How Teachers Respond to Children’s Sadness: A Mixed-Method Analysis in Elementary School

Abstract Background Emotion socialization plays a crucial role in children’s emotional development, shaping how they understand, express, and regulate emotions. Little is known about how teachers respond to students’ sadness during middle-childhood, despite teachers’ role in children’s emotional experiences at school. Objective This study examined how elementary school teachers respond to children’s experiences of sadness and whether teachers’ emotion socialization behaviors vary as a function of the type of sad event, children’s coping strategies, and children’s psychopathological symptoms. Methods Fifty female teachers (age: 25–64, M = 46.8, SD = 10.9) completed structured interviews and questionnaires regarding sadness experienced by 346 students. A mixed-method design was employed, combining thematic analysis of interview data with multinomial mixed-effects models to examine associations among events, coping strategies, symptoms, and teacher responses, accounting for clustering within teachers. Results Three categories of emotion socialization behaviors emerged: emotion-focused, problem-focused, and unsupportive responses. Teachers were more likely to use emotion-focused strategies in response to personal events than to school-related events. Higher levels of children’s externalizing symptoms were associated with a greater likelihood of teachers’ emotion-focused responses. An interaction effect indicated that teachers were particularly likely to adopt emotion-focused behaviors when children responded to personal events with non-constructive coping strategies, and variability emerged across teachers. Conclusions Teachers’ responses to children’s sadness are context-sensitive and related to events, children’s behavioral functioning, and individual teacher differences. Results underscore teachers’ role in the socialization of sadness during middle-childhood and highlight the importance of supporting teachers in navigating children’s emotional experiences in school.