Semantic Uses of Emotional Intelligence in K-12 Teacher Roles: Discussing Concepts across Social Cognitive Context

Abstract

Emotional intelligence (EI) is a term derived from the concept of interpersonal intelligence in Gardner’s multiple intelligences (MI) theory. This term has been used to explain one of the many expectations placed on K-12 teachers in that they are often expected to display EI. Given the prevalence of this term and popularity of MI theory, there is need to contextualize the semantic use of EI. To do so, Bronfenbrenner’s ecological systems theory (EST) is discussed in relation to EI to provide a perspective on ways to conceptualize how to address secondary traumatic stress (STS) risk among teachers. The semantic use of EI relates to a theoretical understanding of teachers’ emotional labor. The purpose of this analysis is to highlight semantic conceptualization and links made between these concepts and to call for additional research on this interdisciplinary topic. Implications are discussed for how collaboration with speech-language pathologists can benefit general education teachers.

1. Introduction

News reports and research studies from 2019 to 2022 have highlighted the issue of teacher attrition and teacher shortages in several regions [1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6]. While there are many potential reasons for why many school districts have struggled to retain teachers, secondary traumatic stress (STS) is a reason that should receive greater attention. There is continued need to expand understanding of teachers’ risk of STS, especially in how to formulate support interventions to prevent high turnover in the profession. A research group highlighted that “trauma-informed approaches to care are distinct from trauma-specific interventions” ([7], p. 5). There continues to be a gap in intervention approaches that will require additional research on the role of emotional labor in the teaching profession. When considering developmental trends from psychological perspectives, additional systematic supports may be developed.

Exploring the interrelated issues of teachers at risk of experiencing STS in providing educational—and potentially emotional—supports to students who experienced or are experiencing adverse childhood experiences (ACEs) is important for study from the perspective of ecological systems theory as it applies to emotional intelligence in developmental psychology. This analysis discusses emotional labor as a reification of emotional intelligence. Emotional intelligence (EI) is defined here as the skill to understand and use emotion in ways that effectively communicate knowing and empathizing with other individuals to reduce stress and help solve challenges and reduce conflict. Emotional labor, then, is an individual’s work in operationalizing EI in personal and professional settings [7]. In this context, stress is defined as the feelings an individual has in response to their personal and professional environments that are causing adverse physiological and/or psychological effects in that individual. As such, this analysis addresses the Sapir-Whorf hypothesis of linguistic relativism as a conceptual framework but delimited within the English language—not in comparison across languages—to inform exploratory discussion into the influence of the interpretation of the terms stress, STS, and emotional intelligence as they are used in relation to schools and teachers. What are the implications of the semantic use of emotional intelligence for teachers? Specifically, this question is focused on a discussion of implications for teacher education and educational psychology in addressing STS. This assumes that MI theory is valid per the studies by Shearer [8, 9] and Shearer and Karanian [10] in contrast to a previous study challenging the validity of MI theory by Schulte and colleagues [11]. Emotional intelligence is addressed here and is assumed valid for the purposes of this analysis.

Effective teachers may often be expected to have high levels of EI. A selection of the literature on this topic is analyzed within the context of Gardner’s [12, 13] multiple intelligences (MI) theory. However, this alone does not seem to answer the question: What is the role of the semantic use of EI in the expectations placed on K-12 teachers? Additional context is posited in this analysis through applying Bronfenbrenner’s ecological systems theory (EST) as a way to bridge the individual’s microsystem context with their mesosystem context of the school. The EST provides further theoretical context for how an individual may perceive their stress level and how the larger school community may perceive an individual teacher’s exposure to stress. When stress levels become too much—or become toxic stress—then that can adversely affect that teacher’s effectiveness. However, how stakeholders, such as administrators, students, and students’ families, interpret a teacher’s EI and to what extent they believe a teacher should engage in emotional labor all have a role in teachers’ stress levels. This is partially an issue of semantics in that one stakeholder may define a teacher’s emotional labor differently than another stakeholder. One might define it as chronically stressful while another stakeholder may not define emotional intelligence as having a decisive role in teachers’ labor.

It is important to address semantic conceptualization of EI and emotional labor for the K-12 teachers’ work context because these concepts may often be assumed without critical evaluation. The association between these concepts is important because they are linked; however, there is a need for additional discussion in how theoretical constructs such as ecological systems theory can provide a way to demonstrate how or why there can be variation in semantic interpretation within the same culture. An administrator may have a different perspective on what EI or emotional labor is than a teacher’s perspective which might differ from a student’s family perspective. The definitions may be the same, but how those definitions are interpreted in practice might show divergence. The Sapir-Whorf hypothesis has historically been posited to discuss intercultural understanding, but additional research is needed on intracultural understanding of selected semantics and the role of semantics in how a person interacts with their social environment.

