SOCIODEMOGRAPHIC CORRELATES OF EMOTIONAL INTELLIGENCE AMONG MEDICAL STUDENTS: A CROSS SECTIONAL STUDY

Background:-Emotional intelligence (EI) is a vital competency for medical students that influences stress coping, empathy and clinical performance. Although sociodemographic factors are known to shape EI but limited studies have been undertaken in this regard in Pakistan. This study aimed to examine the sociodemographic correlates of EI among second-year medical students at a public-sector university in Pakistan.

Methods:-This is a cross-sectional study conducted at Rawalpindi Medical University. Simple random sampling was used to enroll 81 students using an online questionnaire. The questionnaire had two

parts: a sociodemographic form and the Emotional Intelligence Competency Inventory (EICI). The EICI is a 30 item self-report tool that measures four areas of emotional intelligence. Each item is answered on a 5-point Likert scale from strongly disagree to strongly agree. To explore associations between total and domain specific EI scores and gender, age, residence, boarding status and family income the study used independent-samples t-tests and one-way ANOVA.