Reappraising emotions towards teachers: the role of emotion differentiation in students

Research in educational psychology has extensively explored emotion regulation in both students and teachers. However, the specific domain of students' cognitive reappraisal (CR) of emotions related to their teachers – and the influence of emotion differentiation on this process – has received limited attention. To address this gap, this study involved 61 participants who completed an emotion differentiation assessment followed by a CR task. The results showed that students primarily used situation-focused reappraisal strategies to either reduce negative emotions (Study 1) or enhance positive emotions (Study 2) towards their teachers. Importantly, differences in emotion differentiation were strongly associated with the fluency and flexibility of reappraisal strategies employed, with higher differentiation associated with better reappraisal abilities. These findings offer new insights into CR and inform interventions to enhance students' reappraisal skills.