Episode Description:
In this episode of Evidence for Education, we welcome back returning guest Dr. Leigh McLean to discuss her latest research on the powerful role of teacher emotions in shaping student engagement and learning. Building on her earlier work on teacher well-being, Dr. McLean shares new insights into how teachers' emotional experiences vary across different subjects—and how these emotions ripple out to influence students.
We explore how emotional transmission works, why younger students are especially sensitive to their teachers' feelings, and how factors like socioeconomic status can amplify or diminish these effects. A major finding we discuss is that science stands out from other disciplines: teachers’ and students’ emotions around science are often more dynamic and bidirectional than in subjects like math or reading. We reason through why that might be—and what it means for teacher preparation, classroom practice, and education policy.
If you care about the future of teaching, teacher retention, or student engagement, this is an episode you won’t want to miss.
Guest’s work:
McLean, L., Janssen, J., Espinoza, P., Lindstrom Johnson, S., & Jimenez, M. (2023). Associations between teacher and student mathematics, science, and literacy anxiety in fourth grade. Journal of Educational Psychology, 115(4), 539–551. https://doi.org/10.1037/edu0000790
McLean, L., & Jones, N. (2025). Using an observational measure of elementary teachers’ emotional expressions during mathematics and English language arts to explore associations with students’ content area emotions and engagement. Contemporary Educational Psychology, 80, 102352. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.cedpsych.2025.102352
McLean, L., Espinoza, P., Janssen, J., Jimenez, M., & Lindstrom Johnson, S. (2024). Relationships between elementary teachers’ enjoyment and students’ engagement across content areas and among student groups. School Psychology. Advance online publication. https://doi.org/10.1037/spq0000633
