IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/gam/jsusta/v13y2021i15p8591-d606665.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Emotional Competencies in Primary Education as an Essential Factor for Learning and Well-Being

Author

Listed:
  • Èlia López-Cassà

    (Department of Teaching and Learning and Educational Organization, University of Barcelona, 08035 Barcelona, Spain)

  • Felicidad Barreiro Fernández

    (Department of Pedagogy and Teaching, University of Santiago de Compostela, 15782 Santiago de Compostela, Spain)

  • Salvador Oriola Requena

    (Department of Applied Didactics, University of Barcelona, 08035 Barcelona, Spain)

  • Josep Gustems Carnicer

    (Department of Applied Didactics, University of Barcelona, 08035 Barcelona, Spain)

Abstract

Numerous contributions corroborate the need to include emotional education and the development of emotional competencies at school to improve students’ school learning and well-being. The present study aims to learn more about the development of emotional competencies in primary school students, taking into account gender differences across different cycles and analyzing the potential link with students’ overall academic performance. Participants were 2389 primary school students (51.2% boys and 48.8% girls), aged from 6 to 12, from 21 public and semi-private schools in Spain. The study is a non-experimental quantitative study, using an ex-post-facto descriptive method. The Emotional Development Questionnaire (CDE 9-13), the Emotional Competencies Observation Scale, and the overall grade point average were applied to the sample. The results show significant differences in favor of girls in the development of most emotional competencies in all three educational cycles. Differences were also observed in academic performance by gender in the primary school cycle, with girls achieving higher grades. At the same time, positive correlations were found between academic performance and emotional competencies. The results confirm the importance of including emotional education in primary education.

