Evoking teacher’s professional commitment: Exploring interpersonal communication in transmitting emotional intelligence and psychological capital

Teacher professional commitment is vital for developing school organization, including teacher performance and students’ achievement. Accordingly, this study aims to investigate teachers’ professional commitment through emotional intelligence, psychological capital, and interpersonal communication perspective, along with discovering a novelty in mediating the role of interpersonal communication on the relationship between emotional intelligence and psychological capital with teachers’ professional commitment. The researchers created a Likert scale model questionnaire and shared it with 522 government-employed Indonesian teachers of junior and senior high school determined by accidental sampling from seven provinces. Structural equation modeling supported by correlational, descriptive, and common method bias analyses is used in data analysis. Emotional intelligence, psychological capital, and interpersonal communication were found having a direct influence on teachers’ professional commitment in this study. Furthermore, interpersonal communication has mediated the indirect influence of emotional intelligence and psychological capital on teachers’ professional commitment. It has been established that a novel model of interpersonal communication mediates the impact of emotional intelligence and psychological capital on teachers’ professional commitment. As an implication, teachers’ professional commitment can be increased through improved emotional intelligence, psychological capital, and interpersonal communication. Therefore, the new empirical model can be discussed in-depth and critically before being used and modified by researchers and practitioners in their work in the future.