Emotion Science

Funding Source: Wend Ventures

Team Members: James Floman, Annette Ponnock, Marc Brackett, Hannah Asis, Jahnvi Jain

Educators’ well-being plays an influential role in student social-emotional health and academic achievement, which is becoming all the more important now because students (and teachers) are having to navigate the uncertainty and trauma of overlapping national crises, between the coronavirus, pervasive economic insecurity, and pernicious effects of continuing racial injustice. This project aims to identify and longitudinally track the factors that best predict educator resilience and well-being. This includes protective factors that buffer against stress and risk factors that exacerbate stress. Further, understanding the dynamics of the ‘psychological pandemic’ and the coping patterns of a nationally representative sample of US educators will be essential to learning how to best support the well-being and effectiveness of all educators. The latest intervention science indicates that an array of factors drive changes in psychological functioning, and so attaining a nuanced understanding of these factors in educators will be valuable to tailor supports.

Funding Source: Sanford Harmony/National University

Team Members: James Floman, Annette Ponnock, Marc Brackett, Hannah Asis, Jahnvi Jain

This project aims to build off of the Teacher Well-Being and Resilience Longitudinal Study by specifically aiming to understand the well-being and resilience of Black and Latino/a/x educators. We partnered with community organizations that support and work with Black and Latino/a/x educators to recruit an overly representative sample of Black and Latino/a/x educators. This project aims to identify and longitudinally track the factors that best predict Black and Latino/a/x educator resilience and well-being. This includes protective factors that buffer against stress and risk factors that exacerbate stress. Further, understanding the dynamics of the ‘psychological pandemic’ and the coping patterns of a diverse sample of US educators will be essential to learning how to best support the well-being and effectiveness of teachers of color. The latest intervention science indicates that an array of factors drive changes in psychological functioning, and so attaining a nuanced understanding of these factors in educators will be valuable to tailor supports.

1. LaPalme, M., Luo, P., Cipriano, C., & Brackett, M. (Under Review) The Importance of Emotion Regulation Competence Among Pre-service Educators During the COVID Pandemic. AERA Open.
2. Luo, P., LaPalme, M. L.(2021) The Importance of Sociability and Preference of Social Regulation on COVID-19 Pandemic Stress [Manuscript]

Funding Source: How We Feel/Iqonic

Team Members: Zorana Ivcevic Pringle, Shengjie Lin, Marc Brackett

Funding Source: American Psychological Association - Division 15

Team Members: Annette Ponnock, James Floman, Hannah Asis

This project aims to explore the lived experience of Black and Latino/a/x educators’ motivation and well-being during COVID-19. Using community-based participatory research, we have partnered with organizations that work with Black and Latino/a/x educators to recruit and train teacher-researchers who are conducting interviews with teachers from around the country. The qualitative data will be integrated with the quantitative data from the Equity, Well-Being, and Resilience Longitudinal Study. We will be working with our partner organizations to analyze and interpret the data and create a plan for reflective action to support Black and Latino/a/x well-being.

Funding Source: Wend Ventures

Team Members: Marc Brackett, James Floman, Chris Cipriano, Michael Strambler (The Consultation Center at Yale), Joanna Meyer (The Consultation Center at Yale), Maegan Genovese (The Consultation Center at Yale), Annette Ponnock, Almut Zieher, Linda Torv, Hannah Asis, Alessandra Yu, Beatris Garcia

This project is a three-year investigation of educator emotional well-being and social and emotional learning implementation fidelity by the Yale Center for Emotional Intelligence (YCEI) in partnership with The Consultation Center at Yale. Over the course of the project period, the project team will:

1. design, validate, and make widely available a measure of educator well-being;
2. design, validate, and make widely available a measure of educator social-emotional learning (SEL) program implementation fidelity (to gauge associations and potential interaction effects between SEL implementation and well-being); and
3. develop an accompanying set of resources to help schools improve teacher well-being (as driven by survey results).

The combination of enhanced measurement and actionable resources will raise awareness among school leaders and policymakers about the state of teacher well-being and engagement and of steps that can be taken to improve it.

