Abstract

This study was designed to measure the relationship between emotional intelligence and the psychological well-being of secondary school teachers. This correlational study used a multistage random sampling technique to select 1200 teachers from 20 boys and 20 girls’ high schools in district Lahore. The emotional Intelligence Questionnaire (α=.86) and Psychological Well-Being Scale (α=.89) were adapted as tools for data collection. The results showed that emotional intelligence and psychological well-being were strongly correlated with each other. Factor wise descriptive statistics of emotional intelligence showed that teachers were almost completely agreed with their students while teaching. Descriptive statistics of the psychological well-being of teachers showed that they were almost completely agreed while dealing with stakeholders. Female teachers demonstrated a higher score than male in emotional intelligence and psychological well-being. Married teachers demonstrated a higher score in emotional intelligence and psychological well-being. It was recommended that male and unmarried teachers be motivated to improve emotions and well-being.

Key Words

Emotional Intelligence; Psychological Well-Being; Emotionality; Sociability,                                        Autonomy

Introduction

The purpose of this study was to measure the relationship between emotional intelligence and the psychological well-being of public secondary school teachers in district Lahore. Emotional intelligence has been characterized as the ability to empathizes, control motivation, communicate clearly, make thoughtful decisions, solve issues, and work with others in a way that gains friends and success (Mac-Cann, Jiang, Brown, Double, Bucich, & Minbashian, 2020). Emotional intelligence has been characterized as the ability to quick and control emotions that make peoples more intelligent (Robinson, Hull, & Petrides, 2020).

Emotional intelligence has examined the interrelationship between emotions, the significance of emotions, thought, emotional process, understanding of emotions and decisions making. Emotional intelligence has been described as the ability to recognize our own and other emotions and feelings and to manage emotions for motivating ourselves and our relationships (Prentice, Dominique, Lopes, & Wang, 2020). According to Pathak and Muralidharan (2020), emotional intelligence is the capacity to regulate emotions, incorporate emotions, make thoughtful decisions, manage and understanding emotions and affect them successfully.

Emotional intelligence has empathized as the capacity to understand emotions, experience, feelings, control motivations, identity, and thoughtful decisions (Gugliandolo, Costa, Cuzzocrea, Larcan, & Martino, 2020). Emotional intelligence shows a strong positive relationship with people’s ability to manage and regulate their emotions and feeling. Those who have higher emotional intelligence showed a significant relationship between problem-solving, understanding of emotions and feelings, and making good decisions and manage successfully (Khosravi, Rezvani, & Ashkanasy, 2020).

Emotional intelligence refers to an arrangement of an ability, competency, skill, talent, and capacity related to judgment, direction, management, and understanding of feelings (Di-Fabio, & Saklofske, 2019). Emotional intelligence is active management of feeling to understand their work, making some unique ideas for ourselves in life, understanding of right choice, sympathy, self-control, human relationship and positive relation with others (Mattingly, & Kraiger, 2019).

Emotional intelligence could be moderately new academic development and may be defined in shifted ways in which emotional intelligence is basically providing free rule to sentiments, thoughts, ideas, feelings, decisions and monitoring people (Davis, Nowland, & Qualter, 2019). Emotional intelligence is the capacity to surely agree and realize one is influenced in emotional responses, individuals of others, motivating ourselves and our relationship (Kotsou, Mikolajczak, Heeren, Grégoire, & Leys, 2019).

Psychological Well-Being (PWB), the second variable of the study, was a very important and complex construct. It deals overall human psychological state or conditions and contains emotional and behavioral aspects of a person in life. According to Arnold (2017), Psychological well-being refers to the overall psychological conditions and deals with the capacity of individual psychology. Psychological well-being has been characterized as active management that helps peoples to meet their challenges, solved problems of their lives and achieve the goals (McDool, Powell, Roberts, & Taylor, 2020).

Psychological well-being has empathized as a broad construct; they made a difference between positive well-being (pleasant and joy) and negative well-being (unpleasant and stress). Psychological well-being is a vital topic in the informative round and deals overall psychological condition of a person (La-Rosa, Barra, Chiofalo, Platania, Guardo, Conway, & Lin, 2020). According to Huang (2017), if a teacher showed a higher level of psychological well-being, have a happy, healthy, and purposeful life. Similarly, if a teacher showed a lower level of psychological well-being, have a stressful life.

