Do Conscientious Teachers Perform Better in The Classroom?

An empirical research study conducted as part of MSc Psychology project. Ethical approval granted by the University of Wolverhampton.

Quality teaching and learning are major factors in determining student achievement and success. Students respond well to teachers who set clear limits, high expectations, are enthusiastic about their subject, use humour within moderation and provide reward (Ofsted, 2003b).

The consequences of not delivering effective teaching and learning can result in teacher burn-out, underperforming students, destruction of positive student-teacher relationships and in extreme cases permanent student exclusions, which in the UK disproportionately effects those receiving Free School Meals (GOV.UK, 2022).

In addition to this, UK regions such as the North East, North West and West Midlands sees male student permanent exclusions being double the rate compared to females (GOV.UK, 2022) for reasons which relate to “persistent low disruption” and “threatening behaviour towards an adult” this is a source of contention for both the teacher and the student. Whilst persistent low disruption and threatening behaviour cannot be attributed to the teacher specifically, the ability to resolve classroom interpersonal conflict to avoid escalation is a skill associated with five factor traits, namely agreeableness (Jensen-Campbell et al., 2003).

Existing studies of the predictors of positive student-teacher relationships and classroom management suggests that personality traits of the teacher and their self-efficacy contributes significantly in supporting effective teaching and learning on three sub-scales; instructional order, classroom management and ability to engage the student (Romi de Jong et al., 2014).

The concept of self-efficacy, derived from Bandura’s (1977) social cognitive theory can refer to a teachers’ belief in their ability to successfully cope with tasks and accept challenges; teachers with higher self-efficacy are more likely to feel competent when implementing didactic and innovative techniques in classroom management, are able to influence student independence, and are less likely to use authoritative behaviour management methods (Caprara et al., 2006). Female teachers with lower self-efficacy are more likely to suffer from burnout (Salovitta, 2018; Santavirta et al., 2007) whilst male teachers are probable to experience depersonalisation which refers to an attitude of insensitivity and being distant from students (Maslach & Jackson 1981).

Personality traits of extraversion, agreeableness and openness to new experiences are associated with high teacher self-efficacy (Perera et al., 2018; Judge et al., 2013) with agreeableness strongly found to reduce interpersonal conflict between student and teacher though the research is not consistent on how gender moderates this personality trait (Tehrani & Yamini, 2019; Jenson-Campbell & Grazanio, 2001).

Additional research was therefore required in an attempt to understand the differential of effects of gender, personality traits and self-efficacy of the teacher across schools with varying rates of FSM pupils.  

What is Teacher Self-efficacy and Why Does It Matter?

Self-efficacy (SE) can be viewed as one of the most powerful tools we have in our self-regulatory processes towards goal achievement (Bandura, 1990). It facilitates the self-criticism, praise, re-evaluation of personal values along with the acceptance of challenges towards goal achievement.

Studies of self-efficacy within Bandura’s (1977) social cognitive theory reveal four components that influence the elusive construct we call self-efficacy, being: mastery experiences, emotional arousal, vicarious events and verbal persuasions. Additional influences of efficacy include, self-belief of the individual and the outcome expectancy of performing a task (Woodcock & Tournaki, 2022) which could lead to either a positive or negative experience. For example, a teacher may trial a new teaching and learning method with a group of students who, mid-way through the academic year have declining attendance – though at the start of the year they regularly attended class. If the teacher feels the reason for frequent absences is due to lifeless lessons and ineffective classroom management the teacher may have the self-belief to employ a new strategy with the hopeful expectancy outcome of it leading to improved attendance. 

The importance of self-efficacy as a construct that can shape the teachers’ belief in oneself to organise and manage a classroom has meaningful associations with improving student outcomes (Caprara et al., 2016). Furthermore, Soodak and Podell (1993) suggest that higher rates of self-efficacy amongst teachers can result in reduction of referrals to special education needs; teachers with little self-efficacy are more likely to refer children from low socio-economic backgrounds, thus confounding factors of special education referrals could be assumed due to negligible expectations on part of the teacher.

