The present study aimed to analyze the association between of the dimensions of emotional intelligence (attention, clarity, and repair) and different levels of perceived happiness (low, medium, and high) in adolescents. The sample consists of 646 students in the first, second, third, and fourth years of Secondary Education, 47.5% females and 52.5% males, between 12 and 17 years of age. The instruments used were the Spanish version of the Trait Meta Mood Scale-24 Questionnaire to measure perceived emotional intelligence and the Oxford Happiness Questionnaire. Multinomial logistic regression analysis and receiver operating characteristic (ROC) curve analysis were performed. The results suggest that as the capacity of understanding and regulation of emotional intelligence increases, happiness also increases. Adolescence is seen as an ideal time in life to encourage the development of emotional capacities that contribute to the greater happiness of individuals. In this way, the present study stresses the need to carry out practices leading to improvements in the adolescents’ emotional intelligence and therefore increase their happiness and emotional well-being.

Cooperative learning encourages the development of interpersonal skills and motivates students to participate more actively in the teaching and learning process. This study explores the impact of cooperative learning on the academic goals influencing university students’ behavior and leading to the attainment of a series of academic objectives. To this end, a quasi-experimental pretest-posttest control group design was used, with a sample of 509 university students from Preschool, Primary and Social Education undergraduate degree courses. Using the Academic Goals Questionnaire (AGQ), pretest and posttest measures were taken via self-reports to evaluate three types of academic goals: learning goals, social reinforcement goals and achievement goals. The results show that cooperative learning is an effective tool for encouraging university students to develop academic goals that motivate them to fully engage with the tasks they are set in order to acquire knowledge and skills (learning goals). In addition, when students are asked to work as part of a team on an autonomous basis without the structure and supervision necessary to ensure a minimum standard of cooperation, they display a greater tendency toward social reinforcement goals than toward learning and achievement goals. These findings contribute new knowledge to the conceptual framework on cooperative learning. Goals may be considered one of the most important variables influencing students’ learning and the use of cooperative learning techniques in university classrooms creates the necessary conditions for encouraging students to develop goals oriented toward learning.

The cooperative methodology provides an opportunity for university students to develop interpersonal, social, and teamwork competences which can be decisive in their professional and social success. The research described here examines the influence of cooperative learning on the social skills necessary for teamwork. Furthermore, it analyses whether the continued use of this type of learning, the type of group, the basic social skills for teamwork, or the academic level of the students, influence their efficacy. To do so, we have designed a research project of a quasi-experimental kind with a pre-test, a post-test, and a control group, in which 346 university undergraduate students studying degrees in Infant and Primary Education completed self-report surveys about behavior patterns in social skills concerning self-assertion and the reception and imparting of information in teamwork situations. The results show that cooperative learning in university classrooms is effective as a method for developing the social skills necessary for teamwork, as well as the relevance of the control over the number of students in a group, the basic social skills, or the academic level of the students, as relevant factors related with efficacy; where continuity over time in the use of the cooperative methodology is what marks the greatest differences in the development of the social skills necessary for teamwork. It is important to stress that when students are asked to work autonomously in teams, with the aim of favoring the development of social skills, they should be given adequate structures that can guarantee the minimum conditions of participation, so as to allow a proper development of the said social skills.

There is no denying the fundamental role played by parents in the psychosocial development of their children—either as a liability or as protection against mental health disorders. This study seeks to ascertain, by means of odds ratio statistics (OR), the correlation between parental psychological control and emotional and behavioral disorders. A total of 762 students took part in this study, with an average age of 12.23 years—53.8% of whom were girls and 46.2% were boys. Children and adolescents reported their parental psychological control and their emotional and behavioral disorders (i.e., emotional and behavioral problems, internalizing and externalizing problems). Minors who perceive their psychological control as high are 6 times more likely to suffer from internalizing disorders and 4.8 times more likely to develop externalizing disorders. Furthermore, the probability of suffering externalizing disorders is higher among males who perceive a high degree of psychological control. This study breaks new ground on the importance of perceived psychological control—considered as a negative form of control by parents—in the emotional and behavioral disorders among children and adolescents.

The present study focuses on analyzing the relationship between the parental acceptance–rejection perceived by adolescents and emotional instability from the early stages of adolescence. Special attention will be paid to potential differences between mothers and fathers. A total of 1181 students, aged 11–17, took part in the study. We used the factor of emotional instability in the Big Five Questionnaire (BFQ-NA) and an affect scale (EA-H) to measure parental acceptance–rejection. The analyses performed show a clear association between emotional instability with maternal/paternal criticism and rejection. Specifically, maternal criticism and rejection in early adolescence and paternal criticism and rejection in middle adolescence were associated with emotional instability, confirming the association between children’s and adolescents’ emotional adjustment and family dynamics. This study makes interesting contributions to understanding paternal and maternal rejection during the different stages of adolescence. These differences should be incorporated into the research on parental influence and its role in the development of personality among adolescents.

School bullying is a phenomenon of unjustified aggression in the school environment that is widespread throughout the world and with serious consequences for both the bully and the bullied. The objectives of this research were to analyze the differences between the different bullying categories by gender and academic year in primary and secondary education students, as well as their relationship with academic performance. To categorize students according to their bullying experiences, the European Bullying Intervention Project (EBIPQ) Questionnaire was used. The Chi-square test was used to compare the scores obtained by the students in the EBIPQ based on gender and academic year, and the one-way ANOVA test was used to analyze its relationship with academic performance. Research participants were 562 students from the 5th (n = 228) and 6th (n = 186) primary school years and the 1st (n = 134) and 2nd (n = 94) secondary school years. They were males (50.5%) and females (49.5%) ranging in ages from 10 to 15 years old (mean = 11.66, standard deviation = 1.206). The results showed statistically significant differences in gender and academic year, indicating a greater number of boys in the role of the bully/victim and girls in that of non-bully/non-victim. The most aggressive students were in the 2nd year of ESO (12–13 years old). Regarding academic performance, statistically significant differences were obtained that confirm the hypothesis that performance or average grade varies according to the category of bullying in which students find themselves. The academic performance of the non-bully/non-victim and those in the victim category was found to be higher than that of bullies and bully/victim students.