Principals’ Emotional Support of Teachers and Teachers’ Occupational Identity

Managerial reframing of subordinates’ negative emotions is a key part of on-the-job socio-emotional support. The objective behind this qualitative research study is to enhance our understanding of principal-induced reframing of teacher feelings. On the basis of data culled from interviews with 12 principals and 24 faculty members of elementary schools in Israel, we found that such acute emotions are liable to threaten the occupational identity of a teacher. In addition, the current research discovered that school managers avail themselves of various reframing communication tactics, such as empathic listening, words of empowerment, and normalizing messages.