Linking Teachers’ Student-Oriented Goals to Their Emotions in Mathematics Classrooms: The Mediation of Personal Achievement Goals

The appraisal theories of emotions and existing studies have indicated the relationships between emotions and goals. However, little research has investigated the role of teachers’ student-oriented goals for their emotions. This study examined how teachers’ teaching-related emotions relate to their student-oriented goals directly or indirectly through personal achievement goals. A sample of 676 senior secondary mathematics teachers in China (78.6% were female, 56.2% were more than 41 years old, and 64.3% had 15-year or above teaching experiences) voluntarily completed an online questionnaire, and confirmatory factor analysis and structural equation modeling were performed to analyze the data. The results showed that teachers’ student-oriented mastery goals were positive predictors of their enjoyment/satisfaction and negative predictors of anger/anxiety. By contrast, teachers’ student-oriented performance goals predicted their enjoyment negatively and anger/anxiety positively. The indirect effects of student-oriented goals on teacher emotions through personal achievement goals were also significant. This study specifies the mechanisms underlying the relationships between teachers’ goals and emotions, substantiating and advancing the existing theories and the reciprocal model of teacher emotions.