Soc Psychol Educ (2016) 19:451–473

DOI 10.1007/s11218-016-9335-0

How does it feel to become a teacher? Emotions

in teacher education

Henrika Anttila1 • Kirsi Pyhältö2,3 • Tiina Soini4 •

Janne Pietarinen5

Received: 6 May 2015 / Accepted: 31 January 2016 / Published online: 9 May 2016
 Springer Science+Business Media Dordrecht 2016

Abstract Academic emotions are central ingredients in student teachers’ learning.

They have been shown to affect cognitive performance, motivation and achievement
(e.g. Linnenbrink-Garcia et al. in Contemp Educ Psychol 36(1):13–24, 2011).
However, until recently the role of emotions in student teachers’ learning has largely
been neglected (e.g. Ketonen and Lonka in Proc Soc Behav Sci 69(24):1901–1910,
2012). The study focused on exploring the spectrum of academic emotions experi-
enced by 19 student teachers in different academic activities. The results showed that
student teachers experience a wide variety of emotions during their studies. A total of
18 different positive emotions and 20 different negative emotions were reported. They
explicated more positive than negative emotions. Further investigations showed that
student teachers reported more emotional experiences embedded in individual

& Henrika Anttila

henrika.anttila@gmail.com
Kirsi Pyhältö
kirsi.pyhalto@helsinki.fi
Tiina Soini
tiina.soini@uta.fi
Janne Pietarinen
janne.pietarinen@uef.fi
1
Department of Behavioural Sciences, University of Helsinki, P.O. Box 9, Siltavuorenpenger
1A, 00014 Helsinki, Finland
2
Faculty of Educational Sciences, University of Oulu, Yliopistonkatu 9, 90014 Oulu, Finland
3
Faculty of Behavioural Sciences, University of Helsinki, P.O. Box 9, Siltavuorenpenger 5A,
00014 Helsinki, Finland
4
School of Education, University of Tampere, Virta (Åkerlundinkatu 5), 33014 Tampere,
Finland
5
School of Applied Educational Science and Teacher Education, University of Eastern Finland,
P.O. Box 111, Yliopistokatu 2, 80101 Joensuu, Finland

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activities than in social activities. The results implied that the spectrum of academic
emotions experienced by student teachers is wider than previous literature suggests,
and that student teachers experience a wide range of academic emotions in various
academic activities provided by teacher education.

Keywords Academic emotion
Student teacher
Teacher education

1 Introduction

Academic emotions are central ingredients in the education of student teachers.

They have been shown to affect such things as cognitive performance, motivation,
achievement and decision-making as well as problem-solving (Damassio 1994;
Hannula 2012; Lewis et al. 2011; Linnenbrink-Garcia et al. 2011). However, until
recently the role of academic emotions in teacher education has generally been
neglected (e.g. Ketonen and Lonka 2012). The few studies on the academic
emotions of student teachers have explored the connection between emotions and
learning strategies (Wittmann 2011) or emotions and learning outcomes, such as
course grades (Ketonen and Lonka 2012). There is thus a large gap in the literature,
indicating insufficient understanding of academic emotions in various kinds of
academic activities (Hannula 2011; Linnenbrink-Garcia and Pekrun 2011) and
pointing to a lack of studies on the academic emotions of student teachers
(Wittmann 2011), as well as a low number of qualitative studies on academic
emotions (Pekrun and Schutz 2007; Rowe et al. 2015).
Teachers’ work is emotionally challenging, because it involves complex long-
term interactions and social problem-solving. Emotions have been shown to affect
teachers’ cognition, motivation and their approaches to teaching (Sutton and
Wheatley 2003). Furthermore, there is an interactive relationship between teachers’
and students’ emotions, and students are often aware and influenced by teachers’
emotions (Postareff and Lindblom-Ylänne 2011; Sutton and Wheatley 2003). As a
result, it is important to understand future teachers’ emotions, because emotions
experienced while learning to become a teacher are likely to reflect not only on their
learning during the teacher education, but also on their experiences as in-service
teachers (e.g. Eren 2013; Rowe et al. 2015).
Moreover, studying Finnish student teacher’s academic emotions provides
unique insights into the emotional landscape of an elite group of higher education
students. In Finland, teacher education is organised by universities, and all
comprehensive school teachers must have a master’s degree. The teaching
profession is highly valued and teacher education has become more and more
popular in the last couple of years (Kumpulainen 2014). Student teachers are a
highly selected group based on their prior academic records. Only 6 % of applicants
are admitted to the teacher education programme at the University of Helsinki each
year (University of Helsinki 2013). Accordingly, in Finland it is harder to get into
teacher education than it is to study medicine, law or economics.
In order to gain a better understanding of student teachers’ (pre-service teachers,
undertaking a 5-year long master’s programme in a Finnish university) academic

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emotions, the present study focuses on exploring: (1) what kinds of academic
emotions student teachers experience during their study path, (2) what kinds of
emotions student teachers experience in individual and collaborative settings, and
(3) how student teachers’ academic emotions are related to various activities that are
part of teacher education. The goal is to identify the emotional landscape of student
teachers and provide tools with which to develop inspiring learning environments.

