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The Impact of Emotional Intelligence on Student’s Academic Performance:

Article · April 2016

DOI: 10.24924/ijabm/2016.04/v4.iss1/10.18

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International Journal of Accounting & Business Management
Vol. 4 (No.1), April , 2016
ISSN: 2289-4519
DOI: 10.24924/ijabm/2016.04/v4.iss1/10.18 www.ftms.edu.my/journals/index.php/journals/ijabm
This work is licensed under a
Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.

Research Paper

The Impact of Emotional Intelligence on Student’s Academic

Performance:
A Study on Malaysian Tertiary Institution

Michael Ewela Ebinagbome

FTMS Alumni,
Master of Business Administration
E-mail: emykel@rocketmail.com

Dr. Ismail Nizam

Head of MBA Programs,
School of Accounting and Business Management,
FTMS Global Malaysia
E-mail: nizam@ftms.edu.my

Abstract

Emotional intelligence combines the important aspects of interpersonal and intrapersonal

relationships, adaptability, moods and stress management skills, which have an effect on students’
academic performance. Thus, this study was carried out with the aim of examining the impact of
emotional intelligence on students’ academic performance of information technology and business
management students. The independent variable includes self-awareness, self-motivation,
empathy, emotional management and interpersonal skills while the depended variable is academic
performance. This research adopted descriptive and explanatory research design. It also employ
the use of cross sectional survey method using a survey questionnaires that contains 40 items with
Likert Scale (Disagree-1 and 5 for Agree). The sample of 123 students from FTMS College,
Cyberjaya and Erican College were selected using convenient sampling. The data collected was
analyzed using descriptive means and regression via SPSS19. The Pearson’s correlation coefficients
of the five dependent variables have significant positive correlation with students’ academic
performance. However, using the regress analysis only two variable were significant and they
include; empathy and self-motivation. Hence, the study concluded that only the independent
variable of empathy and motivation has a strong influence on academic performance of

KEY TERMS: Emotional Intelligence, Academic performance, self-awareness, self-motivation,

empathy, emotional management and interpersonal skill, information technology, business
management.

1. Introduction

Page 10
Most of the problem one encounter’s in life be it personal, social, educational or political are
caused by how one interprets emotions by the those involved (Mishra, 2012). It is important for
students in the tertiary institutions to be aware that their ability or inability to control to their
emotions will directly impact their academic performance.

Presently, EI has become an interesting aspect for researchers in various fields which
include education, management and psychology from continent such as Europe, US and Asia
(Brown & Moshavi, 2005; Morris, Urbanski & Fuller, 2005).

Studies on E.I carried out in Malaysia were focused on student’s academic performance
in secondary schools (Hashim et al, 2012). Just a few has been done in tertiary institution and
the researcher’s respondents were on medical students (Hassan, Azhar, and Chew, 2013).
Therefore, this research will be pinned down to Management, Arts and Information Technology
(IT) students of FTMS University College and Erican College both in Kuala Lumpur Malaysia.

The objectives of this research are as follows;

 To examine the impact of self-awareness on students’ academic performance

 To examine the impact self-motivation on students’ academic performance
 To examine the impact of empathy on students’ academic performance
 To examine the impact of emotional management on students’ academic
performance
 To examine the impact of interpersonal skill on students’ academic performance

2. Literature Review

There are some factors that can cause a student either to have high or low performance. Among
that dysfunction personality is part of the composition of the formation of emotional
intelligence which is the reason for students’ low grade performance. The student that has
dysfunctional characteristic such as lack of confidence, possess low self- esteem, lack of self-
control and have a high anxiety are said to have a low emotional intelligence, and this will affect
their academic performance.
From the research of Petrides et al (2004) they looked at the relationship between trait
emotional intelligence, academic performance and cognitive, they discovered that emotional
intelligence moderated the relationship between academic performance and cognitive ability.
Parker et al (2004) in their studied concluded that different variable of emotional intelligence
used as predictors of academic success. They found that highly successful students scored
higher than unsuccessful group on three subsets of emotional intelligence (interpersonal ability,
stress management and adaptability). Also, in a study carried out by Rode et al. (2007), they
predicted that emotional intelligence was related to academic performance for two reasons.
Firstly, academic performance involves a great deal of uncertainty. Secondly, majority of
academic work is self-directed, requiring high levels of self-management. Thus, students that
possess high emotional intelligence would perform better academically. Svetlana (2007),
suggests the need to incorporate emotional intelligence training into secondary education
curricula, due to a significant relationship between emotional intelligence and academic
achievement.

Relationship between Self-Awareness and Academic Performance

Self-awareness is to inform oneself of the interest to identify feelings and how it affects
performance. This self-awareness is the key to alert a student or anyone about their strength
and weakness. By possessing self-awareness, that is being able to know ones capability makes

Page 11
such student to obtain self-confidence. According to Johnson (2009) he stated that emotional
health is a fundamental part of effective learning. The most critical element of a student’s
success is for such student to have an understanding of how to learn. Students that possess the
ability of self-awareness and intrinsically motivated will definitely have high academic
performance. While students which do not have a good self-awareness and lack intrinsic
motivation will tend to have low academic score at the end of the semester or academic year.

