Students’ Emotional Intelligence and Self Discipline in Secondary Schools in Kenya

Winnie Muthoni Ngila – Teachers Service Commission, Kenya winngila@yahoo.com
Lazarus Ndiku Makewa – Lukenya University ndikul@gmail.com

ABSTRACT: This study examined the relationship between students’ emotional intelligence and selfdiscipline in schools. The study was descriptive and comparative in design in that subjects were measured at once and comparisons of the variables made in relation to the variables in terms of gender and class levels. Purposive sampling was done targeting high school students. With a target of 725 students, a sample of 224 students, constituting 30.8966% of the population, was obtained. A students’ questionnaire was constructed to obtain data on the students’ emotional intelligence and self-discipline. The questionnaire’s reliability was established to be .8906. Mean ratings were used to compare and analyze the descriptive information obtained. One-way ANOVA was used to establish whether differences in emotional intelligence existed between boys and girls in different class levels. Pearson correlation was used to see whether emotional intelligence was related to students’ self-discipline. The means of female students for both self-discipline and emotional intelligence recorded slightly higher values than those of male students though not significantly different. Nevertheless, there were significant differences in levels of emotional intelligence between the classes attended by the respondents, which were associated to their experience in secondary school. Students’ level of self-discipline positively related to their level of emotional intelligence.