What Matters is the Emotion: Natural Leadership to Promote Well-Being in School

The study focuses on identifying the level of natural leadership among students based on the emotions they elicit in their peers. A social network analysis methodology is used, where students in a classroom evaluate their classmates and identify the emotions they most frequently feel when interacting with them. Additionally, students are asked to assign a leadership level (low, medium, or high) to their peers. A statistically significant positive correlation is identified between high leadership, joy, and trust. The article is innovative because it centers on the perceived emotion of individuals based on the leadership level of others. This topic is relevant because most previous studies focused on the emotions or emotional intelligence of leaders and the effects they have on their followers or subordinates. The article concludes by discussing the implications of natural leadership for positively impacting academic goal such as school well-being, academic performance, and reducing harmful phenomena within the classroom, such as dropout or bullying.