2 Theoretical framework

2.1 Academic emotions

Emotions are defined as intense, short-lived active states that arise in response to
particular stimuli (e.g. Do and Schallert 2004). In contrast to moods, emotions are
dependent on the object of activity (Schutz et al. 2006). It has been suggested that
emotions are socially constructed and personally enacted ways of being that emerge
from conscious and/or unconscious judgements regarding perceived success in
attaining a goal, or in maintaining standards during transactions (Schutz et al. 2006).
An emotional experience also entails a bodily reaction and an evaluative response to
the stimuli (Baumeister and Bushman 2007). The term academic emotions, on the
other hand, refers to a set of emotions experienced in academic activities, typically
in studying, teaching and learning (Pekrun et al. 2002). Previous research on
academic emotions has focused heavily on how and why these emotions emerge,
their role in shaping students’ engagement and achievement, and on individuals’
regulation of emotional resources (Linnenbrink-Garcia and Pekrun 2011).
The majority of studies on academic emotions have focused on exploring test-
related emotions, typically test anxiety (e.g. Mandler and Sarson 1952; Stough and
Emmer 1998). Pride, shame, hope and fear have also been frequently reported in
relation to academic activities (Pekrun et al. 2002). The scope of students’ academic
emotions reported in the literature is still quite limited and there are some
indications that students’ emotional experiences in academic activities are likely to
be richer than prior studies have suggested (Pekrun 2005). Loneliness, for example,
is also likely to be experienced in academic settings, although it has not been
reported in previous studies on academic emotions among higher education
students. This spectrum of academic emotions may also include enjoyment, relief,
anger, hopelessness, boredom, satisfaction, gratitude, admiration, scorn and envy
(Pekrun 2005). Self- and task-orientated emotions, social and any kind of discrete
emotions can also be considered part of academic emotions (Pekrun 2005).
Academic emotions are often explored in terms of two basic dimensions of
emotional experience: the valence (positive vs. negative emotions) and the arousal
(activating/neutral/deactivating) of the emotion (Barrett and Russell 1998; Kleine,
Goetz, Pekrun and Hall 2005). Enjoyment, hope and pride have been classified as
positive emotions, whereas anxiety, anger and boredom are typically perceived as
negative (Goetz et al. 2007). On the other hand, arousal, sometimes referred to as
activity (i.e. Pekrun et al. 2002) is unipolar in nature and refers to mobilisation and
energy, or to the intensity of the physiological emotional reaction (Barrett and

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Russell 1998; Kleine et al. 2005). Enjoyment and anger, for example, are typically
believed to cause high levels of arousal (Kleine et al. 2005). By contrast, relief and
boredom are typically perceived as deactivating, because they reduce tension and
have a low arousal level (Kleine et al. 2005). Furthermore, some emotions, such as
happiness and sadness, are referred to as neutral and are not particularly activating
or deactivating (Linnenbrink 2007).
Valence and arousal are shown to have specific effects on learning, especially
achievement. Negative emotional experiences have been reported to reduce
academic performance, because they decrease motivation and may direct attention
away from a task (Lewis et al. 2011). Further, Blair (2002) has argued that negative
emotions such as anger affect cognitive process, and therefore reduce academic
achievement. Lack of interest has also been shown to be a central predictor of
student dropout (Mäkinen et al. 2004). There may be different reasons for lack of
interest, such as boredom, which has been reported to be extremely detrimental to
learning and motivation (Goetz et al. 2014; Pekrun et al. 2002).
Positive emotions in turn have been associated with the use of more effective
learning strategies and academic performance (Ruthig et al. 2007; Trigwell, Ellis and
Han 2012). For example, enjoyment of learning has been associated with increased
academic motivation (Pekrun et al. 2002). Moreover, positive emotions such as joy,
hope and pride have been shown to correlate positively with students’ academic self-
efficacy and interest (Pekrun et al. 2002). Interest is likely to help students maintain
their focus and perform better (Valiente et al. 2012). Furthermore, students who
experience pride in their achievements have been found to be more likely to succeed
in those subjects later on in their academic lives (Frenzel et al. 2007a). Positive
emotions have also been shown to increase social interaction (Lyubomirsky et al.
2005), to make individuals think and act differently by increasing creativity
(Fredrickson 2001), and to affect academic progress (Trigwell et al. 2012).
Positive emotions do not, however, automatically result in positive learning
outcomes or vice versa. The effect of both positive deactivating emotions (relief,
contentment) and negative activating ones (anger, anxiety, shame) may be
equivocal. While positive deactivating emotions may hinder performance, negative
activating emotions may be beneficial for achievement (Pekrun et al. 2002).
Previous research also suggests that a balance of both high and low positive arousal
states are needed in a successful learning process (Rowe et al. 2015).
It has been argued that students’ academic emotions are related to the task at
hand and to their ability to master the task (Delle Fave and Massimini 2005). This
indicates that academic emotions are at least to some extent domain-specific (Goetz
et al. 2006). Accordingly, learning in different domains may lead to different
emotions, such as enjoyment or boredom, which may be repeatedly experienced in
studying maths or literature, for example (Goetz et al. 2007). It has been shown that
female students in particular experience less enjoyment and pride, but more
inefficacy and anxiety during mathematics lectures (Frenzel et al. 2007b; Frost et al.
1994; Hannula 2011). This relationship between the task and the emotions
experienced, however, seems to be stronger in some domains, such as mathematics,
and less consistent in other domains, such as language, where a student may enjoy
reading literature but becomes anxious when analysing poetry (Goetz et al. 2007).

