunod.
https://www.decitre.fr/livres/la-psychologie-positive-9782100793235.html