According to Ozu, Zepeda, Ilgan, Jimenez, Ata, and Akram (2017), psychological well-being could be a condition of happy, healthy, joy, pleasant mood, mental well-being and psychological self-actualization. Psychological well-being examined as the condition of peace for human achievement in life. Twenge and Martin (2020) accepted that the well-being of a person showed into three categories: emotional reactions, internal satisfaction, and worldwide judgment of people with life happiness. The well-being of a person deals with the overall psychological conditions and refers to the capacity of individual psychology.

Medvedev and Landhuis (2018) described that well-being could be a greater perspective of human life and covers all aspects of life like physical, social, mental, spiritual, and emotional. It could be a more emotional condition of the human mind and behaviors. According to Sherlock and Wagstaff (2019), psychological well-being is the ability to regulate the emotions of human life and recognize all related issues and behaviors of human psychology in term of subjective well-being.

Mcinerney, Korpershoek, Wang, and Morin (2018) identified that those teachers who demonstrated a higher level of psychological well-being have positive relations with their students, colleagues and administration staff and spent purposeful life. According to Stoewen (2017), the well-being of a person deals with the overall psychological conditions and refers to the capacity of individual psychology and also examined as the condition of peace for human development in life.

Research Questions

The study was exploring the overall following research questions:

1.         What do public secondary school teachers perceive their emotional intelligence?

2.        What do public secondary school teachers perceive their psychological well-being?

3.        Is there a significant relationship between emotional intelligence and the psychological well-being of public secondary school teachers in district Lahore?

Hypotheses

The study included the following hypotheses:

H₀1: Male and female teachers of public secondary schools do not significantly differ on emotional intelligence.

H₀2: Teachers of public secondary schools do not significantly differ on emotional intelligence based on their marital status.

H₀3: Male and female teachers of public secondary schools do not significantly differ on psychological well-being.

H₀4: Teachers of public secondary schools do not significantly differ on psychological well-being based on their marital status.

Review of the Related Literature

Emotional Intelligence

The emotional intelligence of the teacher was likely to influence the success of the working relationship that they have with other teachers, directors, individuals, guardians, students, and those within the community. In turn, these relationships are likely to impact school and classroom climate. One most important relationship within the school is the relationship between the teacher and the student. The duty for this relationship falls upon the teachers within the classroom who interact with student’s day after day all through the school year (Miao, Humphrey, & Qian, 2017).

Theories and Models of Emotional Intelligence

Theories about emotional intelligence generally focus on understanding the structure of emotional intelligence. There are three major theories of emotional intelligence; the first one is the Goleman EI theory (1995), the second is that Bar-On EI theory (1988), and the last one is the Mayer, Salovey and Caruso EI theory (1997). Each theory defined a different point of view about emotional intelligence. Further, details are given below:

In the first model, Goleman (1995) presented five competencies of emotional intelligence. Self-awareness is the capacity to recognize thoughts and ideas that the essential part of emotional intelligence. Those who have high emotions and thoughts show high qualities in their lives. People who have strong emotions and face different challenges have higher self-awareness. Self-regulation is the learner ability in which students achieve the goals, arrange assignments, utilize aims, and manage their improvement towards the goals and life success. Self-motivation refers to an arrangement of a people or a group in which individuals set great goals for themselves and them to work from honestly, trusty and self-confidence of success rather than fear of disappointment. Social awareness discusses having the sensibility to the feelings, thoughts, emotions, attention, decisions, and understandings of others. Social skill refers to an arrangement in a human relationship that creates empathy and flexibility to look out for ideas and other sentiments (Goleman & Boyatzis, 2017).

Another model of emotional intelligence is Bar-On (1988). According to him, emotional intelligence is an ability to regulate emotions, empathize, control motivations, solve issues, understanding emotions, and effort with others in a way that obtains positive friendship. Emotional intelligence is an ability to understand our own and other feelings, dealing sentiments, and recognize for motivating ourselves and other relationships. It is a strong relationship with people’s ability to manage and regulate their emotions and feeling (Connor, Hill, Kaya, & Martin, 2019).

