Emotional Intelligence Levels in Professional Athletic Training Students

Background: Recent evidence suggests that a major factor in patient satisfaction and practitioner happiness in health care may be emotional intelligence (EI), or the ability to recognize and modulate the emotions of oneself and others. Literature has demonstrated that EI has decreased in healthcare providers.

Objective: This study sought to find differences in EI levels of bachelor's and master’s level athletic training (AT) students.

Design: Cross-Sectional Analysis

Setting: Bachelor's and Master’s level professional programs.

Participants: Snowball sampling through program directors yielded 44 bachelor’s and 35 master’s students.

Method(s): Self-reported opinions of EI were collected via the Schutte Emotional Intelligence Scale (EIS). Two one-way ANOVAs were conducted to determine if there were mean differences in EI between degree level and gender. Pearson correlations coefficients were conducted to examine the association between age and EI.

Results: There were no significant differences in bachelor’s and master’s students’ EIS scores, however, a gender difference was noted, with males scoring higher. There was a significant correlation between age and EIS score.

Conclusions: This project demonstrates EI differences in men and women that are not supported by past research and should be further explored. EI education should be included in AT curricula to slow the downward trend in EI and improve the healthcare experience for practitioners and patients.