The role of trait emotional intelligence in academic performance and deviant behavior at school

https://doi.org/10.1016/S0191-8869(03)00084-9Get rights and content

Abstract

This paper examines the role of trait emotional intelligence (‘trait EI') in academic performance and in deviant behavior at school on a sample of 650 pupils in British secondary education (mean age ≈16.5 years). Trait EI moderated the relationship between cognitive ability and academic performance. In addition, pupils with high trait EI scores were less likely to have had unauthorized absences and less likely to have been excluded from school. Most trait EI effects persisted even after controlling for personality variance. It is concluded that the constellation of emotion-related self-perceived abilities and dispositions that the construct of trait EI encompasses is implicated in academic performance and deviant behavior, with effects that are particularly relevant to vulnerable or disadvantaged adolescents.

Introduction

Emotional intelligence (EI) has recently attracted a lot of interest in the academic literature (Charbonneau and Nicol, 2002, Ciarrochi et al., 2002, Mayer et al., 2000, Palmer et al., 2002, Petrides and Furnham, in press, Roberts et al., 2001, Saklofske et al., in press). The distal roots of EI can be traced back to the concept of ‘social intelligence,’ coined by E.L. Thorndike (1920) to refer to the ability to understand and manage people and to act wisely in human relations. Its proximal roots lie in the work of Gardner (1983) and, more specifically, in his concepts of intrapersonal and interpersonal intelligence. EI as a term has been present in the literature for a relatively long time (Greenspan, 1989, Leuner, 1966), although it was not until 1990 that the construct was introduced in its present form (Salovey & Mayer, 1990). EI was propelled into prominence by Goleman's (1995) best-selling book and a subsequent lead article in TIME magazine (Gibbs, 1995). Thereafter, articles on EI began to appear with increasing frequency across a wide range of academic and popular outlets. Nevertheless, the quantity of empirical work carried out on the construct, including the development of appropriate measures, seems to bear an inverse relationship to the interest it has attracted in the scientific and popular literature.

Petrides and Furnham, 2000a, Petrides and Furnham, 2000b, Petrides and Furnham, 2001 proposed a clear conceptual distinction between two types of EI, i.e., trait EI and ability EI. Trait EI (or ‘emotional self-efficacy’) refers to a constellation of behavioral dispositions and self-perceptions concerning one's ability to recognize, process, and utilize emotion-laden information. It encompasses various dispositions from the personality domain, such as empathy, impulsivity, and assertiveness as well as elements of social intelligence (Thorndike, 1920) and personal intelligence (Gardner, 1983), the latter two in the form of self-perceived abilities. Ability EI (or ‘cognitive-emotional ability’) refers to one's actual ability to recognize, process, and utilize emotion-laden information. Trait EI is measured through self-report questionnaires and pertains to the realm of personality. Ability EI requires the use of maximum-performance tests with correct and incorrect responses and pertains primarily to the realm of cognitive ability. This is an important distinction inasmuch as it bears directly on the operationalization of the construct and thence on the theories and hypotheses that are formulated about it.

The measurement of ability EI remains a challenging task given the difficulty of devising relevant items that can be objectively scored as correct or incorrect (Petrides and Furnham, 2001, Roberts et al., 2001). In contrast, the measurement of trait EI is much more straightforward and there already exist several widely used instruments for its assessment (e.g., Bar-On, 1997, Schutte et al., 1998). The theoretical underpinnings of trait EI, along with an operational definition of the construct and its precise location in established trait hierarchies are presented in Petrides and Furnham (2001).

The aim of this paper is to evaluate a series of hypotheses concerning the potential role of trait EI in academic performance and in deviant behavior at school. A finding that has been viewed with some concern is that EI, measured through self-report, seems to be uncorrelated to cognitive ability and academic performance (e.g., Newsome et al., 2000, van der Zee et al., 2002). Viewed within the context of the distinction between trait and ability EI, however, this finding is to be expected. Trait EI, which is assessed through self-report instruments, is a personality trait rather than a cognitive ability and as such it should not be expected to show strong associations either with psychometric intelligence or with proxies thereof (see Eysenck, 1994, McCrae, 1994, Zeidner, 1995). Indeed, all the available empirical evidence clearly suggests that trait EI is virtually orthogonal to cognitive ability (Derksen et al., 2002, Newsome et al., 2000, Saklofske et al., in press).

Any investigation of the potential effects of trait EI on academic performance must be pursued in a specific context, for instance, across clearly differentiated groups of individuals. As an example, it is worth noting a study by Reiff, Hatzes, Bramel, and Gibbon (2001), showing that students with learning disabilities had lower trait EI scores than their non-disabled counterparts. While an individual's emotion-related self-perceptions are unlikely to be directly associated with better or poorer scholastic achievement, it is quite possible that they might interact with variables that are (e.g., cognitive ability).

In general, we may expect any effects that trait EI might have on scholastic achievement to be more pronounced in vulnerable groups (e.g., low ability, maladjusted, learning-disabled). This is because vulnerable or disadvantaged individuals are more likely to experience stress and emotional difficulties during the course of their studies and, consequently, they are more likely to benefit from an adaptive disposition to deal with such difficulties. The present study examines this and other issues in a comprehensive multivariate investigation based on a large sample, several different academic subjects, and multiple criteria of both academic performance and deviant behavior in school.

More specifically, we will investigate the relationship between trait EI and scholastic achievement with data from national examinations in various academic subjects. Furthermore, we will look at whether trait EI is associated with deviant behaviors, such as truancy and unruliness in secondary schools. Last, we will examine the incremental validity of trait EI vis-à-vis the three Eysenckian personality dimensions (Barrett et al., 1998, Eysenck, 1947, Eysenck, 1997; for a detailed discussion of issues concerning incremental validity see Petrides & Furnham, 2003).

