Teacher Emotion, Pedagogical Agents and Psychological Well-Being: Implications for Student Development

Dear Colleagues,

For students in school settings, teachers serve as their most pivotal “significant others.” Virtually every aspect of teachers—their emotional states, pedagogical roles, and psychological well-being—profoundly shapes students’ learning, motivation, and development. Over the years, research has increasingly recognized the central role of teachers’ emotions and mental health, as well as the emerging influence of affective pedagogical agents, in shaping educational experiences. However, teachers’ individual characteristics vary widely, and the mechanisms through which their emotions, well-being, and interactions with pedagogical agents affect students’ academic outcomes and socio-emotional growth remain complex and multifaceted. For instance, factors such as emotional valence, arousal levels, complex emotions, and emotional consistency (in both teachers and affective pedagogical agents) may impact students’ development differently depending on contextual variables (e.g., teaching materials) and learner characteristics (e.g., gender, socioeconomic status, motivation, thinking style, and personality). Given the growing recognition of the intertwined roles of teacher emotion, psychological well-being, and pedagogical agents, it is crucial to advance a nuanced understanding of how these factors jointly contribute to students’ cognitive, emotional, and social development. This Special Issue aims to highlight cutting-edge research that unravels these complex interactions and informs both educational theory and classroom practices, ultimately fostering healthier, more effective learning environments.

This Special Issue aims to advance our theoretical and empirical understanding of the intricate relationships among teacher emotion, pedagogical agents, and psychological well-being, and how these factors jointly shape students’ learning and development. We welcome original studies, reviews, and conceptual papers that explore emotional, cognitive, and contextual mechanisms linking teachers’ emotional and psychological states to student outcomes and classroom processes.

Suggested Themes (including, but are not limited to, the following):

• Teacher emotions and their impact on students’ learning, motivation, and well-being.
• The role of teachers’ psychological well-being in shaping classroom climate and student outcomes.
• The design and influence of affective pedagogical agents on teaching and learning processes.
• Interactions between teacher emotion, pedagogical practices, and contextual factors (e.g., culture, subject area, teaching modality).
• Cross-level or longitudinal studies examining the dynamic interplay between teacher and student emotions.
• Intervention studies aimed at promoting teacher well-being and emotional regulation in educational contexts.

Prof. Dr. Xiying Li
Prof. Dr. Zhongling Pi
Guest Editors

Fenge Tan
Guest Editor Assistant

Manuscript Submission Information

Manuscripts should be submitted online at www.mdpi.com by registering and logging in to this website. Once you are registered, click here to go to the submission form. Manuscripts can be submitted until the deadline. All submissions that pass pre-check are peer-reviewed. Accepted papers will be published continuously in the journal (as soon as accepted) and will be listed together on the special issue website. Research articles, review articles as well as short communications are invited. For planned papers, a title and short abstract (about 250 words) can be sent to the Editorial Office for assessment.

Submitted manuscripts should not have been published previously, nor be under consideration for publication elsewhere (except conference proceedings papers). All manuscripts are thoroughly refereed through a double-blind peer-review process. A guide for authors and other relevant information for submission of manuscripts is available on the Instructions for Authors page. Education Sciences is an international peer-reviewed open access monthly journal published by MDPI.

Please visit the Instructions for Authors page before submitting a manuscript. The Article Processing Charge (APC) for publication in this open access journal is 1800 CHF (Swiss Francs). Submitted papers should be well formatted and use good English. Authors may use MDPI's English editing service prior to publication or during author revisions.

• teacher emotion
• pedagogical agents
• psychological well-being
• academic emotion
• teacher–student interaction
• student learning