The Emotional Facilitation Skills of Online Educators Contributing to Positive Outcomes in Private Learning Systems

The article discusses the role of emotional facilitation––one of the four skills supporting the Mayer-Salovey Emotional Intelligence model––in the way a selected group of online professors advances positive outcomes in successful colleges and universities. The attention was placed on how the educators use emotions harnessed in their online classes to facilitate learning. The study1was based on a qualitative design involving a final purposive sample of (N=17) online professors employed at four distinguished American institutions. Based on the results of the Mayer-Salovey-Caruso Emotional Intelligence Test (MSCEIT), the best performing examinees were invited to participate in semi-structured interviews. The results suggest the respondents' emotional facilitation skills play a leading role in positive outcomes experienced in class.