A Study of Relationship Between Emotional Intelligence, Academic Achievement and Vocational Choice

This exploratory study looked into the relationship between emotional intelligence and academic achievement among the Form Four students in the Kulim/Bandar Baharu District. Other aspects explored included the correlation between the five dimensions of emotional intelligence (self-awareness, self-regulations, motivation, empathy and social skills) with academic achievement; the investigation of whether there were any significant differences in the mean emotional intelligence score based
on the two demographic variables (gender and ethnicity); and the association between emotional intelligence and realism in vocational choice.
This research was a quantitative survey carried out on 341 respondents. There were two self-report instruments used to measure emotional intelligence - the EQI (Tapia, 1998) and the EQR (self-developed). Academic achievements were measured by the grades of the Lower Secondary Assessment (PMR) and the grades of the First Semester Examination. Vocational choice was indexed by using the Rothwell-Miller
Interest Blank.
Findings from the study showed that the two instruments were found to be reliable and valid. There was a significant correlation between emotional intelligence scores and grades of PMR and the grades of the First Semester Examination. All of the five dimensions (self-awareness, self-regulation, empathy, motivation and social skills) were found to have significant correlations with grades of the PMR and grades of the First Semester Examination. There were significant differences in the mean emotional intelligence scores when based on ethnic background. However, there was no significant difference in the mean emotional intelligence score according to gender. On realism in vocational choice, the findings were not consistent. The EQI showed an association between emotional intelligence and realism in vocational choice but
the EQR did not.