• Cipriano, C. (Chair, 2020). "The Development and Initial Validation of Four Ecologically Valid,Multi-Dimensional, and Scalable SEL Assessment Tools. Symposium to be presented at the American Educational Research Association Meeting in San Francisco, California (Cancelled due to COVID-19).
• Cipriano, C., Floman, J., Hoffmann, J., & Willner, C. (2019). Building the Assessments We Need: The Development of new actionable SEL data-points for teachers. CASEL SEL Exchange, Chicago, IL

• Brackett, M. & Cipriano, C. (2020). Teachers are Anxious and Overwhelmed: They Need SEL Now More Than Ever. Ed Surge, Published April 7, 2020
• Cipriano,C., & Brackett. M. (2020). How to Support Teachers’ Emotional Needs Right Now, Great Good Science Center. Published April 30, 2020
• Cipriano, C., Naples, L.H., & Eveleigh, A. (2020). Feeling Overwhelmed and Overlooked, Special Educators

• Hamilton, L.S. & Doss, C.J. (2020) Supports for Social and Emotional Learning in American Schools and Classrooms: Findings from the American Teacher Panel. Santa Monica, CA: RAND Corporation. https://www.rand.org/pubs/research_reports/RRA397-1.html.
• Strambler, M.J., Meyer, J.L., Zieher, A.K., & Genovese, M.A. (2020). Surveying Educators about Social Emotional Learning During the COVID-19 Pandemic. New Haven, CT: The Consultation Center at Yale. https://osf.io/ekr2h/
• Zieher, A. K. Cipriano, C., Meyers, J., & Strambler, M. (2021). Educators’ implementation and use of social and emotional learning early in the COVID-19 pandemic. Journal of School Psychology, Online First

Funding Source: Yale Well-Being Office, Yale Secretary’s Office, Donor

Team Members: James Floman, Marc Brackett, Megan Kirk Chang, & Hannah Asis

The Yale Equity in Student Well-Being Project will be a randomized controlled trial (RCT) that compares the effectiveness of different psychological well-being interventions on college students at Yale that will run during the 2021-22 school year. We are interested both in what interventions are most effective for whom (moderators) and why (mediators or mechanisms). We’ll recruit a large, diverse sample of students and measure outcomes at multiple levels of analysis to address these research questions. The ultimate goal is to learn how to better support college students given the significant challenges and demands they face, especially during the pandemic with the major disruption in social connection and emotional health they’ve experienced.

• Learn strategies for improving well-being
  
• Help inform future design of college mental health programs
• Earn up to $390

Funding Source: FAAS Foundation

Team Members: Matt LaPalme & Peihao Luo

Funding Source: FAAS Foundation

Team Members: James Floman, Marc Brackett, Annette, Ponnock, Dena Simmons, & Meiko Lin

This is a large-scale national epidemiological study of US educators’ emotions and well-being. It is one of the largest studies ever conducted on the health and well-being of educators. Multiple papers are currently being written with these data.

Funding Source: Faas Foundation & Ontario Hospital Association

Team Members: Zorana Ivcevic, Zehavit Levitats, Roni Reiter-Palmon & Alex McKay

What do people feel at work? Why does this matter for individual well-being and important work outcomes? To address these questions, the project team conducted large scale nationally representative surveys of the U.S. workforce. These broad economy-wide surveys are to be followed by in depth studies within specific organizations in the healthcare industry.

The questions examined include:

• What is the nature of passion at work (and why does it matter)?
• What are gender and power differences in how people feel at work? What impact do these differences have?
• How does emotionally intelligent behavior of supervisors create an emotional climate and predict creativity and innovation of employees?
• What are the patterns of engagement and burnout at work? Who are the workers most likely to be engaged, burned out, and both engaged and exhausted? What demands and resources predict patterns of engagement and burnout, and what outcomes are associated with these patterns?
• What does it mean to be an emotionally intelligent organization?