Relationship between Emotional Management and Academic Performance

From the classroom perspective, self-control on cognitive and behavior are essential aspects of
learning and academic performance (Corno and Mandinach, 1983; and Corno & Rohrkemper,
1985). Most students if not all will experience frustration and failure to attain their academic
goals. This is because they depend on the strength of fortitude to control their negative thoughts
and feelings. When students are able to control emotions, they will be able to achieve the
academic goals as well (Dweck et al, 1995). Also, in a study conducted by Walter Mischel on
children aged 4 years. It was found that those who could control the impulses of action have
shown their ability in achieving good academic and good social skills when they are in their
adolescence (Shoda, Mischel, and Peake, 1990). The results suggest that better academic
performance might be achieved by targeting skills relation to emotion management and being
able to cope in difficult situations.

Relationship between Empathy and Academic Performance

Empathy is the ability of an individual to show concern for the needs of their colleague. Cooper
(2010), gave the definition of empathy as the most powerful aspect for the development of
learning relationships and achievement of gifted students; empathy is usually communicated
nonverbally via facial expressions and body language (Wang, 2014). Empathizing with fellow
students who can read or understand non-verbal signs such as voice intonation, facial
expression and so forth has an impact students’ academic performance. In a study done by
Chow (2006), it was concluded that student’s levels of empathy have a positive relationship
with their academic motivation thus helping to increase their academic performance.

Relationship between Self-Motivation and Academic Performance

According to Bernard (1965), motivation is the driving force that involves the raise, maintain
and control the interest. He said that this emotional intelligence variable of motivation is very
important to encourage students to actively engage in the activities of teaching and learning,
interested in encouraging students to continue learning to create a fun learning process.
However, in this study the motivation is centered on self-motivation. Self-motivation happens to
be one the key variable of emotional intelligence which gives a boost in improving students’
academic performance. In the context of this research, self-motivation focuses on students
interested to study and understand their leaning goals and objectives for attaining good
academic performance. Self-motivation is connected with ones emotions. Emotions affect the
way a person responds against another person and also to their environment, ultimately it
determines the pattern of adjustment that will be taken in their lives (Kamarudin, 1989).

According to Sikwari (2014), there is a significant correlation between academic

achievement and self-motivation. This was also supported by the findings of Tella (2007) whom
through his research said that there is significant relationship between students’ self-motivation
and academic performance in secondary school in mathematics with respect to gender. In Tella
(2007) research, he found out that highly motivated students usually performed better
academically than those students who experience low motivation. Sikwari (2014) stated that
male students have less self-motivation as compared to their female colleagues.

Relationship between Interpersonal Skills and Academic Performance

Page 12
Low academic performance can be linked to social problems and emotions encountered by
students, especially about the ability to use social skills to get support from teachers
(MacMullin, 1994). As the social environment in which learning occurs can strengthen or
eliminate behaviors that lead to academic achievement, the acquisition of interpersonal skills is
very important to attain excellence in learning. Students who have not gained mastery of the
skills of interpersonal relationship with their peers, those who often behave badly and
eventually lead to poor academic performance (Sulzer-Azaraff and Mayer, 1986). From a study
done by Stephen N. Elliot, a psychology professor at Wiscornsin Univesity, USA, found out that
students who enrolled in social skills from the period 1996-1997, showed an increase in social
skills which in turns leads to an increase in their academic performance. This result was also
supported by Johnson (2009), he proposed that emotional intelligence (like interpersonal skills)
enables the students to develop good relationship and to possess social support which also help
students to perform excellently well in their examinations.

H1: There is a significant relationship between students’ academic performance and

student’s self-awareness.

H2: There is a significant relationship between emotional management and students’

academic performance.

H3: There is significant relationship between empathy and students’ academic

performance

H4: There is significant relationship between students’ self-motivation and academic

performance.

H5: There is a significant relationship between student’s interpersonal skills and

academic performance.

Page 13
 H6: There is a significant relationship between emotional intelligence and students’
academic performance.

3. Research Design and Methodology

This research was done using a quantitative method and also a primary data was collected from
students. In other to be in line with the quantitative approach chosen for this thesis, the medium
through which data will be collected from respondent will be via questionnaire. This is to enable
the researcher to gather a primary data from respondents that are selected in the University of
Choice stated above.

This thesis focus on two departments of the schools involved. This is because this is the
area in which research has not been done in Malaysia. This is the Information technology (IT)
and Management department. Secondly, the researcher chose these department as it has more
number of students in both college as compared to other departments. A total of 150
questionnaires will be distributed in both colleges by means of direct contact of face to face with
the respondents. The questionnaire is divided into two sections, section A comprises of
demography of the respondents such as (age, gender, departments, race, nationality) while
section B covers the targeted questions to carry out the whole investigation. The respondent’s
varies from first semester students to completing students. This research uses a convenient
sampling. This is because respondents are willing to part-take in the research, thereby making it
more appropriate for this research than any other form of sampling.