According to Mayer, Salovey, Caruso (1997), emotional intelligence includes a cognitive and emotional framework, and they claimed that the model could be separated into four branches. Emotional perception refers to the overall emotional feelings, thought, understanding, emotional information about ourselves and others and also focus on decision making and making different ideas problem-solving Emotional integration is the capacity that includes a positive and sustainable framework of a person, individuals, or group in which they demonstrate a higher level of emotional intelligence. Emotional understanding is the ability to regulate our own or other emotions, manage feelings, making unique ideas, and show a positive relationship with human beings. Emotional management is the ability to regulate, and manage the emotions of a person, monitor the feelings of an individual or a group (Mayer, Caruso, & Salovey, 2016).

Psychological Well-being

According to Koydemir, Sökmez, & Schütz (2020), psychological well-being has been characterized as a broad construct; they made a difference between positive well-being (pleasant and joy) and negative well-being (unpleasant and stress). If a teacher shows a higher level of psychological well-being, have a happy, healthy, and purposeful life. Similarly, if a teacher shows a lower level of psychological well-being has a stressful life. It is an important topic in an educational circle and deals overall psychological condition of a person (Kim Oja, Kim, & Chin, 2020).

According to Boniwell, Osin, and Martinez (2016), psychological well-being could be a positive and supportable condition of human behavior that allows peoples to gain their well-being. If a person shows a positive state of mind, happiness, joy, and satisfaction, they have a hedonic component that is pleasant, representing a positive response. Similarly, if a person shows a negative state of mind, stress, dissatisfaction, and unpleasant, they are representing a negative response (Arnold & Reynolds, 2012). The eudemonic approach shows the positive well-being of human life. It involves joy, satisfaction, positive thinking, sincere natures, purpose in life, psychological working, ethical life and human development. According to Di-Fabio and Kenny (2016), psychological well-being is an ability to regulate the emotions of human life and recognize all aspects of related issues and behaviors of human psychology in term of subjective well-being. Psychological well-being may be a greater perspective of human life and covers all aspects of life and maybe a more emotional condition of the human mind and behaviors (Dejonckheere, Mestdagh, Houben, Rutten, Sels, Kuppens, & Tuerlinckx, 2019).

Components of Psychological Well-Being

Ryff (1995) demonstrated six components of psychological well-being: Autonomy is known as the ability to have freedom for individual’s decisions. In other words, if a person is morally, politically, economically free to make certain kinds of decisions, he can be called autonomist and this process is known as autonomism. Environmental mastery is a process under which an individual or a group can be able to change his surroundings by using internal or external forces such as physical powers or psychological or moral values in order to bring some change in the environment (Ryff, 1989). Personal growth covers overall activities of human development and improves quality of life. In personal growth, Openness is the ability, to be frank in relations or decision-making processes, another term ‘open minded’ is sometimes used as an alternative concept. Positive relations refer to have trustworthy, sincere connection and feelings having a strong psychological bond. Such feelings make the human being able to understand and establish friendship and relationship with others by looking at their cultural and moral values (Ryff, 2014).

Purpose in life emphasizes a strong understanding of an individual's life and clear quality of life’s purpose. It makes aims of human life, provides the direction of life, creates a meaningful life, and involves goals. Self-acceptance is the positive condition of recognizing and understanding our own’s emotions and ability. Typically characterized as the key that highlights psychological well-being as well as characteristics of self-actualization, ideal working, and development.

Theories and Models of Psychological Well-Being

Theories about psychological well-being focused on understanding the structure of psychological well-being. It could be hedonic and eudemonic well-being; hedonic component may be a positive and supportable condition of human behavior that allows peoples to gain their well-being. Similarly, the eudemonic approach shows the positive well-being of human life. It involves joy, satisfaction, positive thinking, sincere natures, purpose in life, psychological working, ethical life, and human development.

The model of Ryan, Bernstein, and Brown (2010) found that well-being could be a positive state of human psychology that allows peoples to enhance their well-being, and it comprises joy, empathy, interest, happiness, and satisfaction of life. According to Ryff (2014), the two-domain model of well-being shows positive and negative influences on human; if a person shows a higher level of psychological well-being, have a happy, healthy, and purposeful life. Whereas a person who shows a lower level of psychological well-being have a stressful life (Steptoe, Deaton, & Stone, 2015).

