The Relationship between Cognitive Emotion Regulation Strategies, Emotional Creativity, and Happiness among Primary School Teachers

The Relationship between Cognitive Emotion Regulation Strategies, Emotional Creativity, and Happiness among Primary School Teachers M. Shabanpour M. Hafezian, Ph.D. This research was undertaken to identify the relationship between cognitive emotion regulation strategies, emotional creativity, and happiness. The research method was correlational and the statistical population included all elementary school teachers of Miandorood (130 females and 60 males). The statistical sample consisted of 149 teachers (97 females and 52 males) who were chosen by random stratified sampling. The instrumentation comprised Garnefski’s Cognitive Emotion Regulation Questionnaire, Averill’s Emotional Creativity Inventory and Oxford Happiness Questionnaire. For the purpose of data analysis, Pearson product-moment correlation coefficient, stepwise regression, and independent t-test were utilized. The findings demonstrated that cognitive emotion regulation strategies were positively correlated with emotional creativity and happiness. In addition, significant differences were observed between the two genders regarding emotional creativity. Furthermore, results of multivariate regression indicated that amongst the components of cognitive emotion regulation strategies, positive refocusing and mental rumination had the highest and lowest impacts on happiness, respectively. And the results of independent t-test showed that gender and marital status did not impact the teachers’ happiness, however, gender affected teachers’ emotional creativity. Key words: cognitive emotion regulation strategies, emotional creativity, happiness, elementary school teachers