2. Emotional intelligence through the lens of ecological systems theory

Analyzing emotional intelligence from the interpersonal intelligence construct in Gardner’s [12, 13] MI theory through ecological systems theory (EST) may provide additional understanding of the semantic use of intelligence as it is understood in educational psychology and, more specifically, how it highlights the importance of the emotional labor that teachers do. While debate about MI theory has largely revolved around the definition and use of the term intelligence—and whether it is a plural or singular concept [11]—the usefulness of MI theory and the validity of the concept of multiple intelligences has been supported in some neuroscience studies [8, 9, 10, 14]. When considering MI theory through the lens of EST—also known as bioecological systems theory—development of intelligence at the individual level is necessarily tied to a community as a comparative and supportive process. As Sloman and colleagues argued: “The representations entailed by collective cognition, in contrast, can be analyzed” ([15], p. 11). This is to say that intelligence, when defined as the singular g, has largely been a norm-referenced criterion. Norm-referenced is comparative across individuals to give, for example, an average or a median number for interpretation. However, when intelligence is plural—not the singular g—then intelligences is also criterion-referenced as much, if not more than, than norm-referenced. This perspective suggests a collective cognition that aligns both Bronfenbrenner’s ecological systems theory and Gardner’s MI theory.

Emotional intelligence has been shown to have correlation with prosocial behavior among adolescents [16]. According to a study by Espino-Díaz and colleagues [16], their study found that “several variables showed significant correlation with PSB [prosocial behavior]: EI [emotional intelligence] and EF [executive functions]. On the other hand, EI also showed significant association with the rest of the dimensions that form the PSB construct: empathy, respect, social relations and leadership. In the case of EF, it also correlated with respect” ([16], p. 11). The variables of empathy and respect are especially notable, because if students or other people in the school community demonstrate low levels of empathy and respect toward teachers then that has a cumulative effect on teachers. When considering Cheung and colleagues’ study on “psychological capital” among teachers [17], low levels of perceived respect from students or the school community and behaviors that undermine teachers can increase the risk of STS which can affect teacher self-efficacy [18, 19, 20, 21]. When teachers perceived high levels of respect from students, there was a reduced risk of stress having adverse impacts on teachers’ self-efficacy and instead bolstered teachers’ self-efficacy in teaching their students [17, 22, 23]. When this term is added to the semantic context of teachers, it provides for an additional variable to consider in what words or phrases are connected in discussions among researchers in what affects teachers’ efficacy in preventing or mitigating emotional stress.

Bronfenbrenner’s EST [24] was published just before Gardner’s MI theory [12]. It seems relevant, then, to review the semantic use of emotional intelligence (EI) through the lens of EST. While there is much literature on each of these two contemporary theories, there is very little on exploring the semantic connections between concepts of stress, especially when considering the context of EST to analyze MI theory. This is especially relevant to the social cognitive context of teachers because of the substantial expectations of them to have a high level of emotional intelligence and to demonstrate that consistently. This term can be used suppress a teacher’s expression of frustration at high levels of stress insofar as the term emotional intelligence having semantic power to enforce the expectation of teachers to automatically absorb students’ stress because that is the expectation of the term in the context of teachers. This gap is addressed to call attention to the need for additional research on this interrelated topic. The student-to-teacher working relationship is part of their microsystem (e.g., students, teachers, families) and to a lesser extent their mesosystem and exosystem (e.g., school administrators, district administrators, and/or school board).

Discussion of semantic use of emotional intelligence may come into holistic focus when considering ecological systems theory—also known as bioecological systems theory, though it will be referred to as ecological systems theory (EST) in this analysis similar to Eriksson and colleagues’ holistic use of the theory [25]. This has been used to explain how individuals interact with their environment when considering larger social contexts [26]. It is, at its foundation, tied to language modeling insofar as individuals communicate their place within a larger community and vice versa. For example, EST has been used to discuss trauma-informed practices in educational contexts [27, 28, 29, 30] and, by extension, its relevance for analyzing public health issues [25]. It has been used to analyze how individual students in certain group affiliations interact with schools [31, 32]. The family unit, as part of a student’s microsystem, affects students’ experiences in school [33]. This is itself a type of public health issue when considering the mental health of K-12 students and teachers. Ecological systems theory has been used to address various issues related to trauma such as issues stemming from school absenteeism [34]. It has also been used to consider instructional context [35, 36] and cultural context that is interrelated with these contextual items in which the teacher as a crucial person in a student’s microsystem [37, 38, 39]. This emphasizes the importance of mitigating what scholars and mental health professionals call STS that educators sometime experience, especially considering that many teachers did not know that STS had a name [18, 19, 40]. STS can, among other things, disrupt belongingness [40, 41]. Taken together, the naming of the condition has semantic power because it makes it efficient to communicate the issue when there is a name for it that can be communicated with one phrase, STS, so that it has semantic resonance. This is to say that the common understanding of the term gives those experiencing it a sense of being heard, so semantically the concept has meaning to those not experiencing the condition.

