Experienced academics' emotions related to assessment

Abstract

The aim of this study was to examine the emotions higher education teachers associate with assessment and the factors in their teaching environment that triggered these emotions. As a starting point, Frenzel’s model of teacher emotions and Pekrun’s control-value theory of achievement emotions were used. The sample consisted of 16 experienced and pedagogically advanced teachers who participated in semi-structured interviews. After abductive content analyses, both positive and negative emotions were detected corresponding to Frenzel’s and Pekrun’s models. The main sources of emotions were validity of assessment, assessment methods, pedagogical development and assessment culture. This preliminary study indicates that assessment evokes both positive and negative emotions, and that validity of assessment is a prominent issue in evoking these emotions. Pedagogical training should deal with emotions and their regulation in assessment to help teachers in higher education to cope with negative emotions.

Key Words:

• Achievement emotions
• higher education
• experienced teachers
• assessment

Acknowledgements

We thank Klaus Helkama for his contribution and reliability coding, Niclas Sandström for help in finalizing the manuscript and the two anonymous reviewers for their valuable comments.