The relationship between preschool teacher trait mindfulness and teacher-child relationship quality: the chain mediating role of emotional intelligence and empathy

The teacher-child relationship plays an important role in children’s future development. However, the existing research mainly focuses on the influence of preschool teachers’ external conditions on the teacher-student relationship, while the research on the influence of teachers’ internal psychological characteristics on the teacher-student relationship is relatively lacking. In this study, three hundred and seventeen preschool teachers were tested were tested with Five Facet Mindfulness Questionnaire, Emotional Intelligence Scale, Chinese Interpersonal Response Index, and Teacher-student Relationship Scale. The results showed that trait mindfulness positively predicted the quality of parent-teacher relationship (β = 0.173, p = 0.026). Emotional intelligence played a mediating role in trait mindfulness and teacher-child relationship quality (β = 0.118, p = 0.004), and empathy played a mediating role in trait mindfulness and teacher-child relationship quality (β = 0.112, p = 0.001). Meanwhile, emotional intelligence and empathy played a chain mediating role in trait mindfulness and parent-teacher relationship quality (β = 0.044, p = 0.038). On the one hand, this study enriches attachment theory. The conclusions of this study verify the diversity of proximal factors in attachment theory, and confirm the influence of teachers’ own characteristics and abilities on the teacher-child relationship quality. On the other hand, by exploring the factors affecting the teacher-child relationship quality, we can find ways to improve teacher-child relationship from a new perspective, and then provide some new methods and approaches for improving the quality of preschool teacher-child relationship.