3. Semantic use of emotional labor

Emotional intelligence and emotional labor are semantically linked concepts. When considering that intelligence and labor are both modified by emotional, it might be assumed that the modification is the same, but it is not because of the social cognitive context within which these terms are often used in K-12 education. The assumption is that teachers must have emotional intelligence to be effective. This is a reasonable assumption; however, when that is coupled with emotional labor, there is a tendency to require teachers to engage in emotional labor nearly all the time. The semantic use of the term emotional labor, then, is predicated on teachers always being expected or de facto required to continually use their emotional intelligence at a high level and with a very low error rate.

Belongingness is considered a component of emotional intelligence or, rather, emotional intelligence is like a skill that educators have in which they foster belonginess among their students. By extension, then, school administrators who have developed their emotional intelligence will support teachers so mitigate STS. Successfully mitigating STS can lower the risk of burnout [19, 42, 43]. This is part of the concept of emotional labor which is semantically tied to words such as satisfaction and burnout [17, 44, 45]. This is sometimes also semantically tied to the term public health which is tied semantically to mental health for teachers that is as important as mental health for students [46]. Educators are regularly the first adult authority figures in schools who are affected by student behavior and often placed in situations where they must evaluate students’ actions and what they say. Educators screen every day for student behavior that they must decide if it is something to refer to the school administrator or school mental health professional. Students may divulge sensitive information to their teachers that may further increase educator stress [18, 40].

There are substantial emotional labor expectations placed on teachers from within their microsystem and macrosystem contexts [17, 44]. During class and while at school, teachers are required to monitor all student behavior, detect patterns, screen for behavior issues, and refer to school administrators, as well as intervene if students are being disruptive. In a study of 193 elementary and secondary school teachers in 2020, McMahon and colleagues [46] noted multiple patterns in how teachers are expected to address student behavior, suggesting a complex emotional labor requirement on teachers that requires continual calibration in addition to their other responsibilities. In another study of teachers in the United States, Horner and colleagues [45] posited a new model of an emotional labor construct adapted from the other human service professions outside of education and from the business hospitality field. Their adapted, new model was constructed specifically for K-12 teachers. They stated: “We argue that the model we present is more appropriate for these applications than the model imported from the business literature because our model is tailored directly to the teaching profession, which has clear distinctions from business professions and from other ‘helping’ professions such as nursing” ([45], p. 7). They analyzed types of emotional labor that teachers must engage, including “feeling rules” (i.e., expectations of how someone should feel) and “display rules” (i.e., expectations for how someone at work should show or not show emotions), as well as linked concepts such as “emotional acting” expectations [45]. Navigating these processes individually and in a group are complex and mediated by cultures as well as various interpersonal perspectives. The researchers acknowledged previous studies that had “mixed feelings around the display of natural emotions” in emotional acting strategies, but they found: “Teachers also described using emotional acting strategies in relation to the goal of helping students develop their own emotion regulation skills, particularly in the social sense” ([45], p. 19). Teachers are observed for what they say and do not say, what they do and do not do while at school. Their responsibility for teaching and supporting their students’ social-emotional development is a continuous process.

In terms of avoiding burnout, Horner and colleagues further observed that “when teachers’ emotions do not meet these expectations, they may experience a sense of failure to authentically uphold the ethic of care” ([45], p. 25). The high expectations placed on teachers to perform authentic care on a consistent basis is substantial emotional labor that often is a requirement rather than expectation. It is important, according to these researchers, that preservice teachers are informed about the important role they have in their students’ social-emotional development. They concluded: “The emotional climate of schools inherently hinges on the ability of teachers to serve not only as content educators but also as facilitators of social and emotional development” ([45], p. 25). As such, teachers can quickly find themselves placed in the de facto role of counselor.

STS is an issue among school personnel that, according to some researchers, needs systematic study for the purpose of designing effective supports for teachers [47]. When considered as a public health issue, STS may be more systematically addressed by school districts so that school administrators and licensed mental health professionals might better coordinate more proactively rather than relying on reactive measures [47, 48]. This would require trauma-informed education so that teachers know current best practices within their school context [49, 50]. By providing proactive support for teachers, school administrators support the maintenance of emotional intelligence so that it can be reliably applied [18, 19]. In a 2017 study of teachers’ qualitative responses to a survey, McMahon and colleagues found that school administrators were a crucial component to teachers’ microsystem that directly affected teachers’ feelings and perception of efficacy which affected job-satisfaction and burnout [48]. The linkage between teacher labor and emotional intelligence has been summarized by Harvey and colleagues as “providing the foundation for teachers’ interpersonal attitudes toward, their liking, and caring for students, and their ability to provide a safe, secure social environment” ([51], p. 629). As such, teachers engage in emotional labor that exposes them to potentially to STS. With this perspective, Chafouleas and colleagues called for a proactive, systematic approach to trauma-informed practices in schools [52]. Coordinating licensed mental health professionals and school administrators in support of students by providing support for teachers is a piece of this puzzle to acknowledge the emotional labor of teachers and to support it in ways that lower the risk of burnout from STS [20, 53].

