Emotional Intelligence in Students

Abstract

Many studies exhibit that Emotional Intelligence (EI) improves academic performance (AP) in medical undergraduates and secondary schools. This study aims to examine whether there is a direct link between EI, expected workload and AP and amongst business students. The theory comprises of final year undergraduate students having higher EI in TEIQue-SF and final examination than the 1st and 2nd year students. The study consists of cross-sectional research among 732 (350 females, 382 males) undergraduate students in business doing their 1st, 2nd, and final year in Monash University, RMIT, and University of Melbourne, Australia. Students will be measured doing self-survey on socio-demographic, TEIQue-SF and final examined scores. It was determined that students who have high EI traits help to improve academic performance in final year business undergraduates. Furthermore, it showed that students who have a higher EI showed having a high level of self-regulation and self-awareness helped students to overcome their workload. Higher EI may increase academic performance in final year business students and decreasing the workload task, which helps for future business careers.

In the twenty-first century, the world has become more complicated and more challenging for everyone. Successful people are happier, having high emotion stability, while other people struggle to keep their emotions in check. Becoming a successful person with emotional stability requires a lot of energy and practice, starting with the university. University students who have high Emotional Intelligence (EI) ability perform excessively good, advancing into masters and getting a job. As the competition rises for academic performance so does the emotions to keep up with the workload (Roman & Roman, 2017). Emotions help students to get through academic life.

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Academic Performance (AP) depends on various elements: cognitive ability, emotions, motivations, surroundings, peers, family, support, etc. (Agrawal & SK, 2017). Students who are not able to handle their emotions become stressed on academic performance that causes them to feel stressed and depressed (Lewine, et al., 2011).

When studying emotional intelligence, it is important to understand to what extent does it affect Academic Performance. Chew, Zain, and Hassan, (2013) did a cross-sectional study on 1st and final year medical undergraduates studying if EI improves AP and future patient treatment. It was proven that higher EI may help medical students to perform better and improves their skills for future benefit. Ranasinghe, Wathurapatha, Mathangasinghe, and Ponnamperuma (2017) focused on medical students as a whole, determining if EI, and stress effect AP. In the research, it was concluded that people who have high EI especially self-satisfaction have lower stress levels and determining that EI enhances medical student’s AP and lowering stress levels. However, Qualter, Gardner, Pope, Hutchinson, and Whiteley (2012) focused on the school ground, doing a 5-year long term study on secondary students. The researchers wanted to test whether EI traits and ability help to improve school performance. The results for their research showed that 11 graders had higher EI traits especially in boys rather than girls, and it had confirmed that having the emotional abilities and traits does improve students’ academic performance. Maan and Nagar (2015) also focused on primary students but only in 11th grade. The researchers wanted to test if there is a connection between EI with AP. The results showed that from 5 components only 2 components: self-satisfaction and self-awareness, of EI helped to raise the AP, but the student’s romance and state of mind do effect AP.

The studies helped to understand that Emotional Intelligence does improve Academic Performance to some level, but few setbacks researches faced in their research. Most of the studies largely conducted on medical students, and primary school. Where the population was limited and based on one building. Maan and Nagar (2015) study only focused on 11th grade and not the whole primary school and based on one school in India. In comparison Chew, Zain, and Hassan, (2013) focused primarily on medical students in there 1st and final year, and not the entire year course. Additionally, it was based on one university in Malaysia.

This study aims to use the previous knowledge to measure what traits of Emotional Intelligence help improve Academic Performance despite the workload. It is hypothesised that the final year students will have a higher EI than the 1st and 2nd year students overcoming academic workload for greater Academic Performance.

Expected Outcome and Limitations

When the hypothesis is supported, then there is a direct link between Emotional Intelligence (EI) improving Academic performance (AP) in business undergraduates. EI consist of a mix of emotions and intelligence, where it helps students to think and reason logically on a task. EI traits consist of 5 components self-awareness, self-regulation, motivation, empathy and social skills (Roman & Roman, 2017). These traits help students to communicate, enhancing leadership roles, friendships and understanding own strength and weaknesses. AP is where communication, written, logical thinking, and knowledge growth is being assessed and performed (Pamela Qualter a, 2012). Therefore, when a student has a high level of EI then AP will also be high in completing the task. A study conducted by Dubey and Bakhshi (2018) showed Emotional Intelligence rises as the students grow and mature. This experiment shows that EI can increase with age and that the learned experience helps the student to perform better in academics.

When the hypothesis does not support the statement then there is a weak relationship between EI and AP. It means that certain traits of EI do not help enhance the academic performance Maan and Nagar (2015) and show that students are unable to engage themselves in the environment and there is no knowledge being intercepted (Dubey & Bakhshi, 2018). However, if EI does not have any relationship in AP then there might be other factors affecting the students to perform.

The research has a few limitations that were encountered. The study focused on undergraduate specifically and not measuring other potential students. The information will be based on undergraduate Emotional Intelligence with academic achievements. The second limitation is that the research was conducted primarily on business students and neglecting other streams to get more information on EI. Finally, the research was based to measure the direct link between EI, expected workload and AP. For future research, there should be a study to determine the relationship that the family background and situation have a direct link with EI on academic performance in business students.

References

1. Roman, M., & Roman, V. (2017). EMOTIONAL INTELLIGENCE – WHAT IS IT AND WHY DOES IT MATTER? International Journal of Communication Research, 7(4), 275-282. Retrieved from https://search-proquest-com.ezproxy.lib.monash.edu.au/docview/1989828493?accountid=12528
2. Qualter, P., Gardner, K. J., Pope, D. J., Hutchinson, J. M., & Whiteley, H. E. (2012). Ability emotional intelligence, trait emotional intelligence, and academic success in british secondary schools: A 5 year longitudinal study. Learning and Individual Differences, 22(1), 83-91. doi:http://dx.doi.org.ezproxy.lib.monash.edu.au/10.1016/j.lindif.2011.11.007
3. Dubey, C., & Bakhshi, P. (2018). A study on emotional intelligence amongst management students. BVIMSR’s Journal of Management Research, 10(1), 31-41. Retrieved from https://search-proquest-com.ezproxy.lib.monash.edu.au/docview/2038188488?accountid=12528