“For Me and for you”. Relationship between Teachers’ Mentalizing and Functioning in Their Professional Role and the Students’ Development
Abstract
The teaching profession is one of those in which interaction with another person, communication, engagement, and emotional exchange, play an important role. Mentalizing is an ability to understand one’s own and other people’s mental states as causes of behaviour (Białecka-Pikul, 2012), and it seems to be one of the foundations of creating satisfying relationships with others, including teacher-student relationships. The purpose of this article is to present the existing research on mentalizing abilities in teachers. A review of the literature on the subject suggests the need to identify at least two groups of research in this area. First, the research focuses on the role of mentalizing for teachers’ functioning in their professional role, and second, it shows the relationship between teachers’ mentalizing and the functioning of their students. The review indicates that mentalizing can be a protective factor for teacher well-being and a facilitator of classroom relationships and student development. However, conclusions should be made with caution, as research on this issue has been conducted for a short time, and the collected data needs to be deepened and replicated in further studies.
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