Systematic approach to trauma-informed practices that support teachers tend to be undermined when there is frequent turnover of school leadership. Teacher turnover tends to increase when school leader turnover increases [54]. This can disrupt the delicate system of support for teachers and, by extension, the supports for students. Their findings reinforce results from other studies in which emotion-regulation ability of teachers was positively correlated with supportive principals and related administrative support factors [55]. Such disruptions add further to the challenges some students face as well as those teachers who are at risk for STS that can lead to a negative feedback loop if there is insufficient support from administrators and school mental healthcare staff [56]. Collaboration between administrators, teachers, and licensed mental health professionals who have clearly defined roles and responsibilities is important in effective intervention [57].

A term that has increasingly been associated with trauma-informed practices is toxic stress, which can be linked to STS. These are semantically linked in discussing intervention practices. Toxic stress is defined as chronic or having acutely severe episodes that can cause substantial problems with an individual’s physiological or psychological health. Intervention in the microsystems of people is essential for increasing the likelihood of success in mitigating toxic stress [25, 58]. A group of researchers concluded that their “analysis shows that studies utilizing Bronfenbrenner’s ecological system concepts, by clearly considering interactions within and between different ecological systems, can come up with most useful recommendations for public mental health promotion and interventions” ([25], p. 429). When considering emotional intelligence from the context of MI theory, it is important that school administrators have a high level of emotional intelligence to support the teachers in their schools in coordinating with licensed mental health professionals to therapeutically assist students who have experienced ACEs that are affecting their behavior or belongingness in school [49]. Some students with ACEs might project their stress onto their teachers in what has been called psychological transference [59]. This could include aggressive verbal disrespect or even physical attacks against their teacher which substantially increases the risk of those teachers having STS. In a 2022 study of K-12 students in relation to aggression toward teachers, the researchers found that when students were aggressive toward a teacher this predicted higher self-reporting by teachers of feeling traumatized which led to self-reporting of lower job-satisfaction [60].

Having trauma-informed practices at each level of the ecological systems is important from a practitioner’s viewpoint in how the language of such practices is commonly understood. If there is semantic misalignment among stakeholders’ assumptions of those terms, that could lead to lower efficiency or effectiveness in addressing concerns. The screening and diagnostic instruments are components that should be intentionally integrated across systems [61]. Doing so might foster resilience [62]. Another group of researchers, Tebes and colleagues, argued for “infusing trauma-informed practice into everyday activities so it is a routine part of interpersonal transactions” ([62], p. 494). Similarly, Berardi and Morton noted in 2019: “We caution educators not to minimize the importance of developing trauma-informed competencies, and to name them as such. This includes continued discernment regarding implementation language sensitive to social context” ([63], p. xi). That sensitivity to social context is part of emotional intelligence.

4. Semantic use of emotional intelligence with emotional labor in context with ecological systems theory to address risk for STS

4.1 Semantic link of compassion to emotional intelligence in expectations on teachers

Part of the modern concept of emotional intelligence is now increasingly influenced by artificial intelligence (AI) and how it might be used to support decision processes [64]. This is important because these are rooted in large-language models. Such models use the predominant semantic assumptions of the day, usually. These use algorithms that are embedded in more educational software being used in schools. In theory, this can help lower the stress burden on teachers by “sharing” the decision-making process. However, this is inconclusive with many examples of how such reliance could cause problems. Nevertheless, a well-designed and implemented AI can offer some assistance in lowering teachers’ stress levels. Such processes may be used to address mental health in schools. This remains to be seen, but it is important to mention. AI programs could be used to inform and support decisions by both licensed mental health professionals and by classroom educators, especially if doing so might increase efficiency in supporting teachers [65]. Regardless of whether AI is used or not in supporting emotional labor, there will remain the human support element in which school administrators play a key role. According to Ormiston and colleagues, “to mitigate the effects of student trauma on teachers, we can provide training in pre-service teacher programs, provide professional development, lessen teacher’s workload, create trauma-informed schools, and hire more mental health providers who can serve students and provide guidance and consultation for teachers” ([20], p. 815). But where staffing ratios do not meet the need, AI might play a larger role in the future.

