Abstract: Unlike the evidence-based educational research which emphasizes the positivist epistemology and experimental methods, empirical research featuring evidence-based and diverse methods seems particularly important for contemporary educational research in China. Empirical educational researchers advocate that all claims about specific objects are based on the evidence obtained from rigorous quantitative or qualitative inquiry, which can be well examined by human logic. The investigation on teachers' emotional labor in mainland China presents an approach to empirical educational research, that is, the 3R journey consisting of re-view, re-search, and re-conceptualization. It's argued in this article that the empirical educational researchers should pay attention to the dialectical relationship between theory and practice, and ensure the smooth transfer between the ideas and the experiences in order to enrich our understanding and increase human knowledge.

Key words: emotional labor, teacher, teaching, empirical educational research