Self-efficacy appears to play a pivotal role for pre-service and early career teachers where the ‘survival’ stage of teaching can inevitably make or break the aspiring practitioner (Klassen & Chiu, 2010) which could be as a result of self-efficacy being at its most malleable in the early stages of teaching (Hoy & Spero, 2005) and therefore easier to strengthen or defeat. Furthermore, research indicates that when self-efficacy is measured on the three sub-scales that the present study explored; instructional order, classroom management and student engagement – female teachers have greater self-efficacy with delivering instructional orders whilst male teachers show strengths with classroom management (Klassen & Chiu, 2010).

Whilst higher Teacher Self-Efficacy correlates with a multitude of benefits, a key issue in the field of studying this construct (Pfitzner & Eden, 2016) are what factors influence self-efficacy. Bandura’s (1995) reciprocal determinism concept can help to explain the primary influences which considers triadic factors; personal, behavioural and environmental

Mastery experiences, which occur in the classroom are seen as having the strongest effect on Teacher Self-Efficacy since they are considered the most authentic indicators of one’s capabilities (Bandura, 1997). According to Pfitzner-Eden (2016) vicarious experiences have a greater influence than mastery experiences on pre-service teachers as vicarious experiences allows for the opportunity to model effective teaching once observed for example, witnessing an experienced teacher overcome difficulties. Similarly, a strong mentor can act as verbal persuasion depending on the credibility of the mentor (Pfitzner-Eden, 2016; Bandura, 1997). Hoy et al., (1998) proposes that self-efficacy is judged by the resources available, not only in material form such as facilities but including social persuasion for example feedback from colleagues, parents and other members from the wider community of the school i.e., administrators.

Teacher Personality Traits

To understand the construct of personality, researchers have proposed numerous personality theories. However, the Big Five is the dominant personality framework (McCrae & John, 1992) which is underpinned by the lexical hypothesis. The Big Five traits include; Openness, Conscientiousness, Extraversion, Agreeableness and Neuroticism.

Research pertaining to personality traits as a predictor of job performance in teaching suggests that those who perform well and deliver effective instructional order display characteristics of; humour, enthusiasm, emotional stability and friendliness – these traits connect with the Big Five qualities, agreeableness, extraversion and openness (Moore & Kuol, 2005).

Klassen and Tze (2014) meta-analysis of 43 studies reviewed the two psychological constructs of self-efficacy and personality of teachers found that the role of personality is significantly and positively related to teaching performance. Additional research supports this finding in connection to the Big Five traits for example Cheng and Zamarro (2016) purports higher levels of conscientiousness in a teacher can result in effective pedagogical processes within an educational environment, thus raising the profile of student success. Furthermore, conscientiousness is thought to predict teacher persistence with students who appear to struggle in the classroom (Bastian 2015; 2017).

In educational settings where there is high need perhaps underpinned by socioeconomic deprivation, cognitive difficulties, social, emotional or mental health strain it can be assumed that to achieve success in instructional order, classroom management and enhancing student engagement the teacher would do well to have leading traits of conscientiousness in addition to the trait of openness to experience (Bastian, 2015) which significantly predicts employment in high-poverty, high-minority, and low performing schools. The ability to persevere in such schools also indicates greater teacher self-efficacy, thus, there may be useful links between high self-efficacy and Five Factor traits.

Delivering instructions and providing support in the classroom are integral components of the teaching role, Pianta et al., (2008) suggests teachers with higher traits of extraversion is a strong indicator of healthy job performance, as is conscientiousness in the teaching field. This might be due to the fact that characteristics associated with extraversion include being outgoing, energetic and sociable alongside conscientiousness being associated with purposefulness, reliability and hardworking. There is some suggestion that male teachers tend to be higher in extraversion personality dimension compared to female teachers (Khedkar, 2023). Pianta (1999) postulates further that the healthiest student-teacher relationships are characterised by relatedness, respect, warmth and support with low levels of interpersonal conflict.

