Associations Between Teachers' Stress, Child-Center Beliefs, Reflective Practice and Responsiveness to Children's Negative Emotions

Introduction: Young children’s social-emotional development is central to future social behaviors and academic success (Denham, et al. 2012; Garner, 2010). In early care/education, teachers, and specifically the quality of their responses to children’s emotional reactions, influence this development (Denham, et al 2012; Zinsser et al. 2013). Although there is considerable research on the importance of education on teacher quality (Cochran-Smith & Zeichner, 2005; Rice, 2003), less attention has been given to components of teachers’ well-being that may also influence teacher-child interactions. Given this gap, we examined teacher’s child-centered beliefs, stress, and reflective practice (defined as the ongoing process of examining behaviors and their subsequent consequences) in relationship to the quality of teacher reactions in the classroom.

Methods: Data came from 1,129 preschool-aged teachers in daycare and public pre-K programs. Teachers reported on degrees of stress, child-centered beliefs, reflective practice, and responsiveness to children’s negative emotions. We conducted a path analysis to test direct and indirect associations between stress and child-centered beliefs and teachers’ responsiveness through reflective practice. We controlled for teachers’ demographics (age, race/ethnicity, marital status, and income), professional background (educational attainment, ECE college coursework, experience years, lead teacher status, participation in professional development), and program characteristics (non-profit, public pre-K, Head Start, national accreditation).

Results:  Results of path analysis showed a good model fit x² = 32.05, df = 26, p > .05; CFI = .99, RMSEA = .02. Teachers who reported higher child-centered beliefs also reported higher levels of reflective practice (β = .14, p < .001), positively-focused reactions (β = .06, p < .05), and expressive encouragement (β = .22, p < .001). On the other hand, teachers who reported higher levels of stress reported lower levels of reflective practice (β = -.11, p < .001) and higher levels of negative reactions (β = .08, p < .05). Teachers who reported higher levels of reflective practice also reported higher levels of positively-focused reactions (β = .23, p < .001) and expressive encouragement (β = .19, p < .001). Test of mediation by bootstrap technique (n = 5000) showed significant mediation effects.

Conclusions:  Child-centered beliefs may enhance, while teacher stress may impede, reflective practice. Results of this study affirm the importance of teacher stress management and highlight child-center beliefs and reflective practice as tools to improve teacher reactions. Professional development in these areas may be beneficial for teachers and the development of children in their care.