EDUCATIVE SOCIAL SKILLS OF UNIVERSITY TEACHERS: PROPOSAL OF A CONCEPTUAL FRAMEWORK

ABSTRACT The quality of teacher-student relationship, as regards higher education, is important due to its impact on the process of learning and adaptation to higher education, to the changes in the profile of college students and the paradigm of teaching performance, and to the social responsibility of the university. From the literature on factors that interfere in the teacher-student relationship in higher education, from the theoretical-practical field of social skills and from the empirical data on the social behaviors presented by university professors in the interaction with their students, this study presents a conceptual framework about the performance of the teacher in interaction with his students concerning higher education. The proposed structure involves (a) relevant variables in the context in which performance occurs, (b) possible behavioral patterns presented by the teacher in interaction with students and (c) the consequences that each of these patterns can have on the student’s learning and about the relationship itself.