• Ivcevic, Z., Stern, R., & Faas, A. (2021). Research: What do people do to perform at a high level. Harvard Business Review. https://hbr.org/2021/05/research-what-do-people-need-to-perform-at-a-high-level
• Ivcevic, Z., Menges, J., & Miller, A. (2020). How common is unethical behavior in U.S. organizations? https://hbr.org/2020/03/how-common-is-unethical-behavior-in-u-s-organizations
• Ivcevic, Z., Moeller, J., Menges, J., & Brackett, M. A. (2020). Supervisor emotionally intelligent behavior and employee creativity. Journal of Creative Behavior. doi:10.1002/jocb.436
• Moeller, J., Ivcevic, Z., White, A. E., Taylor, C., Menges, J. I., Caruso, D., & Brackett, M. A. (under review). Passion for work: What is it, who has it, and does it matter? Preprint. https://doi.org/10.31219/osf.io/xhbu7
• Moeller, J., Ivcevic, Z., White, A. E., Menges, J., & Brackett, M. A. (2018). Highly engaged but ready to quit: Intra-individual profiles of engagement and burnout. Career Development International. 23(1), 86-105. doi: 10.1108/CDI-12-2016-0215
• Taylor, C., Ivcevic, Z., & Brackett, M. A. (2020). Gender and creativity at work. Creativity and Innovation Management. Advanced online publication. doi: 10.1111/caim.12397

• Creativity runs on passion, Psychology Today
• Taking creativity to work and making work more creative, Psychology Today
• 1 in 5 employees is highly engaged and at risk for burnout, Harvard Business Review
• How to avoid burnout at work - and the signs you should take a break, The Telegraph
• The truth about burnout: It doesn’t look how we expect it to, The Hill
• Feeling Burned Out? Here Are 3 Things That Can Help, New York Times
• Full list of media stories for the research on engagement and burnout

Funding Source: Capital One

Team Members: Jessica Hoffmann, Maneeza Dawood, Julie McGarry

This project aims to build inter-organizational capacity through collaboration on a chatbot designed to support college-bound and college-enrolled students. Prospective and enrolled college students, as well as the colleges and universities supporting them, face many challenges like summer melt (students who are accepted and intend to enroll but do not attend, often due to barriers), difficulty navigating and accessing financial aid, and challenges with retention or degree attainment. These challenges are particularly present for first-generation or low-income (FGLI) students. The Yale Center for Emotional Intelligence has partnered with the Partnership for Education Advancement, Norfolk State University, Paul Quinn College, and Mainstay to promote cultural responsiveness, emotional intelligence, and career readiness in Oli, Mainstay’s supportive chatbot.

This project seeks to promote:

• Capacity-building among the partner organizations
• The infusion of cultural responsiveness, emotional intelligence, and career readiness knowledge and skills into the bot
• A better understanding of the impact on students attending historically Black colleges and universities (HBCUs)

• Seltzer, R. (2022, September 9). How one nonprofit is looking beyond 'generic tools' to help HBCUs boost retention. Higher Ed Dive.

Funding Source: Botin Foundation, Imagination Institute, National Endowment for the Arts

Team Members: Zorana Ivcevic & Marina Bazhydai (Lancaster University)

Emotions are central to the creative process, from the (emotional) decision whether to engage in the creative process (Will people think my ideas are silly?), to positive emotions broadening idea generation, and to inevitable frustrations of creative work. Emotions spark creativity; they are used in the process of creation, and they need to be regulated to sustain the creative process. In its report on the future of jobs, The World Economic Forum lists several groups of creativity-related skills (creativity, originality, and initiative; analytical thinking and innovation; complex problem solving; reasoning, problem solving, and ideation) and emotion-related skills (emotional intelligence; leadership and social influence). That is, 6 of the 10 skills on the list pertain to creativity and emotions. This project developed a comprehensive model of the role of emotions and emotional intelligence in creativity. It works to empirically test different aspects of the model, and develops programs to apply this knowledge in teaching emotion and creativity skills through the arts.