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Many researchers have agreed that emotions are formed at the interface of
personal and social aspects of learning (e.g. Ainley and Hidi 2002; Järvenoja and
Järvelä 2009; Schutz et al. 2006; Volet and Järvelä 2001). Moreover, emotions
themselves can be collective, i.e. they occur among members of a group and are
shared by them (Goetz et al. 2003). Group work can, for example, create positive
emotions and support group members’ motivation (Jones and Isroff 2005; Järvenoja
and Järvelä 2013). However, group situations can also arouse negative emotions if
group members’ personal demands or goals conflict and thus may lead to
demotivation or even withdrawal (Järvelä et al. 2000; Järvenoja and Järvelä 2013).
Pekrun et al. (2002) have suggested that students experience positive emotions as
often as negative ones. However, negative emotions have more often been the focus
of the studies (Valiente et al. 2012). The reason for this might be that there are fewer
positive emotions than negative ones: more specifically, some studies have stated
that there is approximately one positive emotion for every three negative emotions
(Ellsworth and Smith 1988). Another reason might be that some emotions can be
explicated more easily than others. Positive emotions are often more difficult to
distinguish. For example, Ekman (1992) has suggested that positive emotions do not
have unique facial signatures. The identification of different emotions is also
difficult because they are always socially and culturally constructed (i.e. emotions
are highly situational) and thus cannot be separated from the context in which they
are embedded (Averill 1980).

2.2 Academic emotions in studying to become a teacher

Teacher education provides the primary learning environment for student teachers.
Teacher education is not a single entity: instead, it provides a wide variety of
practices for student teachers to participate in. Different practices provided by
teacher education might evoke different emotions in student teachers, including
encounters with pupils or teacher-educators, undertaking tasks, writing exams or
attending classes (e.g. Caires and Almeida 2007; Ketonen and Lonka 2012;
Litmanen et al. 2012; Timoštšuk and Ugaste 2012). However, empirical evidence on
the spectrum of emotions experienced by student teachers and the context of their
experience remains scarce (Eren 2013). Previous studies have suggested that
teaching practice is the most significant part of teacher education affecting student
teachers’ personal and professional development (Malderez et al. 2007; Timoštšuk
and Ugaste 2012; Yeung and Watkins 2000). Timoštšuk and Ugaste (2012) found
that student teachers experience both positive and negative emotions during
teaching experiences, and that these emotions are related to high expectations of the
teaching practice. Most of the positive emotions that student teachers experienced
were related to the pupils in teaching practice, where they experienced joy when
interacting with pupils, appreciation of their relationship with the pupils, and
excitement when they saw changes in their pupils’ skills, for example (Timoštšuk
and Ugaste 2012). On the other hand, student teachers’ strong negative emotions
have been shown to be related to teacher-educators both in university and in training
schools. However, in other studies student teachers have reported satisfaction
towards their teacher training supervision (Caires and Almeida 2007).

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Previous studies of student teachers’ academic emotions have shown that

disappointment and anxiety were seen as the most prevailing emotions experienced
by student teachers (Poulou 2007; Timoštšuk and Ugaste 2012). Moreover, Ketonen
and Lonka (2012) showed that negative emotions such as anxiety were related to
lower achievement in lecture courses among student teachers. However, it has been
shown that even being slightly anxious appears to be better for learning than being
carefree or completely unstressed (Ketonen and Lonka 2012). According to
Litmanen et al. (2012), motivational states as high as flow experiences might be
almost impossible to attain without some experiences of anxiety as well. Litmanen
et al. (2012) found that student teachers experienced more negative emotions when
studying in inquiry-based settings than in teacher-centred settings. Furthermore,
they reported that they were also more challenged in inquiry-based settings. Inkinen
et al. (2013), on the other hand, found that when challenges and skills were both at
high levels and in balance, the emotional experiences of student teachers were both
positive and activating.
Timoštšuk and Ugaste (2012) also noted that student teachers’ emotions play an
important role in social learning and development of professional identity. For
instance, many early career teachers experience an ‘emotionally loaded reality
shock’ when they enter the profession (e.g. Veenman 1984; Kim and Cho 2014).
These emotionally challenging learning experiences regulate early career teachers’
considerations of changing the profession (Heikonen et al. in press; Hong 2012). As
a result, it may be argued that experienced positive and negative emotions during
teacher education are indicative to the early career teachers’ perceived success in
their work. Previous studies suggest that positive emotions are related to the
generation of more ideas and strategies that can help teachers to create a broad range
of different coping and problem-solving skills (Sutton and Wheatley 2003) in their
everyday work. In addition, teachers’ positive emotions have shown to be connected
to setting more ambitious goals for their own teaching as well as setting challenging
learning objectives for their students (Sutton and Wheatley 2003). Accordingly, the
positive emotions adopted by teachers seem to be intertwined with learning
activities that are beneficial for further professional development. This indicates that
student teachers’ academic emotions are highly embedded in social interactions
provided by teacher education, including practices in school. However, we do not
know much about how to foster optimal emotional experiences for learning
(enhancing the joy of learning and reducing anxiety or boredom) in teacher studies.

3 Aim of the study

The present study aims to acquire a better understanding of academic emotions

among primary school student teachers. The study focuses on exploring the
spectrum of the student teachers’ academic emotions as embedded in different
activities provided by their educational programme. In order to gain a more
profound understanding of student teachers’ academic emotions, we posed the
following research questions:

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1. What kinds of academic emotions do student teachers experience during their

studies?
2. What kinds of emotions are experienced in individual and group activities? Are
there differences between emotions experienced in individual and group
activities?
3. How are the academic emotions related to various activities provided by teacher
education?

