Improving Malaysian Undergraduates’ Emotional Intelligence Skills through Emotional Intelligence Training Program

Abstract

The initial stage of university life can be difficult, particularly for first year university students. Lack of emotional control, emotional awareness, and emotional management can lead to many psychological and emotional disorders among this population. Even though earlier studies strongly recommend introducing emotional intelligence training programs (EITP) in educational settings, it has been found that only a small number of universities have offered emotional intelligence (EI) courses for undergraduates. Furthermore, only a limited number of studies have explored methods to enhance undergraduates' EI and establish an EITP in universities that possess a robust theoretical foundation. To reduce the gaps, the study used a quasi-experiment design with 60 experimental groups and 60 control groups drawn from both social or social science and pure science programs at Universiti Putra Malaysia (UPM). Multivariate analysis of variance (MANOVA) presented significant differences in EI scores between treatment and control groups from social or social science fields and pure science fields. Additionally, the paired-samples t-test demonstrated that the EITP successfully enhanced the EI skills of treatment groups, while no significant effects were found in control groups. The finding serves as a foundation for implementing EITP in Malaysian public universities. For the recommendation, the study suggests further investigating the EI module to ensure the EITP can be generalized among this population.