DEVELOPMENT OF AN INDIGENOUS MODEL OF EMOTIONAL INTELLIGENCE SCALE AMONG ADOLESCENTS IN SOUTHWESTERN NIGERIA

Abstract

Emotional intelligence, an important construct that has been extensively used globally, is a critical factor in adolescent growth. However, extant literature have shown that locallybased Emotional Intelligence Scale (EIS) for measuring adolescents’ emotional intelligence in Nigeria is scarce, while several foreign scales on the construct are not culturally appropriate. Previous studies used foreign-made EIS for measure of adolescents emotional intelligence among Nigeria students neglecting locally made EIS. This study, therefore, was designed to develop an indigenous model of emotional intelligence scale among adolescents in southwestern Nigeria. The Goleman Daniel’s Emotional Intelligence and Julius Akinboye’s Creativity theories provided the framework, while a multitrait-multimethod research design was adopted. The multi-stage procedure was employed. The six states in southwestern Nigeria were enumerated. The simple random sampling technique was used to select 12 Local Government Areas (two per state) and 24 schools (two per LGA). One thousand four hundred and forty adolescents (60 per school) were randomly selected. The instruments used were self-developed Indigenous Emotional Intelligence scale (α =.90), Schutte Selfreport EIS (α =.90) and Emotional Instability Scale (α =.77). Data were analysed using descriptive statistics, Pearson product moment correlation, Exploratory and Confirmatory factor analyses at 0.05 level of significance. The participants’ age was 14.2±1.41, and 54.5% were female. Out of 80 items of the emotional intelligence scale, 66 items had correlation value above r>0.3. Only seven potential factors were produced from the original 66-item scale. The seven potential factors accounted for 13.3%, 8.8%, 8.8%, 8.4%, 8.5%, 5.9% and 3.6% variances, respectively. All these factors produced 57.2% joint effect on emotional intelligent measure. The proportion of the variance in the measures of emotional intelligence was explained by the underling factors of the scale. After pruning down the scale, it resulted into six dimensions with an internal convergence validity of managing personal emotion (r =0.79), self-regulation (r = 0.73), managing other emotion (r = 0. 49), emotional creativity (r =0.78), emotional innovation (r = 0.56) and self-actualisation (r = 0.65). The developed indigenous EIS also had an external convergence validity (r = 0.39) with Schutte Emotional Intelligence scale. Emotional intelligence test showed a negative discriminant validity with Emotional Instability (r =-.38). However, the six factors model displayed a better fit index; (χ² = 15.58) and the indigenous emotional intelligence scale showed a composite reliability value of 0.90, with each dimension of the scale recording a good reliability coefficient. The developed indigenous emotional intelligence scale produced a reliable and valid measure for diagnosis and research purposes among adolescents in Southwestern Nigeria. Counselling psychologists and researchers in test and measurement should adopt this test for counselling and research purposes.