Compassion is viewed as a part of emotional intelligence. The two terms are semantically linked. In the social context of teachers, it is assumed that to have emotional intelligence is also to have a demonstrated level of compassion. When a teacher’s microsystem is not receiving adequate support, a group of researchers observed that teachers who are experiencing STS can quickly exhibit “compassion fatigue” ([20], p. 803). Compassion fatigue (CF) is defined by Cieslak and colleagues as: “a reduced empathic capacity or client interest manifested through behavioral and emotional reactions from exposure to traumatizing experiences of others” ([66], p. 76). Ormiston and colleagues summarize the implication for teachers: “This means caring for children with trauma histories—and bearing witness to the behavioral, socioemotional, and academic cost of being victims of trauma—which can lead to higher rates of CF” ([20], p. 803). It can also include teaching students who exhibit maladaptive behaviors and/or are disrespectful toward the teacher. In a study of 150 teachers, Simon and colleagues found in 2022: “Results from multi-level structural equation modeling indicated that, as hypothesized, teacher STS symptoms were positively associated with their ratings of students’ socio-emotional difficulties (β = .28, p < .01) such that as teacher symptomology increased, so did the level of student difficulties reported” ([23], p. 213). STS affecting the emotional labor of the helping professions—such as teachers—tends to require multiple modes of systematic support to reduce the risk of STS occurring or mitigating STS if it is already being experienced [20, 23, 67, 68].

There are few studies that empirically test interventions that are aimed at supporting teachers in their emotional labor where variables identified are STS and compassion fatigue. One such study by Halamová and colleagues in 2022 tested an emotion-focused training for helping professionals (EFT-HP) online module. 22.6% of their participants were educators. Halamová and colleagues found:

“participants’ lives showed significant improvements after only a 14-day online intervention. This is very important as a time efficient intervention that can be delivered without direct contact with mental health professionals and managed by the participant to some degree might prove to be a good alternative for helping professionals who are often overworked and under great pressure” ([67], pp. 13–14).

They also found:

“Compared to the control group, the experimental group participants had significantly lower scores of secondary traumatic stress, burnout, self-criticism, and higher scores of self-compassion after the intervention. No significant changes were found for the control group, except a significant increase in time in the reported score for one dimension of burnout—exhaustion” ([67], p. 1).

Taylor and colleagues in 2021 made similar observations in their study of a brief mindfulness-based intervention (bMBI) module for teachers. These findings set the stage for additional research that designs and test support intervention strategies [69]. The EFT-HP and bMBI examples substantiate the proactive support model for teachers and are in parallel with data-based support models used for children and adolescents. The behavioral measures in the Brown parent scale, for example, according to Leisman and colleagues:

“demonstrated that a significant number of children in the treatment group no longer met the diagnostic criteria for ADD/ADHD after the 12-week intervention, while the control group did not demonstrate a significant change and actually demonstrated a decreased performance on the Brown scale (BADD) associated that is reflective of an increase in the reported symptoms of ADD/ADHD relative to the treatment group” ([70], p. 6).

These studies provide a basis for addressing STS as a public health issue that can be mitigated through proactive interdisciplinary support programs [60]. Systematic programs are needed to assist teachers in their emotional labor. More research is needed to design and test trauma-informed support programs that may be implemented school-wide [30, 71].

A study in Australia demonstrated that training programs in trauma-informed education for general education teachers tended to increase teachers’ self-reporting of more confidence—or less indecision—in how to respond to students who have experienced trauma that may have been affecting their behavior in school [72]. More training in trauma-informed practices is needed in K-12 school administrator preparation programs as well as a concerted effort among school districts to support coordination between school administrators, licensed mental health professionals, and teachers. In doing so, both teachers and students may have more proactive strategies in implementing an “ethic of care” that Berardi and Morton summarized as “ultimately a commitment to being in community in a manner that provides a welcome and inclusive environment fostering relational safety and well-being” ([63], p. 104). When each stakeholder is engaged in this ethic of care, or at least knowledgeable about it, a more supportive environment in the school may be achieved and maintained.

Adverse childhood experiences (ACEs), as a concept, has semantic implications that have evolved during the past decade. According to Portwood, the definition of ACEs has included various forms of physical and emotional abuse and neglect, and “more recently, other events, including poverty, bullying, exposure to community violence and discrimination have been conceptualized as ACEs” (para. 1) [73]. ACEs tend to increase the risk of negative health outcomes in adulthood and, as such, should be viewed as developmental issues [58, 74]. Studies have provided evidence that ACEs affect the brain, especially the hippocampus and the amygdala [75]. According to Shonkoff and colleagues, an ecobiodevelopmental framework for understanding toxic stress suggests “that many adult diseases should be viewed as developmental disorders that begin early in life and that persistent health disparities associated with poverty, discrimination, or maltreatment could be reduced by the alleviation of toxic stress in childhood” ([58], p. e232). Likewise, Herzog and Schmahl concluded: “Individuals with ACE seem to be at higher risk for the development of mental and somatic disorders throughout the lifespan” ([75], p. 2). These studies establish the context for how STS can affect teachers.

When a student divulges experiencing an ACE, or behavior is being affected by an ACE, or discusses their stress with their teacher, especially when done multiple times or from multiple students over time, this places the teacher at risk for STS. Expectations on teachers to perform emotional labor in support of students can be especially pronounced when staffing ratios do not provide readily accessible licensed mental health professionals for students [76]. When there are few licensed mental health professionals such as licensed school counselors, social workers, or school psychologists, the gap is filled by students’ classroom teachers which shifts more expectations on teachers to perform additional emotional labor. As a crucial component of students’ microsystem, teachers should have ready access to licensed mental health professionals to whom students may be referred for both the benefit of the student and to lower the risk of STS for teachers.

