Do emotional intelligence and previous caring experience influence student nurse performance? A comparative analysis

Abstract

Background: Reports of poor nursing care have focused attention on values based selection of candidates onto nursing programmes. Values based selection lacks clarity and valid measures. Previous caring experience might lead to better care. Emotional intelligence (EI) might be associated with performance, is conceptualised and measurable. Objectives: To examine the impact of 1) previous caring experience, 2) emotional intelligence 3) social connection scores on performance and retention in a cohort of first year nursing and midwifery students in Scotland. Design: A longitudinal, quasi experimental design. Setting: Adult and mental health nursing, and midwifery programmes in a Scottish University. Methods: Adult, mental health and midwifery students (n=598) completed the Trait Emotional Intelligence Questionnaire-short form and Schutte's Emotional Intelligence Scale on entry to their programmes at a Scottish University, alongside demographic and previous caring experience data. Social connection was calculated from a subset of questions identified within the TEIQue-SF in a prior factor and Rasch analysis. Student performance was calculated as the mean mark across the year. Withdrawal data were gathered. Results: 598 students completed baseline measures. 315 students declared previous caring experience, 277 not. An independent-samples t-test identified that those without previous caring experience scored higher on performance (57.33 ± 11.38) than those with previous caring experience (54.87 ± 11.19), a statistically significant difference of 2.47 (95% CI, 0.54 to 4.38), t(533) = 2.52, p = .012. Emotional intelligence scores were not associated with performance. Social connection scores for those withdrawing (mean rank = 249) and those remaining (mean rank = 304.75) were statistically significantly different, U = 15300, z = -2.61, p < 0.009. Conclusions: Previous caring experience led to worse performance in this cohort. Emotional intelligence was not a useful indicator of performance. Lower scores on the social connection factor were associated with withdrawal from the course.

The association between emotional intelligence and entrepreneurship as a career choice: A study on university students in South Africa

“…According to Zeidner et al (2009), emotional intelligence represents a strip of uncharted psychological terrain, and its exploration will add much to our comprehension of individual differences pertaining to emotion. However, Stenhouse et al (2016) take an opposing stance by remarking that it is, in fact, vastly theoretically conceptualised and empirically tested in psychology, and they attribute this as the reason behind the availability of numerous valid and reliable measurement instruments, which mitigate the problems of poorly defined variables. Walter, Humphrey and Cole (2012) pointed out that there is little consensus on the true meaning of emotional intelligence, resulting from the complexity of the construct and no generalised view on its applicability or its existence.…”

The predictive value of two on-site selection methods of undergraduate nursing students: A cohort study

“…It would have been interesting to assess the predictive validity of the different parts of the psychological aptitude test, such as personality testing (Wartegg I & II, Sentence Completion Test, SELF-test) and learning abilities, but unfortunately, we were only able to access the overall scores of the psychological aptitude test. According to the previous related literature, a combination of both cognitive [7,9] and non-cognitive [3,7,24] approaches may be useful in future nursing student selection. However, further identification of factors and methods to assess cognitive and non-cognitive skills of nursing students is required.…”

“…[3,23,24] Individual and group interviews are widely used, for example, in the United Kingdom, because of the requirement from the Nursing and the Midwifery Council for face-to-face contact with nursing applicants. [12,15] In a study by Ehrenfeld and Tabak, [19] individual interviews were more often associated with reduced attrition compared to group interviews, past performance and psychometric testing.…”

“…[22] Emotional intelligence tests have been used to assess personcentred skills or personal qualities, such as self-awareness and social interaction, in the on-site selection of nursing students. [3,24] Rankin [3] used the Assessing Emotions Scale (AES) to assess the emotional intelligence of nursing student applicants (n = 307) at one UK University. A significant predictive relationship was found between emotional intelligence and three program outcomes, practice performance, academic performance and retention, even after controlling for prior academic achievement, age and gender.…”

“…Prior academic attainment and overall emotional intelligence did not correlate, indicating that the two predict different outcomes. [3] Stenhouse et al, [24] used the Trait Emotional Intelligence Questionnaire-Short Form and the Schutte's Emotional Intelligence Scale upon entry to adult, mental health and midwifery programs (n = 598). They found that emotional intelligence scores were not associated with performance, but social connection scores for students withdrawing and remaining were statistically significantly different.…”