Bottom-Up Model used in term of ideal working, the meaning of life and self-actualization. Psychological well-being is the state of happy, healthy, joy, pleasant, mental well-being, and psychological self-actualization. The well-being of a person deals with the overall psychological conditions and refers to the capacity of human psychology and acknowledges the individuals who perform better in psychology well-being feel more satisfied with their lives (Oishi, Diener, & Lucas, 2009).

According to the Top-Down model, psychological well-being has empathized as a wide concept; they made a difference between positive well-being and negative well-being. Individuals have a preference to clarify life experiences in positive and negative ways. In other words, well-being conceptualized as the state of peace for human accomplishment in life. Our personal explanation of action instead of a neutral situation themselves should be an important effect on psychological well-being (Wohl, De-Shea, & Wahkinney, 2008).

Linking Emotional Intelligence and Psychological Well-Being

Emotional intelligence may be a particularly important aspect of psychological well-being and could be a solid indicator of psychological well-being. Emotional intelligence is the ability to regulate emotions, incorporate emotions, make thoughtful decisions, manage and understanding emotions. It has a strong relationship with people’s ability to manage and regulate their emotions and feeling. Psychological well-being represents a greater perspective of human life (Petrides, Mikolajczak, Mavroveli, Sanchez-Ruiz, Furnham, & Pérez-González, 2016).

Salami (2010) measured the emotional intelligence and psychological well-being of teachers. In this study, the sample size consisted of 420 secondary school teachers (200 males and 220 females) from the five states in Southwest Nigeria. The researcher used a simple random sampling technique to collect the data from five states. The findings show a positive relationship between the teacher’s emotional intelligence and psychological well-being. Moreover, female teachers demonstrated a higher level of emotional intelligence rather than male teachers. Similarly, female teachers showed a higher score in psychological well-being rather than male teachers.

Ishak, Mustapha, Mahmud, and Ariffin (2006) measured the emotional intelligence of Malaysian teachers in the workplace. The population of the study was all public secondary school teachers from Malaysia. In this study, the sample size comprised 100 teachers, including married and unmarried; the researchers used a simple random sampling technique to collect the data. The result showed that married teachers of public secondary school were more intelligent in their emotions and behavior at the workplace rather than unmarried teachers.

Vaezi and Fallah (2011) measured the relationship between EI of teachers and burnout. The population of the study was five private language institutes in the city of Tehran, Iran. The sample size comprised 104 teachers (52 males and 52 female teachers), the researchers used a convenient sampling technique to collect the data. The result demonstrated that there was a negative relationship between the emotional intelligence of teachers and their burnout. Also performed that there was no significant relationship between the gender-based comparison.

Akram (2019) measured the psychological well-being of teachers working within the university in Pakistan. The population of the study was four public, and private universities and the sample size comprised 437 university teachers. The researcher used a multistage sampling technique to collect the data from teachers. A questionnaire on psychological well-being was used to conduct this study. Result demonstrated that female and unmarried teachers showed a higher score in their well-being. Moreover, male and married teachers showed a lower score in their well-being.

The purpose of Behloli, Karimi-Motlagh, and Dehghanpour (2015) study was to measure the spiritual

intelligence and psychological well-being of teachers. It was descriptive research with correlational design. The population consisted all the teachers in the city of Taibad, Iran. The sample size comprised 310 teachers from elementary and secondary school. Data were analyzed with the help of two questionnaires, the researchers used multistage sampling technique to gather the data. The result demonstrated that there was positive relationship between spiritual intelligence and psychological well-being of teachers. Moreover, secondary school teachers were more intelligent in their score rather than elementary school teachers.

Research Methodology

It was quantitative research with a correlational design. Correlational research is conducted to measure the relationship between two or more quantifiable variables. The population of the study comprised all teachers from public secondary schools of district Lahore. Sampling is the procedure of choosing a representative part of a population for the purpose of defining the characteristics of the whole population. The researchers used a multistage random sampling technique to collect the data. Initially, 40 public secondary schools (20 boys’ and 20 girls’) were selected. Later, 1200 teachers from these selected schools were sampled of this study (600 males and 600 females).

Instrumentation

Instrumentation is the process of using the tools for data collection. For this study, the researchers adapted two questionnaires.

1.         Trait Emotional Intelligence Questionnaire (TEIQue) developed by Petrides (2009) adapted with the permission of the author. The questionnaire included 30 items ranged from Strongly Disagree (1) to Strongly Agree (7) with seven points. Emotional Intelligence comprised 4 factors namely: (a) Emotionality, (b) Sociability, (c) Self-control, and (d) Well-being.