Suggested Citation

  • Èlia López-Cassà & Felicidad Barreiro Fernández & Salvador Oriola Requena & Josep Gustems Carnicer, 2021. "Emotional Competencies in Primary Education as an Essential Factor for Learning and Well-Being," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 13(15), pages 1-10, August.
    • Handle: RePEc:gam:jsusta:v:13:y:2021:i:15:p:8591-:d:606665
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.mdpi.com/2071-1050/13/15/8591/pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://www.mdpi.com/2071-1050/13/15/8591/
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Heckman, James J. & Kautz, Tim, 2012. "Hard evidence on soft skills," Labour Economics, Elsevier, vol. 19(4), pages 451-464.
    2. Laura Lübke & Martin Pinquart & Malte Schwinger, 2021. "The Role of Flexibility in the Realization of Inclusive Education," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 13(8), pages 1-18, April.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Jesús Fernández-Gavira & Santiago Castro-Donado & Daniel Medina-Rebollo & M. Rocío Bohórquez, 2021. "Development of Emotional Competencies as a Teaching Innovation for Higher Education Students of Physical Education," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 14(1), pages 1-20, December.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Lea Cassar & Mira Fischer & Vanessa Valero, 2022. "Keep Calm and Carry On: Immediate-vs. Six-Month Effects of Mindfulness Training on Academic Performance," CESifo Working Paper Series 10099, CESifo.
    2. Majda Schmidt & Gregor Lešnjak & Joca Zurc, 2025. "Attitudes of University Teachers Towards the Educational Inclusion of Students with Special Educational Needs," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 17(18), pages 1-25, September.
    3. Hendrik Jürges & Luca Stella & Sameh Hallaq & Alexandra Schwarz, 2022. "Cohort at risk: long-term consequences of conflict for child school achievement," Journal of Population Economics, Springer;European Society for Population Economics, vol. 35(1), pages 1-43, January.
    4. Lechner, Michael & Sari, Nazmi, 2015. "Labor market effects of sports and exercise: Evidence from Canadian panel data," Labour Economics, Elsevier, vol. 35(C), pages 1-15.
    5. Estrellado, Emmanuel & Charoensilp, Pimmada & Yamada, Shoko, 2023. "The effects of game-based soft skills training: A quasi-experiment with Ethiopian garment workers," International Journal of Educational Development, Elsevier, vol. 101(C).
    6. Nataliya Kusa, 2018. "Should intra-familial time transfers be compensated financially?," MAGKS Papers on Economics 201802, Philipps-Universität Marburg, Faculty of Business Administration and Economics, Department of Economics (Volkswirtschaftliche Abteilung).
    7. Vaaramo, Mikko & Huikari, Sanna & Ala-Mursula, Leena & Miettunen, Jouko & Korhonen, Marko, 2024. "Temperament traits and economic preferences predict occupational choice beyond human capital variables," Labour Economics, Elsevier, vol. 90(C).
    8. LaFave, Daniel & Thomas, Duncan, 2017. "Extended families and child well-being," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 126(C), pages 52-65.
    9. Fulvia Pennoni & Beata Bal-Domańska, 2022. "NEETs and Youth Unemployment: A Longitudinal Comparison Across European Countries," Social Indicators Research: An International and Interdisciplinary Journal for Quality-of-Life Measurement, Springer, vol. 162(2), pages 739-761, July.
    10. Stephen Yeaple & Chong Xiang, 2017. "Educational Quality along Multiple Dimensions: A Cross-Country Analysis," 2017 Meeting Papers 510, Society for Economic Dynamics.
    11. Shubha Chakravarty & Sarah Haddock & Ioana Botea, 2016. "Providing Out-of-School Adolescent Girls with Skills," World Bank Publications - Reports 24571, The World Bank Group.
    12. David J. Deming, 2017. "The Growing Importance of Social Skills in the Labor Market," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 132(4), pages 1593-1640.
    13. Calderone, Margherita & Fiala, Nathan & Melyoki, Lemayon Lemilia & Schoofs, Annekathrin & Steinacher, Rachel, 2022. "Making intense skills training work at scale: Evidence on business and labor market outcomes in Tanzania," Ruhr Economic Papers 950, RWI - Leibniz-Institut für Wirtschaftsforschung, Ruhr-University Bochum, TU Dortmund University, University of Duisburg-Essen.
    14. Mihails Hazans & Jaan Masso & Per Botolf Maurseth, 2023. "Human values and selection into supervisory positions: Evidence from nine European countries," EGEIWP 01-2023, Dipartimento di Economia e Finanza - Università degli Studi di Bari "Aldo Moro", revised Dec 2023.
    15. Jieping Shi & Hui Qiu & Aohua Ni, 2023. "The Moderating Role of School Resources on the Relationship Between Student Socioeconomic Status and Social-Emotional Skills: Empirical Evidence from China," Applied Research in Quality of Life, Springer;International Society for Quality-of-Life Studies, vol. 18(5), pages 2349-2370, October.
    16. Shelly Lundberg, 2013. "The College Type: Personality and Educational Inequality," Journal of Labor Economics, University of Chicago Press, vol. 31(3), pages 421-441.
    17. Ruzica Savcic & Nikolaos Theodoropoulos & Dimitrios Xefteris, 2023. "Conscription and educational outcomes," Journal of Population Economics, Springer;European Society for Population Economics, vol. 36(4), pages 2799-2824, October.
    18. Peter Haan & Daniel Kemptner & Victoria Prowse & Maximilian Schaller, 2025. "Insurance, redistribution, and the inequality of lifetime income," Quantitative Economics, Econometric Society, vol. 16(2), pages 565-613, May.
    19. Pablo Lavado & Nelson Oviedo & Hernán Ruffo, 2016. "Destruction of Cognitive and Noncognitive Skills in Adulthood," Working Papers 16-07, Centro de Investigación, Universidad del Pacífico.
    20. Calero, Carla & Gonzalez Diez, Veronica & Soares, Yuri S.D. & Kluve, Jochen & Corseuil, Carlos Henrique, 2017. "Can arts-based interventions enhance labor market outcomes among youth? Evidence from a randomized trial in Rio de Janeiro," Labour Economics, Elsevier, vol. 45(C), pages 131-142.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    ;
    ;
    ;

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:gam:jsusta:v:13:y:2021:i:15:p:8591-:d:606665. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: MDPI Indexing Manager (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://www.mdpi.com .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.