4.2 When emotional intelligence as labor is semantically linked to teachers’ expanding role in supporting student mental wellbeing

Teachers may be placed in uncomfortable situations by the nature of their role in students’ microsystem as functionally de facto mental health intake assessors [1, 63]. This shift in emotional labor increasing for teachers needs additional study for practical solutions to assist preservice and in-service teachers [49, 50]. Some states in the United States, such as Tennessee, with the Literacy Success Act of 2021, require competencies in trauma-informed practices for K-3 general education teachers [77]. This may be the scenario regardless of staffing ratios, but it is especially apparent when the number of licensed mental health professionals who are available in schools is below recommended minimums [76]. This context has led to calls for trauma-informed literacy [23, 49]. Although teachers will refer students to a licensed mental health professional in the school or district, the teacher still listens to the student’s situation and must report to administration and follow up with the school counselor. Temporal proximity and student familiarity with their teachers makes it more likely that students will discuss their stress or behave in ways that requires the teacher to assess for mental health, especially if it affects the classroom learning environment. This perspective suggests the importance of bridging an individual’s microsystem with the exosystem. In other words, the teacher needs support from their school administrators, licensed mental health professionals, and the district administration to efficiently support prosocial development among the children in their school who are at risk of maladaptive behavior and academic failure.

Addressing worker risk of STS within and across community service professions should be proactive [74]. In the context of K-12 education, this is important when considering the number of youth who have ACEs. For example, according to a study by Duke and colleagues: 136,549 students in grades 6, 9, and 12 completed the 2007 Minnesota Student Survey in which 28.9% reported at least one ACE [78]. In another study, Jimenez and colleagues found in 2016 that 55% percent of the study’s sample of 1,007 children had experienced one ACE [79]. Teachers may be at especially high risk for STS when students have experienced or are experiencing ACEs. In a meta-analysis of studies researching the relationship between ACEs and psychological resilience among children, Morgan and colleagues in 2022 found that those “who experienced an ACE were 63% less likely to display high resilience, in comparison to subjects without such experiences” ([80], p. 1). This affects those students’ academic performance and can, by extension, have what Lawson and colleagues (2019) identified as “spill-over effects” of increasing teachers’ stress and adversely affecting the school community overall. Lawson and colleagues observed in 2019: “Undesirable effects of STS start with professional disengagement and declining performance, include spill-over effects into educators’ personal lives, and, ultimately, may cause them to leave the profession” ([68], p. 421). If teachers are not supported by administrators and licensed mental health professionals as a team effort to provide supports for students with ACEs, it might cause a feedback loop of higher incidences of teacher attrition and turnover which might cause gaps in care for at-risk students. Teachers who have a supportive administration are more likely to have higher morale [81].

A teacher’s emotional intelligence has become a factor of increasing focus recently in relation to their perceived skills in being able to be part of a support team for students who may be experiencing latent effects of ACEs. If ACEs are present in a child’s microsystem (e.g., their families), that will have indirect—and potentially direct—effects on the rest of their microsystem, mesosystem, and exosystem (e.g., their school community of teachers, other children in their school, etc.). According to Ballard and colleagues: “Classes of childhood traumatic experiences predict specific psychiatric and behavioral outcomes in adolescence and young adulthood” ([82], p. 3305). Jimenez and colleagues concluded in their study of ACEs in early childhood that children who had ACEs were statistically associated with teacher-reported, below-average academic and literacy skills in addition to behavior problems in kindergarten [79]. This affects teachers who may sometimes or often times be placed in situations of deciding how to provide emotional support or if the curriculum should or should not be modified. This has cumulative effects on teacher stress levels.

A new term entered the lexicon of cultural psychologists to refer to an individual’s social standing within a group. The new term was “psychological capital” [17]. This term can be semantically linked to emotional intelligence in that teachers must have an active awareness of their standing with stakeholders to indicate that they have high levels of emotional intelligence as evidenced by good performance evaluations. Lower psychological capital generally results in lower job satisfaction [17]. Lower job satisfaction tends to lead to more turnover and increases the likelihood of teachers leaving the profession. For example, this phenomenon can be observed in Fortin and Fawcett’s reporting in 2022 and Perna’s reporting in 2022 and in studies of teacher attrition [1, 3, 6, 21]. Psychological capital may be increased or stabilized among teachers when there are clearly defined roles and proactive availability of licensed mental health professionals, such as counselors, in their school so that teachers may be more likely to feel supported in addressing the needs of their students [57].

