Reliability of sullivan emotional intelligence scale for children in Malaysian context using rasch measurement model

Abstract

Emphasizing only on intellectual intelligence without stressing on feelings and emotions could negatively affect an individual’s emotional development. Development of stable emotion regulation strategies is important for an individual to function appropriately in different contexts. Although there are many scales developed to measure emotional intelligence (EI), there is a dearth of instruments to measure EI in preschool children. One instrument that taps EI in preschool children is The Sullivan Emotional Intelligent Scale for Children (EISC). EISC was developed for use in the United States and there is no such instrument available in Malaysian context (to the best of our knowledge).The aim of the current study was to adapt EISC to measure Malaysian preschool children’s emotional intelligence. EISC was translated into Malay Language and the reliability value of the instrument was then tested using the Rasch Model. There are 50 respondents (preschool children) was random selected from the research area (Johor Bahru) which had same features with the real respondent for this purpose. The results show a high ‘item reliability’ of 0.94 and also a high ‘person reliability’ of 0.93 after distillations (37 out of 59 items retained). The results suggest that The Sullivan Emotional Intelligent Scale for Children (EISC), adapted for Malaysian children, can be used to determine the level of Malaysian preschool children’s EI with psychometric soundness.