4 Methods

4.1 Participants

In Finland, primary school teachers are required to hold an MA (Master of Arts)

degree with a major in either applied educational sciences or educational
psychology. Primary school teachers typically teach in years 1–6 where pupils
are usually between 7 and 12 years of age. The teachers often have their own class
or group, to which they teach a majority of the subjects on the curriculum, thereby
guiding the whole personal development of their pupils.
The primary school teacher curriculum (300 credits) includes orientation and
communication studies (25 credits), main subject studies in education/educational
psychology (140 credits), multidisciplinary studies in all subjects taught at primary
school (grades 1–6) (60 credits), and one or two complementary minor subject
studies (60–70 credits) to enhance their future expertise as teachers. The main
subject studies include courses in the cultural, psychological and pedagogical bases
of education (50 credits), research studies (70 credits, including courses in research
methods, bachelor’s thesis and master’s thesis) and three teaching practice periods
(20 credits). Finnish teacher education is highly research-based. All teaching is
based on recent research and the studies are organised so that students get to practise
decision-making, justification and argumentation skills (Krokfors et al. 2011). The
target time for completing an MA degree in educational sciences is 5 years, and the
education is funded by the state.
This study included data collected from 19 primary school student teachers who
were majoring in educational science and were finishing their MA studies at the
University of Helsinki (female: 14, male: 5; age: mean = 31, mode = 32,
median = 29.5, min/max = 23/51 years of age). The participants were selected
on the basis of their self-estimated time of graduation (within 1 year), their
professional orientation (interest in working in a comprehensive school after
graduation) and their education (as a major subject in the teacher education
programme) (see Ahonen et al. 2015). The participants differed in terms of their
prior teaching experiences as well as in their study backgrounds: some had already
completed some courses before entering the teacher education programme, while
others had entered the programme straight from upper secondary school. In terms of
age and gender, the sample sufficiently represented the entire primary school
student teacher population at the University of Helsinki (Statistics Finland 2011).

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4.2 Student teacher interviews

Student teacher interviews were conducted during the spring of 2011. One member
of our research group visited 11 study groups (generally, master’s seminars) in
which students were in the final stages of their studies, in order to seek participants
and briefly introduce the project. The participants were contacted later via e-mail or
telephone to arrange the interview. The study groups did not differ from each other
in terms of student background.
The interviews were conducted by using a contextually modified version of the
teachers’ professional landscape inventory (TPLI) developed by the research group
(Soini et al. 2010). The themes related to teacher education as a study context, the
perceived study path and the student teachers’ perceptions about the future work
were added to the original TPLI that similarly mapped the teacher learning in the
school context. Before data collection, the instrument was also validated by four
pilot interviews.
The interviews aimed at gaining information on three main themes: (1) learning
during teacher education, (2) perceptions of studying in the teacher education
programme, and (3) perceptions of the teacher’s work at school. Altogether, the
standardised interview contained 20 questions, including 16 questions about
studying in the teacher education programme and a teacher’s role at school, and four
questions about the participants’ personal and professional backgrounds. The
interview was semi-structured: all questions were asked of each participant, but in
addition the researcher asked clarifying questions if necessary.
In the interview the participants were asked to draw a visualisation of their study
path as they saw it; they drew their paths as timelines, winding roads and maps. The
participants were asked to mark the positive aspects on their visualisations, and
identify crucial events as well as negative, hindering events that made a difference
to their studies (Tripp 1993). The participants were then interviewed based on their
visualisations, e.g. what happened, how they felt, what they learned in a given
situation, and what made them change their way of thinking. More specifically, the
visualisations were only used as a practical tool for supporting participants to recall,
structure and reflect their study paths during the interviews. Each interview lasted
between 60 and 120 min and was digitally recorded, then transcribed into text files
by members of the research group or trained research assistants. In this sub-study,
the focus of the analysis was purely on the experienced academic emotions reported
by the student teachers.
This study is part of a larger national research project: ‘Learning pedagogical
well-being and agency in comprehensive school’ (see more detailed information in
Soini et al. 2010).

4.3 Analysis

The interviews were qualitatively content-analysed using an adductive strategy

(Fig. 1) (e.g. Chamberlain 2006). This analysis strategy maintained a dialogue
between the theoretical presumptions and the empirical data and is thus compatible
with the idea of a hermeneutic circle (Morgan 2007). The strategy emphasises the

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Fig. 1 Phases of the analysis

constant comparative method for ensuring the accuracy of incident codes within
each category and has the purpose of generating theoretical properties for each
category (Harry et al. 2005).
In the first phase of the analysis, a functional coding procedure was developed.
The interviews (N = 19) were read through several times carefully to obtain an
overall understanding and become familiar with the data. Thereafter, all the text
segments in which the students described emotional experiences relating to their
studies were classified in the same hermeneutic category, using grounded-inspired
strategy (e.g. Glaser and Strauss 1995). The criteria for identifying student teacher’s
academic emotions were that (1) participants themselves had given an emotional
label to the episode, (2) it had to have a valence and an arousal, and (3) it had to
have at least a closely-related emotion previously identified in the emotion
literature. The analysis resulted in a total of 793 emotional experiences. When
identifying the emotions and building the finely divided emotional landscape,
researchers utilised the existing emotion literature widely.
In the second phase, the valence of the emotional experience was then coded into
two categories. The analysis drew on the valence-arousal framework (Pekrun et al.
2002). The analysis resulted in two basic categories: (a) positive emotions, including
efficacy, hope, enthusiasm, enjoyment, surprise, courage, trust, pride, interest,
admiration, satisfaction, gratitude, appreciation, belonging, amusement, happiness,
relief and longing; and (b) negative emotions, including shock, unfairness, irritation,