This study analysed the data collected through the use of quantitative analysis. This is
because statistical analysis give the researcher the opportunity to get descriptive information
through mean outputs (Carrol, 1991) and standard deviation will help to investigate if the mean
is in line with the view (Saunder, et al, 2007). A regression coefficient will be collected through
SPSS analysis that helps the researcher to investigate if the variable of emotional intelligence
has an impact on students’ academic performance. Also a two tailed analyses will be used also to
check the relationship of the variables and student academic performance.

4. Results and Discussion

This research performed a regression analysis using SPSS to predict the impact of emotional
intelligence on academic performance based on the five independent variables of emotional
intelligence. The dependent factor in this study is academic performance.

The Model Summary table below predicts that academic performance shows R as 0.654,
R impact of emotional intelligence components on academic performance in Malaysia Tertiary
institutions (with reference to management and information technology department) squares
as 0.428 and adjusted R Square 0.403, indicating that only 40.3% of the variance of emotional
intelligence can be predicted by the independent variables of self-awareness, self-motivation,
empathy, emotional management and interpersonal skills. Nevertheless, the general accepted
rule for regression to be a good fit is considered to predict at least 60% variation of the
dependent variable (Zygmont & Smith, 2014). Thus, this model for this research is considered to
be a poor fit as it only predict just 40% of the entire model. Nevertheless, the autocorrelation of
this regression is potentially very high. Also, with a good F test value, it shows that the
regression model is significant.

Page 14
The Beta Coefficients table below is used for testing the hypotheses above. The summary of
hypotheses test results is provided in which follows.

Hypotheses Test Results

No Hypothesis Beta Significant Decision

coefficient (P<0.05)
1 H1: There is a significant relationship -0.025 -0.794 Rejected
between student’s academic performance and Not significant
student’s self-awareness.

2 H2: There is a significant relationship -0.153 0.103 Rejected

between emotional management and Not Significant
students’ academic performance.
3 H3: There is significant relationship between 0.374 0.001 Accepted
empathy and students’ academic Significant
performance
4 H4: There is significant relationship between 0.350 0.001 Accepted
students’ self-motivation and academic Significant
performance.
5 H5: There is a significant relationship 0.150 0.146 Rejected
between student’s interpersonal skills and Not Significant
academic performance.

There is a positive and significant influence on self-motivation and academic performance of

students in Malaysia tertiary institutions. From this researched it is perceived that self-

Page 15
motivation is one of the key factors that plays an important role in influence the performance of
students in Malaysia tertiary institutions. This is in corroboration with other researches done in
the past; in these researches it was found out those pupils that have self-motivation orientation
had better and higher score in reading and mathematics and also achieved higher overall score
as compared to their fellow students that does not have self-motivation instead extrinsic
motivation.

Also this research concludes that there is a significant and positive relationship between
student’s emotional intelligence construct of empathy and academic performance of students.
This is in connection with other research. In these studies it was showed that low levels of
empathy are connected with poor academic performance. When two students who have
intellectual intelligence (that is having the same IQ) but different empathy skills, found that
student’s that possess higher empathy ability gets better grades.

According to this research this on emotional intelligence and students’ academic

performance it has shown that there is no significant influence of the emotional intelligence
constructs of self-awareness of self-awareness, emotional management and interpersonal skills.
These conclusions are contrary to past research which linked these three constructs to have a
significant and positive impact on academic performance of students. However, by concluding
this way, it is important for further research to be carried out on these constructs to investigate
if they are combined with other emotional intelligent constructs they can have an impact on
academic performance of tertiary students in the management and information technology
departments.

5. Conclusion

In summary, it is concluded according to this research that only empathy and self-motivation
has stronger influence (as in seen in the mean figures, correlation and regression analysis) on
the academic performance of Malaysia tertiary institution in the management and information
technology departments. It is found that while self-awareness, emotional management and
interpersonal skill has a weak influence (as seen only in the mean and correlation figures) on
the academic performance of Malaysia tertiary institution in the management and information
technology departments. Thus, this study recommends that students who want to excel in their
academic pursuit in Malaysia should take notes of their emotions intelligence (with special
reference to their empathy and self-motivation skills).

Therefore it is important for Malaysian tertiary institutions to organize seminars either

semester or yearly to enable students have a better understanding of their emotions or how it
influences their education and academic performance. With these seminars in schools students
will be encouraged to learn much about themselves and their emotions. By so doing they will be
vast and have a better knowledge of their emotions thereby increasing their emotional
intelligence. Hence as students continuous to understand the influence of emotional intelligence
(self-motivation and empathy), their academic performance begin to improve which will
eventually lead to them to graduate with a better CGPA (Cumulative Grade Point Average).As
universities to continue graduate students yearly with better cumulative grade point average
(CGPA) this will impact the universities education reputation that might call for global
recognition and acceptance.

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