Emotional intelligence and interpersonal relationship quality as predictors of high school physical education teachers’ intrinsic motivation

Teachers’ intrinsic motivation for their work supports a host of adaptive outcomes for teachers and students. In this study, we examined novel predictive pathways linking teachers’ emotional intelligence, psychological need satisfaction within their workplace relationships (i.e., with students, colleagues, and principal), and their intrinsic motivation for their work. Australian high school physical education teachers (N = 110) reported their emotional intelligence, need satisfaction within their relationships with students, colleagues, and their principal, and their intrinsic motivation for teaching. Multiple mediation analyses revealed that emotional intelligence directly and positively predicted all relationship need satisfaction variables, and indirectly predicted greater intrinsic motivation via student-focused relationship need satisfaction. These findings contribute to our knowledge about emotional intelligence among high school teachers, and may provide practical insight into potential strategies—grounded in emotional intelligence frameworks—for supporting teachers’ relationship-specific need satisfaction and motivation at work.