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anxiety, frustration, hate, fear, insecurity, worry, anger, envy, shame, restlessness,
sadness, harm, exhaustion, disappointment, inadequacy, boredom, loneliness and
misery.
In the third phase the arousal of the emotional experience was analysed in terms
of whether it was activating, neutral or deactivating. This phase started out as
empirically grounded, but moved towards more theory-driven analysis guided by
the valence-arousal framework (Braun and Clarke 2006).
In the fourth phase the emotional experiences were analysed on the basis of
whether emotions occurred when engaging in individual activities or in social
interactions. Emotions that were embedded in social activities, such as interactions
with other students and teachers during lectures and seminars or outside lecture
halls, were categorised as social activities, and individual activities, including
individual study, reading or writing, as well as personal expectations for the future,
were categorised as individual activities.
In the last phase of the qualitative analysis, the emotional experiences were
analysed on the basis of the context of the actions in which the experiences were
embedded. These subcategories emerged from empirical data analysis and covered
the context of teacher education extensively. This resulted in five different
categories: major studies, minor studies, research, practice, and informal learning
environments.
The analysis process was non-linear; as a result, it involved moving back and
forth between the full interviews and the text segments (see Elo and Kyngäs 2007;
Graneheim and Lundman 2004; Mayring 2000). The research group validated the
categories resulting from the content analysis at the end of each analytical phase
(Miles and Huberman 1994). In the few cases of disagreement, a consensus on the
final categorisation was reached in discussion among the researchers. In addition,
independent parallel analysis of 20 % of the data was carried out and the inter-rater
agreement was 92 %.
Building on the valence-arousal framework (Pekrun et al. 2002), the interrelation
between the valence of student teachers’ emotions and the level of activation of the
emotions and the social aspect of the activity was analysed by using cross tabulation
and the v2-test (p B 0.05).

5 Results

The results showed that student teachers experienced a wide variety of emotions
during their studies. They described a total of 793 emotional experiences: 18
different positive emotions and 20 different negative emotions were identified from
the data (see Table 1). The emotions experienced ranged from enthusiasm and
belonging to frustration and loneliness. The valence, intensity and duration of the
emotional experience also varied. The experienced emotions were embedded in a
variety of academic activities. Student teachers, for example, described frustration
caused by attending irrelevant lectures and enthusiasm initiated by smoothly-
functioning interaction with pupils in their teaching practice.

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Table 1 Emotions experienced

Positive emotions (n) Negative emotions (n)

Activating Enthusiasm (135) Efficacy (9) Frustration (42) Insecurity (4)

Interest (66) Surprise (8) Anxiety (26) Unfairness (4)
Enjoyment (52) Courage (5) Fear (15) Shame (4)
Admiration (40) Pride (4) Irritation (15) Envy (2)
Hope (39) Trust (1) Worry (8) Restlessness (1)
Shock (5) Hate (1)
Neutral Satisfaction (74) Appreciation (5) Harm (18)
Belonging (23) Happiness (3) Sadness (3)
Gratitude (6) Amusement (1)
Deactivating Relief (6) Disappointment (59) Exhaustion (16)
Longing (4) Inadequacy (59) Loneliness (7)
Misery (19) Boredom (4)

n = frequency

The most often-reported positive emotion was enthusiasm [n (frequency) = 135],

while satisfaction (n = 74), interest (n = 66), enjoyment (n = 52) and admiration
(n = 40) were also frequently described (see Table 1). As for negative emotions,
inadequacy (n = 59) and disappointment (n = 59) were experienced most often,
but frustration (n = 42) was also frequently reported. Some emotions were reported
only on rare occasions, including trust (n = 1), amusement (n = 1), happiness
(n = 3), envy (n = 2), restlessness (n = 1), hate (n = 1) and sadness (n = 3).

5.1 Valence and arousal of academic emotions experienced in teacher

education

In total, student teachers reported more positive emotions (61 %) than negative ones
(39 %) (see Table 2). Moreover, activating emotions were experienced more often
(61 %) than neutral (17 %) or deactivating (22 %) emotions. Regarding the positive
emotions, student teachers experienced more activating (75 %) emotions than
neutral (23 %) ones. In addition, only 2 % of positive emotions experienced by
student teachers were deactivating. The negative emotions reported, on the other
hand, were both deactivating (53 %) and activating (40 %) by their arousal level.
However, student teachers most commonly described negative emotions as being
deactivating. In addition, only 7 % of negative emotions were neutral.
As a result, the student teachers’ positive emotions were more frequently activating,
whereas negative emotions experienced during their studies were deactivating (see
Table 2). The relationship between the valence and the arousal of the academic
emotions experienced was statistically significant (v2 = 283.3, df = 2, p \ 0.001).
In addition, the investigation showed that most of the activating emotions were
positive (74 %) and only 26 % were negative. The majority of neutral emotions
reported by the student teachers were positive (83 %). However, deactivating emotions
were typically negative emotions (94 %) and only 6 % were positive emotions.