• Ivcevic, Z., & Hoffmann, J. D. (2019). Emotions and creativity: From process to person and product.In J. C. Kaufman & R. S. Sternberg (Eds.). Cambridge Handbook of Creativity (pp. 273-295). New York: Cambridge University Press.
• Ivcevic, Z., & Fundación Botín (2019). Introduction. In E. Gokcigdem (Ed.), Designing for empathy: Perspectives on the museum experience (pp. 1-15). Washington, DC: Rowman & Littlefield.
• Grohman, M., Ivcevic, Z., Silvia, P., & Kaufman, S. B. (2017). The role of passion and persistence in creativity. Psychology in Aesthetics, Creativity and the Arts. 11(4), 376-385. http://dx.doi.org/10.1037/aca0000121
• Ivcevic, Z., Ebert, M., Hoffmann, J. D., & Brackett, M. A. (2017). Creativity in the domain of emotions. In J. C. Kaufman, J. Baer, & V. Glaveanu (Eds.), Cambridge Handbook of Creativity Across Different Domains (pp. 525-548). New York: Cambridge University Press.
• Ivcevic, Z., & Hoffmann, J. D. (2017). Emotions and creativity: From states to traits and emotion abilities.In G. Feist, R. Reiter-Palmon, & J. C. Kaufman (Eds.). Cambridge Handbook of Creativity and Personality Research (pp. 187-213). New York: Cambridge University Press.
• Ivcevic, Z., & Nusbaum, E. C. (2017). From having an idea to doing something with it: Self-regulation for creativity. In M. Karwowski & J. C. Kaufman (Eds.), The creative self: How our beliefs, self-efficacy, mindset, and identity impact our creativity (pp. 343-365). San Diego, CA: Academic Press.
• Maliakkal, N. T., Hoffmann, J.D., Ivcevic, Z., & Brackett, M.A. (2017). An art-based workshop for families: Learning emotion skills and choosing creativity. International Journal of Creativity and Problem Solving. 27(1), 45-60.
• Hoffmann, J. D., Ivcevic, Z., Zamora, G., Bazhydai, M., & Brackett, M. (2016). Intended persistence: Comparing academic and creative challenges in high school. Social Psychology of Education, 19(4), 793-816. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11218-016-9362-x
• Maliakkal, N. T., Hoffmann, J.D., Ivcevic, Z., & Brackett, M.A. (2016). Teaching emotion and creativity skills through art: A workshop for adolescents. The International Journal of Creativity and Problem Solving, 26(1), 69-83.
• Ivcevic, Z., Maliakkal, N., & The Botin Foundation (2016). Teaching emotion and creativity skills through the arts. In E. Gokcigdem (Ed.), Fostering empathy through museums. Washington, DC: Rowman & Littlefield.
• Ivcevic, Z., & Brackett, M. (2015). Predicting creativity: Interactive effects of Openness to Experience and Emotion Regulation Ability. Psychology of Aesthetics, Creativity and the Arts, 9, 480-487. http://dx.doi.org/10.1037/a0039826
• Ebert, M., Hoffmann, J. D., Ivcevic, Z., Phan, C., & Brackett, M. A. (2015). Creativity, emotion, and art: Development and initial evaluation of a workshop for professional adults. International Journal of Creativity and Problem Solving, 25, 47-59.
• Ebert, M., Hoffmann, J. D., Ivcevic, Z., Phan, C., & Brackett, M. A. (2015). Teaching emotion and creativity skills through art: A workshop for children. International Journal of Creativity and Problem Solving, 25, 23-35.
• Ivcevic, Z., Hoffmann, J. D., Brackett, M. A., & Botin Foundation (2014). Emotions, creativity, and the arts. In B. Heys (Ed.), Arts and emotions: Nurturing our creative potential (pp. 6-23). Santander, Spain: Botin Foundation.

• Creativity and Serendipity: Making the Unexpected Happen
• Resolution: Build Creativity and Well-Being
• Why Creativity Takes Courage
• Creativity is More than Just Coming Up with Ideas
• To Be Creative, Be Smart with Emotions
• How to Get Students to Persist
• What Emotions Help Creativity?