Emotional intelligence and academic performance among nursing students

In the modern world students feel difficult to control their emotions in order to face various situations in their academic as well as personal life. Success in academics can be predicted more by emotional measures. A student must be emotionally intelligent and mentally healthy so that he can achieve good academic results also. The study was descriptive in nature and purposive sampling technique was used. Three hundred 4th year BSc nursing students from selected government and private nursing colleges in Kerala were included in this study. Socio-personal data sheet, Mangal’s emotional intelligence inventory and observation record were used to assess the demographic data, emotional intelligence and academic performance of nursing students respectively. The findings revealed that emotional intelligence and academic performance were correlated (ρ =0.71, p<0.01). And no difference was found in the emotional intelligence of nursing students between government and private nursing colleges. Also there was significant difference in the academic performance of nursing students between government and private nursing colleges (t=4.69, p<0.001). Majority of the students had average emotional intelligence and found that emotional intelligence increases with academic performance. Integration of emotional intelligence in to the nursing curriculum provides nurses to enhance the quality of their clinical practice and thereby overall professional development.