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Table 2 Valence and arousal of academic emotions

Level of arousal Valence of the emotion

Positive emotions Negative emotions Total

Activating n = 361 n = 125 n = 486

74 % 26 % 100 %
75 % 40 % 61 %
Neutral n = 110 n = 22 n = 132
83 % 17 % 100 %
23 % 7% 17 %
Deactivating n = 11 n = 164 n = 175
6% 94 % 100 %
2% 53 % 22 %
Total n = 482 n = 311 n = 793
100 % 100 % 100 %
61 % 39 % 100 %

v2 = 283.3, df = 2, p \ 0.001, n = frequency, % = per cent

5.2 Academic emotions in social and individual activities

Further investigation showed that the student teachers experienced more emotions
in individual activities (n = 435) than in social activities (n = 355) (see Tables 3,
4). Regarding individual activities, student teachers described experiencing both
enthusiasm and inadequacy in writing their master’s theses or when they were
reading for examinations, for example.
I think I still have this problem that I find course material that is in English
extremely difficult. I don’t know why this is. I don’t think that I’m that bad at
English, but when it comes to reading for exams in a foreign language… I just
don’t feel competent. (Participant 2: negative/individual/inadequacy)

Table 3 Positive emotions in

Positive/ Positive/ Positive/ Total
individual and social activities
Activating Neutral Deactivating

Individual n = 198 n = 55 n=6 n = 259

activities 76 % 21 % 2% 100 %
55 % 50 % 55 % 54 %
Social activities n = 163 n = 55 n=5 n = 223
73 % 25 % 2% 100 %
45 % 50 % 45 % 46 %
Total n = 361 n = 110 n = 11 n = 482
100 % 100 % 100 % 100 %
v2 = 800, df = 2, p = .670, 75 % 23 % 2% 100 %
n = frequency, % = per cent

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Table 4 Negative emotions in

Negative/ Negative/ Negative/ Total
individual and social activities
Activating Neutral Deactivating

Individual n = 69 n=8 n = 100 n = 177

activities 39 % 5% 56 % 100 %
55 % 36 % 61 % 57 %
Social activities n = 56 n = 14 n = 64 n = 134)
41 % 10 % 48 % 100 %
45 % 54 % 39 % 43 %
Total n = 125 n = 22 n = 164 n = 311
100 % 100 % 100 % 100 %
v2 = 5.0, df = 2, p = .080, 40 % 7% 53 % 100 %
n = frequency, % = per cent

These master’s studies have been very pleasant and have awakened a new fire
in me for my studies. Now, later on, I’m so enthusiastic and maybe also grown
up, and my thinking has developed so that I have wanted to read more.
Everything has been so interesting that I have enthusiastically grabbed books
to read and so on. So these master’s studies have been very motivating for me.
(Participant 5: positive/individual/enthusiasm/interest)
Student teachers also reported experiencing emotions embedded in social activities.
These emotions ranged from belonging to a peer group to envy of other students, as
well as admiration of and disappointment in teacher-educators and the teacher
education system.
The supervisor in our teaching practice was amazing. My partner and I were
both older students, and we both already had some teaching experience, so we
got to work very freely. But still we got constructive feedback, and that was
the main thing in the teaching practice. (Participant 15: positive/social/
admiration)
Well, what comes to mind first is that in the geography, physics, biology and
chemistry courses we did the same things over and over again. For example,
when we were examining rocks, we told the teacher that we had already done
the same thing in the physics class, but he just said, ‘‘Oh well, then we’ll just
do it from a slightly different angle.’’ But there was no different perspective or
anything. So I felt that no one here knew what was being done in other subject
courses, and for me that was extremely frustrating. (Participant 16:
negative/social/frustration)
Moreover, student teachers experienced slightly more positive emotions in
individual activities (54 %) than in social activities (46 %) (see Table 3). In
general, student teachers most often experienced positive activating emotions
(76 %) in individual activities. Positive neutral emotions were also experienced
frequently (21 %). However, positive deactivating emotions were experienced less
often (2 %) in individual activities. In addition, in social activities, student teachers
most often experienced positive activating emotions (73 %). In social activities,

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student teachers frequently experienced positive neutral emotions (25 %), but
positive deactivating emotions (2 %) less often. No significant differences were
detected between emotions experienced in individual activities and those experi-
enced in social activities (see Table 3).
The negative emotions described by the student teachers were also more often
embedded in individual activities (57 %) than in social activities (43 %) (see
Table 4). Student teachers experienced negative deactivating emotions (56 %)
most frequently in individual activities. They also frequently reported negative
activating emotions (39 %), but negative neutral emotions (5 %) were rarely
experienced in individual activities. As for social activities, student teachers most
often experienced deactivating emotions (48 %), but activating emotions were
also experienced repeatedly (41 %). Moreover, negative neutral emotions were
seldom experienced in social activities (10 %). The negative emotions experi-
enced by the student teachers were similar in both individual activities and social
activities in teacher education. No significant differences between student
teachers’ emotional experiences in individual and social activities were detected
(see Table 4).

