The Influence of Demographic Profiles on Emotional Intelligence: A Study on Polytechnic Lecturers in Malaysia
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Abstract
Emotional Intelligence (EI) is defined as an ability to identify, understand, experience and express human emotions in a healthy productive way (Nelson, Low, & Nelson, 2006) . The benefits of demonstrating high frequency of emotional intelligence in the workplace is vast especially in service based professions like teaching. Therefore this study is aimed to explore the level of EI among lectures from a polytechnic in Malaysia and in the same time explore the influence of demographic profiles towards those levels. Demographic profiles such as gender, age group, occupational grade, working experience in the current job and prior working experience in the industry are selected. The Genos Emotional Intelligence Inventory (Concise version) was distributed to all the academic departments and the total number of respondents were n=162. Findings show that the overall level of EI is average. Gender groups and prior working experience groups were not significantly different when compared to the levels of emotional intelligence. Where else age, academic qualification, occupational grade and working experience as a lecturer proof to have statistically significance difference among the groups. Thus levels of emotional intelligence among the lecturers proof to improve with age, teaching experience, grade and education.
Keywords
Abstract
Emotional Intelligence (EI) is defined as an ability to identify, understand, experience and express human emotions in a healthy productive way (Nelson, Low, & Nelson, 2006) . The benefits of demonstrating high frequency of emotional intelligence in the workplace is vast especially in service based professions like teaching. Therefore this study is aimed to explore the level of EI among lectures from a polytechnic in Malaysia and in the same time explore the influence of demographic profiles towards those levels. Demographic profiles such as gender, age group, occupational grade, working experience in the current job and prior working experience in the industry are selected. The Genos Emotional Intelligence Inventory (Concise version) was distributed to all the academic departments and the total number of respondents were n=162. Findings show that the overall level of EI is average. Gender groups and prior working experience groups were not significantly different when compared to the levels of emotional intelligence. Where else age, academic qualification, occupational grade and working experience as a lecturer proof to have statistically significance difference among the groups. Thus levels of emotional intelligence among the lecturers proof to improve with age, teaching experience, grade and education.
Keywords
- According to Goleman (1995), emotional intelligence could be divided into five domains as follows: self awareness, managing emotions, motivating others, recognizing emotions and handling relationships. These five domains description are outlined in Table 1. According to Bradberry and Greaves (2005), Golemans’ 5 domains could be summarized into two main competencies as personal competencies and social competencies. Personal competencies are divided into self-awareness and self- management and social competencies is divided into social awareness and relationship management. Salovey and Mayer’s Four Branch Model of Emotional Intelligence (EI) defined the overall emotional intelligence of a person as a joined ability between accurately perceiving emotions, using emotions to facilitate thoughts, understand emotions and managing emotions (Mayer, Roberts & Barsade, 2008).
- Palmer (2003) in his study analyzed various models of emotional intelligence such as Mayer-Salovey- Caruso, Bar-On’s , The Trait Meta-Mood Scale, Toronto Alexithymia Scale (TAS-20) and Self-Report Measure Of Emotional Intelligence (SEI ) proposed a new taxonomic model of EI with five domains; Emotional Recognition and Expression, Understanding Emotions External, Emotions Direct Cognition, Intrapersonal Management and Interpersonal Management. Based on Palmers model, Schutte Self- Report Emotional Intelligence (SSREI) and the Swinbourne University Emotional Intelligence Test (SUEIT), the GENOS model of emotional intelligence was developed The Genos Model of Emotional Intelligence describes seven factors or domains that are outlined in Table 2. The inventory developed based on Genos EI model was chosen as it designed for workplace settings (Palmer, Stough, Harmer and Gignac, 2009).
- determines popularity, leadership and interpersonal effectiveness. Note: Summary of emotional domains from Emotional Intelligence (Goleman, 1995). Table 2. Genos Model of Emotional Intelligence Factor name Description Emotional Self – Awareness The skill to perceive and understand your own emotion Emotional Expression The skill to effectively express your own emotion Emotional Awareness of Others The skill of perceiving and understanding others’ emotion. Emotional Reasoning
- Manual (Gignac, 2008). The frequency distributions and percentage of the 162 respondents are as in Table 4.
- Discussion Based on the results, it can be concluded that the level of emotional intelligence based on self rating GENOS Emotional Intelligence inventory is found to be average. The results prove to be similar to the results on the level emotional intelligence on school teachers in Malaysia as reported by Noriah et.al., (2010). Table 5 is the interpretive guideline for the level of EI based on the technical manual provided by Genos EI. Table 5. Interpretive guidelines of levels of emotional intelligence in the workplace Categorisation of emotional intelligence
- Note: Adapted from Genos Emotional Intelligence Inventory: Technical Manual (Gignac, 2008)
- Between the male and female genders, emotional intelligence of the female (Md=3.32) were slightly higher than the male (Md=3.29) lecturers. Some studies revealed that women tend to have higher emotional intelligence than male (Condren, Martin, & Hutchinson, 2006 ; Rohana et al., 2009). The result of this study does prove to be similar with Condren et. al. yet the researchers would have to agree with Beisecker and Barchard (2004) that claims that the difference between genders are usually not significant especially in self rated emotional inventories.
- Based on research findings provided by the Reuven Bar-On.org, emotional intelligence of older groups usually scored significantly higher than the younger groups and respondents in their late 40s obtained the highest mean scores (Bar-On, 2007) .The results of this study supports Bar-On’s study, as there were significant difference between the age groups of the lecturers, however as the test conducted was a nonparametric test, the median value was calculated. The median value for the respondents that were in the group more than 40 years scored the highest value. Based on a study done by Noriah et.al (2006), Malaysian respondents suggest spirituality and maturity as important aspects to develop stable emotion. Maturity due to age could also be a supporting factor to the high level of emotional intelligence among those above 40 years.
- Empirical studies in this area such as by Penrose, Perry, and Ball (2007) claimed that the relationship between working experience and occupational grade with emotional intelligence still remains unclear. Rohana et al., (2009) reported that age group; length of service, position and experience did not have an impact on the level of emotional intelligence. However it is suggested that further research be conducted on educators’ emotional intelligence in Malaysia as they feels that it has not been explored in-depth yet (Noriah et.al.,2006; Rohana et al., 2009). The researcher feels it is important to implement training in EI as most of the educators were not aware of the term ‚emotional intelligence’’ itself and how it could be beneficial for them. Ting and Cheah (2010) claimed that higher education institution could gain much from implementing emotional intelligence in their institution. In addition, based on the research respond rate, the researcher feels that in the context of Malaysia polytechnics it is important to implement dual language questionnaires as some of the respondents were not comfortable with English based questionnaires.
- Conclusion As the findings of this research proved that emotional intelligence improves with age and experience, the researcher would agree with Daniel Goleman author of Working with Emotional Intelligence that claims the growth of emotional intelligence increases with maturity (Goleman, 1998). Acknowledgements The researcher would wish to thank Dr. Gilles Gignac (Genos International) for permission to use the GENOS Emotional Intelligence (Concise Version) in this study and her advice during the course of the research. The researchers would also like to thank the director and lecturers of the polytechnic that gave their full commitment to making the study possible.
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