In an unusual study of the concept of psychological transference, Boulanger concluded in 2018 that another new term called “vicarious trauma” had emerged within the lexicon of mental health professionals when working with individuals who experienced traumatic events can be a therapeutic tool if applied within carefully structured clinical contexts [59]. This term is semantically linked to the phrase “trauma is contagious” ([59], p. 60). This assumption asserts a foundational variable to consider when designing ways to mitigate psychic contagion. As such, the contextual semantics of these terms reinforce each other to emphasize the reification of teachers’ emotional labor. They are tacitly expected to have advanced emotional intelligence to know when and how to engage in this emotional support labor on behalf of the students and their families [44]. Designing support with this in mind to mitigate teachers’ risk for STS is important for school administration in trying to prevent burnout [42, 43, 44, 55, 56]. STS is a condition of psychological transference that Boulanger called vicarious trauma [59]. As such, designing countertransference routines for teachers would seem to be an important concept and skill to teach K-12 school administrators and school counselors in how to assist teachers in working with students who have experienced ACEs. This requires mental health professionals to be actively engaged and available to administrators and teachers for supporting their work with students and their families.

According to Boulanger, “Sometimes vicarious trauma is experienced as a form of psychic contagion, unwelcome and unintentional. Only in acknowledging the contagion can clinicians begin to work through their patients’ traumatic experiences” ([59], p. 67). This is key, because it is a primary responsibility of mental health clinicians—not teachers—to assist students who have experienced trauma such as ACEs. Nevertheless, as several studies have demonstrated, part of the reality is that students experiencing ACEs may rely in part on teachers for initial discussion of their situation which may tend to place teachers in a de facto assistive role to the mental health professionals for initial screening and even observation as students are in class regularly [45, 50]. This is more support for the calls to increase collaboration between K-12 school administrators, school mental health professionals, teachers, and students’ families [49, 57, 83]. The students’ microsystems, mesosystems, and exosystems are intrinsically linked, and so the importance of collaboration is essential in addressing psychic contagion, especially from a semantic perspective. The way words are used in relation to intense emotional experiences affects perception and the ways in which intensity can be mitigated and channeled into productivity.

When considering how the word stress—as in emotional distress—and STS are used among teachers and school administrators in comparison to how other stakeholders in education use those words, there should be considerable overlap and consistency. Relatedly, emergency preparedness or emergency response, the social cognitive context is one that is likely high in emotional distress. STS can emerge in these situations over time, but how emotional stress is discussed is relative to the culture within which it occurs. This goes back to the Sapir-Whorf hypothesis in linguistic relativity theory [84], in which questions such as this are asked: “Does our understanding of things shape and change our language or does our language shapes our understanding of things?” [85]. Local culture affects perceptions of EI, perceptions of how emotional stress affects teachers, and opinions on how teachers should address emotional stress with school administrators or whether they should at all. Local school culture, then, affects the social cognitive meaning of stress, as interpreted by stakeholders, and what it means in terms of expectations on, of, and for teachers, as well as how stakeholders perceive their roles [2, 5].

Differences may be seen across countries or even between districts within the same country in how stress or STS is conceptualized and used similarly or differently by teachers, administrators, and students’ families. Given different perceptions based on level of exposure to stress, a teacher might have a different view of their risk for STS compared to how a students’ family or a school administrator might perceive that teacher’s risk level—if it is considered at all. The point here is that these words have emotional meaning because a teacher’s role is, among many other things, one of emotional labor in addition to teaching. The word stress, as an emotional concept, and the term STS have emotional meanings that may not always have the same interpretation from each stakeholder in the school community. Perlovksy stated that there are “‘conceptual’ pragmatic cultures in which emotionality of language is reduced and differentiation overtakes synthesis resulting in fast evolution at the price of uncertainty of values, self doubts, and internal crises” ([86], p. 518). Given this observation of what Perlovsky called an “emotional version” of the Sapir-Whorf hypothesis [86], it can be adapted for application as a conceptual framework for studies of teachers’ emotional labor and the related idea of emotional intelligence.

It is important to note that this conclusion is a modification of the Sapir-Whorf hypothesis in that the emotions of words may differ within the same cultural linguistic context without claiming there are any differences in thinking across languages. This is important also because the Sapir-Whorf hypothesis has been criticized for its initially narrow conceptual framing of its theorization of the potential effects of language on a person’s thinking. This applies in this discussion because the semantic uses of terms such as stress, STS, emotional labor, and emotional intelligence within the English language can have different impact on individuals based on their individual psychological experiences. It is assumed in this discussion that an individual’s primary language has no effect on that individual’s thinking. In other words, the assumption here is that the word stress—as in emotional distress—has the same meaning across all languages. This is different than the original Sapir-Whorf hypothesis, though it has been updated more recently [87]. Future research could test this by studying perceptions of stress and STS among teachers across linguistic groups.