5.3 Academic emotions in different academic settings provided by teacher

education

The results showed that the student teachers experienced academic emotions in a
wide variety of academic settings and activities (see Fig. 2). Academic emotions
were experienced, for example, during courses, in teaching practice, while writing
theses and in peer interaction. Academic emotions were embedded in five primary
contexts of teacher education, including major studies, minor studies, practice,
research and informal learning environments.
Further investigations showed that major studies and teaching practice provided
the primary contexts for the student teachers’ emotional experiences, both in terms
of positive and negative emotions. In major studies, teacher-educators and
multidisciplinary studies have been particularly emphasised. For example, student
teachers reported experiencing pride in their study success, enjoyment of learning,
and a sense of belonging when they found their place and fulfilled their ambitions.
Practice experiences were also often heavily emotionally loaded. Student teachers
described admiration and frustration caused by their supervisors, but also enjoyment
resulting from working with their pupils.
But then at the same time I experienced moments when I was like, ‘‘Hey, I can
do this’’ and I felt capable, for example, of forming something out of clay in
art class. (Participant 2: major studies/efficacy)
And the worst experience was the teaching practice. It was the most horrible
eight weeks of my life. I had no life of my own, and I was as tense as a violin
string. (Participant 5: practice studies/anxiety)

Some activities in teacher education evoked more emotions than others. Figure 2
shows that emotions were less frequently experienced while doing research

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How does it feel to become a teacher? Emotions in teacher… 465

Positive Emotions Negative Emotions

151

102

22 26
10

Major (n=347) Minor (n=48) Practice (n=290) Research (n=67) Informal learning
environment
(n=41)

Fig. 2 Valence of emotions in different contexts in teacher education. n = frequency

(n = 67), i.e. when writing a bachelor’s or master’s thesis, in minor studies

(n = 48) or in informal learning environments (n = 41).
Moreover, the results showed that emotional experiences in informal learning
environments were mainly experienced in social activities (see Table 5). On the
other hand, academic emotions experienced in research contexts were more often
perceived in individual activities than in social activities.

6 Discussion

6.1 Methodological reflections

In the present investigation, student teacher interviews were used to analyse the
academic emotions experienced in different teacher education settings. Previous
research has, however, suggested that in interview studies the structure of the
interview may influence the results, and students may deliberately hide or be
unaware of their emotions and sources of them (Wosnitza and Volet 2005). As a
result, we did not merely rely on asking the participants about their emotions, but
also questions about the key study experiences were addressed to promote the
explication of experienced emotions during the study track (e.g. Järvenoja and
Järvelä 2005). Moreover, asking student teachers only about the academic emotions
they experienced might have caused them to feel pressured to recall certain kinds of
emotions related to their studies. Allowing the participants to reflect freely on their
study path and addressing the question directly enabled them to recall the most
emotionally loaded experiences. More specifically, both the quality of the
experienced academic emotions and the key study experiences where academic
emotions occurred were captured by rich interviews.
A retrospective approach was applied in the interview, i.e. the students reflected
on their whole study path. There are, however, some challenges to be noted in using

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Table 5 Emotions in different academic activities

Positive Negative

Individual activities Major studies (n = 106) Major studies (n = 95)

Minor studies (n = 14) Minor studies (n = 9)
Practice (n = 104) Practice (n = 52)
Research (n = 33) Research (n = 20)
Informal learning environment (n = 2) Informal learning environment (n = 1)
Social activities Major studies (n = 90) Major studies (n = 56)
Minor studies (n = 12) Minor studies (n = 13)
Practice (n = 84) Practice (n = 50)
Research (n = 8) Research (n = 6)
Informal learning environment (n = 29) Informal learning environment (n = 9)

n = frequency

the retrospective approach (e.g. Cox and Hassard 2007). The emotions experienced
by the student teachers were always situated in a certain time, context and overall
life situation. Therefore, it might be challenging for the student teachers to recall the
experienced academic emotions at the end of the study path. These memory effects
may have influenced the data by generalising about the experiences. However, the
retrospective approach also gave the participants an opportunity to reflect on their
entire study path. This resulted in very rich data, in which the participants described
their emotions in detail. Moreover, the sample represented the entire student teacher
population in the educational faculty sufficiently well in terms of age and gender
distribution.
Because of differences in teacher education from one country to another, the
findings cannot be generalised to other contexts. As a result, further studies are
needed to validate the findings on a broader scale. However, the transferability of
the results, especially in terms of the identified dynamic relationship between the
valence and arousal of the academic emotions in teacher education is significantly
higher.

6.2 Theoretical reflections and educational implications

The main findings of our study showed that becoming a teacher is an emotionally-
charged journey. Student teachers described a total of 38 different emotions,
including 18 different positive and 20 different negative emotions. Student teachers
reported experiencing positive emotions more commonly. The most commonly
experienced positive emotion among student teachers was enthusiasm, but
satisfaction and interest were also mentioned often. In turn, the most commonly
described negative emotions were disappointment and inadequacy. The main results
also showed that student teachers most often experienced activating emotions.
The present study identified a wider range of academic emotions experienced by
student teachers during their education than prior studies have suggested (e.g.
Pekrun et al. 2011). Although previous studies on students’ academic emotions have