Given that trait EI may be especially relevant to vulnerable groups, e.g. learning disabled or low IQ individuals, it might be expected to act as a moderator of the effects of cognitive ability on academic performance. In particular, high trait EI is likely to be associated with better performance in pupils with low cognitive ability. It is unclear, however, whether such an effect might vary across different subjects (e.g., mathematics and English), as is the case with psychometric intelligence (Jensen, 1998).

Low trait EI may be a key ingredient in a variety of deviant behaviors, many of which have been repeatedly linked to emotional deficits (Cohen and Strayer, 1996, Eisenberg, 2000, Roberts and Strayer, 1996). Moreover, there is evidence that negative self-perceptions are associated with both truancy and classroom disruption at secondary school level (Fergusson et al., 1995, Williamson and Cullingford, 1998). A low level of emotional self-efficacy, in combination with increased impulsivity and poor social skills, are likely to be implicated in various forms of antisocial behavior. We hypothesized that trait EI will be negatively related both to exclusions (suspensions due to serious breaches of school discipline) and to unauthorized absences (truancy) from school.

Section snippets

Participants

Questionnaire data were collected from 901 pupils. Complete data were available for about 650 of them, although the actual sample size varies depending on the variables involved in the various analyses. Approximately 52% of participants were males and 48% females. All participants were Year 11 pupils in British secondary education (mean age of approximately 16.5 years).

Trait Emotional Intelligence Questionnaire (TEIQue)1

Trait EI was assessed with a 144-item questionnaire based on a five-point Likert scale. Most items were drawn from existing

Structural equation model

In order to provide an overall picture of this relatively large and complex data set, a structural equation model was set up in LISREL 8.3 (Jöreskog & Sörbom, 1993), whereby IQ and trait EI were modelled as exogenous variables and KS3 and GCSE as endogenous variables.

Fig. 1 presents the tested statistical model, along with the standardized parameter estimates. The model represented a good fit to the data: χ2(13)=61.73, RMSEA=0.07, GFI=0.98, CFI=0.99, SRMR=0.02. We note in passing the negative

Discussion

The influence of IQ on scholastic achievement is well documented (Jensen, 1993, Mackintosh, 1998, Neisser et al., 1996) and will not be discussed here, except to note that the markedly strong effects witnessed in this study are related to the breadth of the sample. Despite the limited scope for additional influences from other variables, trait EI was significantly related to scholastic achievement, with its effects having noteworthy implications for low IQ pupils.

Concluding remarks

The present findings suggest that trait EI is relevant to scholastic achievement and deviant behavior at school, especially for disadvantaged and vulnerable adolescents. These results are in line with previous research on trait EI (Reiff et al., 2001), in particular, and with theories and findings highlighting the importance of cognate constructs during the critical period of adolescence, more generally (Cohen and Strayer, 1996, Eisenberg, 2000, Gottfredson, 2001). All this research converges

Acknowledgements

K.V.P. was supported by a Postdoctoral Fellowship from the Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC). The Study was supported by a grant from the Buckinghamshire County Council Educational Authority (UK). We are grateful to the Director of Education, Buckinghamshire County Council and to the head teachers, staff, and pupils of the participating schools for their continuous logistical support throughout the study.

References (64)

  • K.V Petrides et al.

    On the dimensional structure of emotional intelligence

    Personality and Individual Differences

    (2000)
  • N.S Schutte et al.

    Development and validation of a measure of emotional intelligence

    Personality and Individual Differences

    (1998)
  • C.D Spielberger

    The effects of anxiety on complex learning and academic achievement

  • L.S Aiken et al.

    Multiple regression: testing and interpreting interactions

    (1991)
  • R Bar-On

    BarOn Emotional Quotient Inventory: technical manual

    (1997)
  • M Boekaerts

    Being concerned with well-being and with learning

    Educational Psychologist

    (1993)
  • J.C Caruso et al.

    Reliability of scores from the Eysenck Personality Questionnairea reliability generalization study

    Educational and Psychological Measurement

    (2001)
  • D Cohen et al.

    Empathy in conduct-disordered and comparison youth

    Developmental Psychology

    (1996)
  • R.B Darlington

    Regression and linear models

    (1990)
  • B De Raad et al.

    Personality in learning and educationa review

    European Journal of Personality

    (1996)
  • N Eisenberg

    Emotion, regulation, and moral development

    Annual Review of Psychology

    (2000)
  • H.J Eysenck

    Dimensions of personality

    (1947)
  • H.J Eysenck

    Personality and intelligence: psychometric and experimental approaches

  • H.J Eysenck

    Personality and the experimental study of education

    European Journal of Personality

    (1996)
  • H.J Eysenck

    Personality and experimental psychologythe unification of psychology and the possibility of a paradigm

    Journal of Personality and Social Psychology

    (1997)
  • D.M Fergusson et al.

    Truancy in adolescence

    New Zealand Journal of Educational Studies

    (1995)
  • H.S Friedman et al.

    Understanding and assessing nonverbal expressivenessthe Affective Communication Test

    Journal of Personality and Social Psychology

    (1980)
  • R.J Friedrich

    In defense of multiplicative terms in multiple-regression equations

    American Journal of Political Science

    (1982)
  • H Gardner

    Frames of mind: the theory of multiple intelligences

    (1983)
  • N Gibbs

    ( October 2). The EQ factor

    Time

    (1995)
  • D Goleman

    Emotional intelligence: why it can matter more than IQ

    (1995)
  • D.C Gottfredson

    Schools and delinquency

    (2001)
  • Cited by (0)

    View full text