4.3 Speech-language pathologists are essential in supporting primary school teachers

What has not been mentioned previously and that this study now highlights is the importance of speech-language pathologists and speech-language therapists for primary schools. These specialists should be part of the collaborative teams for teachers to consult because they can help with students’ emotional intelligence development with general education teachers by providing their expertise in supporting students’ literacy. Education is largely based on language, so speech-language pathologists are essential for schools [88]. This is especially important for those students whose language development may be affected by latent effects of ACEs [53]. When considering the Sapir-Whorf hypothesis [84] in its modified emotional version [86], it might offer a conceptual framework to exploring the concept of the semantic uses of emotional intelligence and its related vocabulary in research studies. The social cognitive context of teachers’ emotional labor comes into focus as increasingly important. Students’ perception of teachers’ emotional labor has also been noted as an important factor [89]. The ways in which these terms are used in educator preparation programs and in schools affect the ways in which stakeholders address teacher roles. It is when expectations are out of alignment that problems can emerge; therefore, aligning expectations to the meaning of these concepts is essential. Speech-language pathologists can be a part of this process with their expertise in communication development to align expectations among stakeholders.

Cross-cultural study of stress and STS among teachers and school administrators is an area in need of additional research. How the word stress and term STS are conceptualized may be influenced by stakeholders’ relative position in the discussion as they may have different levels of knowledge of what terms such as STS, EI, and EL mean and what the effects of stress or STS might be based on that knowledge or stakeholder interest. Speech-language pathologists informed in psycholinguistics can have an important role in supporting school administrators, students, students’ families, and general education teachers. This is especially important for general education teachers in using literacy-informed approaches to content area instruction. Having consistent understanding of vocabulary is essential for cross-cultural communication as well as for internal consistency within a given language when used in schools. Language development is a central role of the school and should be in alignment with the developmental process [90, 91].

Cross-cultural communication is essential at many schools. If not directly stated, it is inferred through the content area literacy requirements in primary school and the requirement in many secondary schools to take modern language courses and a second language. It is an important skill that depends on advanced language skills that must be practiced. Cross-cultural competency can lower stress because teachers have more communication tools [84, 91]. A student may further develop their emotional intelligence by learning a second language. The level of proficiency in a second language should ideally have the goal to achieve advanced “C” level on the CEFR (Common European Framework of Reference) Scale; though beginning “A1” level may be enough to initiate growth in EI. This will be helpful should they decide to become a teacher as this will give additional understanding as they enter their educator preparation program. Reviews of the semantic uses of MI theory provide important insights into trends in the field that can inform research studies [92].

An additional implication for future research of this conceptual review of the semantic use of emotional intelligence within a social cognitive context with EST is to expand on studies of preservice teacher perceptions of emotional labor and what they believe the expectations are for them in how to apply their emotional intelligence and how to measure that concept. For example, in a previous study of preservice elementary school teachers’ semantic approach to responding to survey questions about their efficacy with the arts, this researcher performed a discourse analysis evaluating participants’ use of grammatical person; if the participant used the first-person there was the suggestion that it inferred higher levels of self-efficacy than if the participant deflected with a third-person response [93]. The methodology in that study could be applied to designing a study on preservice teacher perceptions of the semantic uses of emotional intelligence and emotional labor as they individually perceive those concepts and how they believe other school stakeholders perceive those concepts in their expectations of teachers’ role in supporting students’ social development.

5. Conclusion

Emotional intelligence, when viewed through the lens of EST, is especially important at the microsystem level in the teaching profession. This concept has tended to be semantically linked to an assumption of the emotional labor in the K-12 teaching profession being always a given. It is also important at every other system level, but the microsystem is the area in which people have the most daily interaction. Coordination between the system levels from microsystem to exosystem and beyond is important for school administrators in supporting teachers to mitigate STS. When STS is not effectively addressed it can lead to compassion fatigue and, as such, is a public health issue affecting schools. Part of this process is school administrators acknowledging teachers’ emotional labor and finding ways to increase the efficiency of collaboration between themselves, the teachers, and the licensed mental health professionals so that they may collectively address the needs of students while also mitigating STS. As such, the semantics of these terms matter. If a school stakeholder does not have the same definition of EI that another school stakeholder does, this can cause misalignment of priorities and potentially increase risk of STS and burnout among teachers who are at the forefront of emotional labor in schools. To assist in conceptualizing the semantic use of EI and emotional labor, Bronfenbrenner’s EST can be used to situate teachers’ experiences in the impact of the microsystem, mesosystem, and macrosystem levels that affect perception. Additional research is needed on designing and testing proactive support programs for teachers and students to mitigate STS in coordination with language learning specialists, especially speech-language pathologists. Research from multiple vantage points would advance understanding on the influence of the semantic use of emotional labor and how changing semantic use of the terms might influence stakeholders’ expectations placed on teachers.

Conflict of interest

The author declares no conflict of interest.

Nomenclature

MI	multiple intelligences theory
STS	secondary traumatic stress
EI	emotional intelligence
EL	emotional labor
ACEs	adverse childhood experiences
EST	ecological systems theory