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stated that positive emotions are experienced as often as negative ones (Pekrun et al.
2002), our results showed that negative emotions were reported less frequently than
positive emotions. Our results might, however, be specific to the Finnish context,
since here the teaching profession as well as teacher education is highly valued. It
should be noted that in countries where the reputation of teachers is not as high as in
Finland, student teachers might experience more negative emotions. Although
student teachers described more positive emotions than negative ones, the variety of
different positive emotions was narrower and less specific than the variety of
negative emotions. It has been suggested that positive emotions are often more
difficult to distinguish and characterise than negative ones (Ekman 1992). One
reason for this may be that the basic function of emotions is to ensure our well-
being, hence it is more important to distinguish negative emotions, which carry
direct and adaptive benefits in situations that may threaten survival (Fredrickson
2001). Accordingly, our findings may reflect the fact that negative emotions are
more easily explicated than others.
The most commonly experienced emotions, both positive and negative, were
related to motivational elements. The negative emotions of disappointment and
inadequacy may cause loss of motivation. On the other hand, interest, enthusiasm and
enjoyment have been associated with increased academic motivation (e.g. Pekrun
et al. 2002). In terms of developing pedagogical practices in teacher education, our
findings imply that if we want to enhance students’ motivation, we need to create
learning environments that promote positive activating emotions. Furthermore, our
results imply that characteristics for the student teacher’s learning environment
interaction, that promotes positive studying experiences, provide constructive
feedback, emotional support and facilitate active participation. Moreover, results
indicated that tasks which require the application of knowledge as well as moving
between theory and practice are likely to promote positive activating emotions.
However, further studies are needed to gain a better understanding of how to foster
positive emotions in teacher education. It is also important to pay attention to the
amount of negative deactivating emotions that a learning environment constructs. It
should be noted that the problem is not the fact that students experience negative
deactivating emotions, but rather how widely the emotion causes avoidance behaviour
and withdrawal from challenging tasks and situations.
In addition to valence, our study also focused on the arousal of the emotion. The
results showed that student teachers most often experienced activating emotions.
Earlier studies indicated that positive activating emotions are most beneficial for
students learning at the individual level (Pekrun et al. 2002). This implies that in
terms of positive emotions, emotionally experienced teacher education was often
successful in providing meaningful and supportive learning environments for the
student teachers. However, our findings also showed that the negative emotions
most commonly experienced were deactivating by their arousal level, which has
been shown to be the most detrimental to learning at both the group and the
individual level (e.g. Goetz et al. 2014; Pekrun et al. 2002). This indicates that
teacher education can also be experienced as a detrimental and stressful learning
environment. Furthermore, it is suggested that neutral positive emotions are
beneficial for group work (e.g. Linnenbrink-Garcia et al. 2011). In general, emotions

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that have a neutral level of arousal were seldom identified in this study. One reason
may be that when something is perceived as meaningful, it also evokes strong
emotions, and hence extreme ends are emphasised. However, more studies are
needed to gain a better understanding of the function of neutral emotions embedded
in academic activities. In addition, the results strengthened the key idea of the
valence-arousal framework, suggesting that there is a connection between valence
and arousal.
Our results showed that there were no differences between emotions experienced
in individual activities and social activities. In both, social and individual activities,
activating positive emotions and negative deactivating emotions were experienced
most frequently. One reason may be that merely ‘working together’ does not
necessarily mean relatedness to others in the group experience, such as in terms of
shared goals or support, and therefore the co-work remains on the surface.
Our results also showed that the student teachers experienced emotions in a wide
range of academic settings. Accordingly, the results confirmed the findings of prior
studies on primary- and secondary- school students’ academic emotions, thus
suggesting that different activities may provide different emotions (e.g. Artino and
Jones 2012; Dettmers et al. 2011; Lichtenfeld et al. 2012; Linnenbrink-Garcia et al.
2011). Emotions, experienced as both positive and negative, were mainly embedded
in major studies and in teaching practice, activities in which students learn the basics
of becoming a teacher. Teaching has been described as an emotionally loaded
profession (Mevarech and Maskit 2014; Soini et al. 2010). In-service teachers have
reported experiencing love and care for their pupils, but are also exposed to high
levels of negative emotions, including inadequacy and cynicism (e.g. Sutton and
Wheatley 2003; Postareff and Lindblom-Ylänne 2011). Novice teachers in particular
have reported experiencing high levels of stress, anxiety and confusion (Mevarech
and Maskit 2014). However, over time teachers’ negative emotions seem to decrease
(Mevarech and Maskit 2014). These findings suggest that in order to promote future
teachers’ occupational well-being, student teachers need to learn to identify their
emotions and regulate them in order to cope with work-related stressors and to create
inspiring learning environments for their pupils and themselves.
The results further imply that student teachers’ academic emotions are regulated
by the complex dynamic between themselves and their learning environment
(Edwards 2007; Edwards et al. 2006; Kristof 1996). Accordingly, further studies are
needed to explore the dynamics that contribute to student teachers’ emotional
experiences. Moreover, we need to know more about the patterns of academic
emotions experienced during teacher education.

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Henrika Anttila is a doctoral student at the University of Helsinki. Her research interests include
learning and academic emotions in the context of teacher education and comprehensive schools.

Kirsi Pyhältö is a professor of educational sciences at the University of Oulu. She also works as a
research director at the Centre for Research and Development of Higher Education at the University of
Helsinki. Her research interests include teachers’ professional agency, learning and well-being in school,
and teacher education. In the field of higher education her interests are focused on researcher education
and early career researchers.

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How does it feel to become a teacher? Emotions in teacher… 473

Tiina Soini is a research director at the University of Tampere’s School of Education. Her research
interests concern learning and well-being in educational organization’s developmental processes,
especially in the contexts of teacher education and school communities.

Janne Pietarinen is a professor of teacher education at the University of Eastern Finland’s School of
Applied Educational Science and Teacher Education and Adjunct Professor at the University of Tampere.
His research interests lie in educational transitions, pupils’ and teachers’ learning, and well-being in the
context of sustainable school development.

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