Improving emotional intelligence and emotional self-efficacy through a teaching intervention for university students

Emotional intelligence continues to receive a substantial amount of attention from researchers who argue that it is an important predictor of health, wellbeing and in particular, work-related outcomes. Emotional self-efficacy, which is concerned with beliefs in one's emotional functioning capabilities, has recently been shown to be important in relation to graduate employability. However, there are very few empirical studies which demonstrate that emotional functioning ability is something that it is possible to teach and develop. This study investigates whether it is possible to improve levels of emotional intelligence and emotional self-efficacy in university students through a teaching intervention. The findings show that it is possible to increase emotional self-efficacy and some aspects of emotional intelligence ability. These findings are considered within the framework of graduate employability, as improving emotional functioning may be particularly important to young people who will shortly join the graduate working population.

► We focus on developing emotional intelligence skills and emotional self-efficacy.
► We developed a teaching intervention for undergraduate students.
► Significant improvements found for some aspects of ability emotional intelligence.
► Significant improvements found for emotional self-efficacy.
► Findings considered within the framework of graduate employability.