THE RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN EMOTIONAL INTELLIGENCE WITH JOB PERFORMANCE AND OCCUPATIONAL STRESS IN NURSES WORKING IN EDUCATIONAL AND MEDICAL CENTERS IN URMIA IN 2022

Background &

Nurses are the most important members of health care systems. Due to the nature of their job, they need to have skills that can help them in providing quality care. Emotional intelligence is a relatively stable individual ability and an essential characteristic of nursing practice. The present study was conducted to determine the relationship between emotional intelligence, job performance, and occupational stress in nurses.
Methods & Materials: The current research is a quantitative study with a descriptive cross-sectional and correlational approach conducted on 300 nurses working in educational and medical centers in Urmia City. Data collection tools included the Siberia Schering Emotional Intelligence Standard questionnaire, Paterson's Job Performance Questionnaire, and the Nursing Stress Scale (NSS). After completing the questionnaires, the data was analyzed using descriptive and analytical statistics in SPSS 20 software.

The findings showed that the mean emotional intelligence score of the nurses was 107.78, having good emotional intelligence. The mean occupational stress score was 77.10, which represents the average job stress, and the mean job performance score was 37.62, which indicated a very good job performance among the nurses. The analytical investigation confirmed a significant relationship between nurses' job performance and emotional intelligence (P=0.000) as well as occupational stress (P=0.000) in nurses.

Since emotional intelligence is considered an important skill in the nursing profession, this skill can reduce nurse's job stress and improve their job performance. Therefore, it is recommended that the policymakers and educational planners add this emotional intelligence skill education in the nursing curriculum or continue education courses to improve their skills and reduce the workload and stress, increase their performance, and finally promote quality care to patients and increase their satisfaction.