The emotional intelligence of medical students: an exploratory cross-sectional study.
BACKGROUND
Emotional intelligence (EI) may be related to student characteristics (such as conscientiousness and empathy), and performance at medical school, although few studies have so far been conducted.


OBJECTIVE
To investigate the association of EI with students' age, sex, ethnicity and stage of study at a London medical school.


METHODS
All medical students were invited to complete an online EI instrument, the Mayer-Salovey-Caruso Emotional Intelligence Test (MSCEIT) version 2, a 141-item measure of the ability to perceive, use, understand and manage emotions. An additional questionnaire to gather demographic data was linked to the MSCEIT.


RESULTS
We analysed 263 responses from a population of 2114 medical students after three reminders (12.3% response rate). Aggregated EI scores were similar through the curriculum. Age, sex and ethnicity explained 9.2% of the variance in aggregated EI scores. In terms of managing emotions, 6.7% of the variance was explained by the stage of study, with significantly higher scores for students in their final year compared to those in the first two years.


CONCLUSIONS
This exploratory study provides preliminary data on EI scores for UK medical students identifies factors associated with higher and lower scores and suggests that aggregated EI scores remain stable during medical training.
Todres
Mathew
M
Department of General Practice and Primary Care, King's College, London, UK.
Tsimtsiou
Zoi
Z
Stephenson
Anne
A
Jones
Roger
R
D000328:Adult; D003430:Cross-Sectional Studies; D056348:Emotional Intelligence; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D008131:London; D008297:Male; D012577:Schools, Medical; D013337:Students, Medical / Q000523:psychology*; D055815:Young Adult