The relationship between emotional intelligence,academic and social adjustment among North-West University Students (Mafikeng Campus)

Abstract

The aim of the study was to investigate the relationship between emotional intelligence, academic adjustment and social adjustment among North West University students. The study was based on three hypotheses: (1) Male students will be more academically adjusted than their female counterparts. (2) There will be a positive relationship between Emotional Intelligence and academic adjustment among the participants. (3) There will be a strong positive relationship between emotional intelligence and social adjustment among the participants. The study used self-report questionnaires with four sections A, B, C, and D to assess the relationship. Section A contained demographic information, section B an Emotional Intelligence scale, Section C a Social Adjustment scale and Section D an Academic Adjustment scale. Psychometric properties of all the scales used: The results yielded the following: for 'Satisfied Academically from Academic Adjustment scale' and Gender (n = 137, M = 1.8182, SD = 0.52448) for males and (n = 160, M = 17605, SD = 0.61838) for females , the effect size observed was 0.09. For 'Pressure at University' and Gender (n = 137, M = 1.8798, SD= 0.46760) for males and (n = 159, M = 1.7952, SD=0.53640) for females, the effect size was 0.16. The group statistics results suggest that male students are more academically adjusted than their female counterparts. Both results are statistically insignificant and practically less significant With regard to Emotional Intelligence for 'Emotional Awareness' and 'Personal Satisfaction,' the Spearman's correlation coefficient (rs) = 0.372, number of students (n) = 300, p-value (p) = 0.000, whereas for 'Emotional Awareness' and 'Interpersonal Relationships' (rs = 0.382, n = 299, p < 0 .001). A weak positive correlation was observed between 'Emotional Awareness' and 'Personal Satisfaction'. With regard to 'Emotional Awareness' and 'Interpersonal Relationships,' the results also yielded a weak positive correlation. The correlation between 'Awareness of Other People's Feelings ' (AoOPF) and 'Personal Satisfaction' yielded (rs = 0.403, p < 0 .001) and between 'AoOPF' and 'Interpersonal Relationships' yielded (rs = 0.389, p < 0.001). There was a moderate correlation between AoOPF and 'Personal Satisfaction', and a weak correlation between 'AoOPF' and 'Interpersonal Relationships'.