Interpersonal conflict resolution styles are thought to be strongest when the trait of agreeableness is dominate within an individual though past research does not pertain specifically to the teaching sector (Jensen-Campbell & Grazanio, 2003) personality traits overall are relatable to individuals, including education practitioners. Conflict resolution can be seen as an integral component towards establishing and the maintenance of healthy relationship be it with friends, family or students. Thus, an antecedent of successful conflict resolution is the personality trait of agreeableness (Jensen-Campbell, 2010) as this trait is characterised by friendliness, compassion, ability to empathise through effective communication as opposed to being detached and analytical.

Previous cross-cultural research on gender differences has established that women appear to score higher on agreeableness than men (McCrae et al., 2005), additionally those who demonstrate a dominant trait of agreeableness predicts successful performance in interpersonal oriented jobs (Hurtz & Donovan, 2000) such as teaching (Kell, 2019) Furthermore, it is reported that agreeableness is the strongest predictor of teacher effectiveness at secondary level as the requirement to demonstrate warmth and sensitivity towards parents, students and staff is required daily – high scores of agreeableness places the teacher in a stable position to succeed in the aforementioned areas (Kim et al., 2018).

However, there are limitations to this finding in that, the trait of agreeableness supporting effective teaching is not clear which is thought to be due to measurement bias (Kim et al., 2019) and the trait being more important for jobs requiring teamwork (therefore, greater interpersonal interactions) than those involving dyadic interactions (Mount et al. 1998) such as that which occurs between student and teacher.

What Did This Study Set Out To Explore?

The aim of this study set out to explore the effects of gender and personality traits alongside level of self-efficacy amongst in-service secondary school teachers with respect to classroom management, instructional order and student engagement. This comes as a result of limited research on the teaching professionals’ gender as a moderating effect on classroom management (Romi de Jong et al., 2014) and differences between female teachers being efficacious with instructional order and male teachers with classroom management (Ismailos et al., 2019; Klassen & Chiu, 2010) with those in-service as opposed to pre-service teachers.

What Did We Find?

A conclusion that evolved from the study is that teacher characteristics do not consistently predict self-efficacy in the three domains; classroom management, instructional order and student engagement. The present study recognises that the small sample of participants may have contributed towards the lack of findings to interpret. Nevertheless, we cannot conclusively blame having a small sample size for the reason of absent associations. It may be that personality traits do not predict self-efficacy across the domains; classroom management, instructional order and student engagement.

However, it is well documented in previous literature the association between teacher self-efficacy and personality traits, the circumstance of the present study not producing similar results might suggest there’s a need to test the association between alternative personality traits and self-efficacy domain, or ensure there’s variety between males and females. No association was found between the self-efficacy sub-scale classroom management and the personality trait of agreeableness as previously documented in the literature. A weak positive association was found between the self-efficacy sub-scale student engagement and the personality trait of openness to experience. A moderate positive association was found between conscientiousness as a personality trait and quality of instructional order.

What Does This Mean For The Future?

As teachers are the motivational force behind student achievement and engagement, there may be wider implications for improving teacher training programmes in the UK to readily prepare pre-service teachers achieve longevity in the classroom, or alternatively support those in-services to remain in the profession through development of conscientious personality traits.

Since the debate is ongoing in terms of personality being a malleable construct, there is evidence to suggest that one’s personality can change across the lifespan (Roberts et al., 2017) which employers could use this knowledge to inform their decision of using personality tests as part of continuing professional development should teachers feel they have an area of their persona they would like to improve. It is important to note that personality trait change through use of intervention is mostly applicable to emotional stability, therefore may not be as successful when attempting to develop conscientiousness. However, using mastery and vicarious experience, verbal persuasion, and affective states (Bandura, 1997) could help to support the development of conscientiousness since classroom observations by well-trained observers have the advantage in that they evaluate teachers from a perspective of experience (Muijs, 2006) in the field which they are able to share with newly qualified professionals.

Use of field observations could allow researchers to review the interplay between self-efficacy, personality traits and gender. This would facilitate a clearer perspective into the characteristics of highly efficacious teachers across various educational settings including both, Free School Meal/non-FSM status, or those providing alternative provision such as Pupil Referral Units where there is an environment of high needs pupils.