2.        The Scale of Psychological Well-Being (SPWB-42) developed by Ryff (1989) and previously validated by Akın, Demirci, Yıldız, Gediksiz, and Eroğlu (2012) adapted by the permission of the author. The questionnaire included 30 statements with a 7-points rating scale such as 1) Strongly Disagree; 2) Disagree; 3) Partly Disagree; 4) Undecided; 5) Partly Agree; 6) Agree; and 7) Strongly Agree. The questionnaire comprised 6 factors, namely: (a) Autonomy, (b) Environmental mastery, (c) Personal growth, (d) Purpose in life, (e) Positive relations with others, and (f) Self-acceptance.

Data Collection

Because of pandemic situations, the researchers obtained the list of public secondary schools’ teachers from school-websites. Initially, total of 40 public secondary schools were selected (20 boys’ and 20 girls’) through a random sampling technique to collect the data. After that, the researchers took phone numbers of school administration from social-media and requested the administration to share the cell numbers of their teaching staff. From those cell numbers, the researchers contacted them randomly. The questionnaire was designed in Google doc. The researchers contacted the teachers, shared the link of the questionnaire via online platforms for data collection, and got both the questionnaires filled by them.

Data Analysis

Data were analyzed by using Statistical Package for Social Sciences (SPSS-Version 26). For the first two research questions, descriptive statistics calculated. For the third research question, Pearson r computed to measure the relationship between emotional intelligence and psychological well-being. For testing the hypotheses for two groups, the researchers used the independent samples t-test.

Table 1. Descriptive Statistics of Emotional Intelligence of Teachers (N=1200)                                   

Table 1 shows that the teachers demonstrated the highest score on Emotionality (M=36.66, S.D.=7.48), stating they completely agreed while dealing with their students and teachers, followed by well-being (M=30.90, S.D.=5.11). The lowest score was found on Sociability (M=36.66, S.D.=7.48). The score on all factors showed that the teachers completely agreed that they were emotionally intelligent.

 Table 2. Descriptive Statistics of Psychological Wellbeing of Teachers (N=1200)                                                           

Table 2 shows that the teachers rated the highest score on Positive relations with others, (M=26.08, S.D.=4.53), followed by purpose in life (M=25.83, S.D.= 4.58). The teachers rated the lowest score on the factor of Environmental mastery (M=23.77, S.D.= 4.38). The score on all factors showed that the teachers completely agreed they felt well-being.

Table 3. Factor-wise Correlation

**. Correlation is significant at the 0.01 level (2-tailed).

^*A=Autonomy, ^*EM=Environmental mastery, ^*PG=Personal growth, ^*PR=Positive relation with others, ^*PL=Purpose in life and ^*SA=Self-acceptance.

Table 3 shows a correlation between emotional intelligence and psychological well-being. Well-being and Self-acceptance (r=.70) showed the highest relationship between the factors and followed by well-being and personal growth (r=.65). The lowest relationship was found between Sociability and Autonomy (r=.45). Overall, moderate positive significant relationship between all the factors of emotional intelligence and psychological well-being. The detailed results are given in Table 4.4.

Table 4. Pearson Correlation Coefficient between Emotional Intelligence and Psychological Wellbeing

Table 4 shows the overall relationship between emotional intelligence and psychological well-being. There was a strong positive correlation between emotional intelligence and the psychological well-being of teachers (r=.74).

Table 5. Independent Samples t-test for Gender-Based Comparison of Teachers on Emotional Intelligence

The Independent Samples t-test was run for gender-based comparison of teachers on emotional intelligence. According to Table 5, overall, there was a significant difference in the emotional intelligence of female and male teacher’s t (1198) = -.102, p=.001. Factor-wise analysis showed that female teachers demonstrated more emotionality (M=38.08, S.D.=8.042) than male teachers (M=36.24, S.D.= 6.883), t (1198) = .794, p=.020.

Table 6. Independent Samples t-test for Marital Status of Teachers on Emotional Intelligence

The Independent Samples t-test was run to measure the difference between single and married teachers of emotional intelligence. According to Table 6, there is a significant difference in the emotional intelligence of single and married teachers was found at t (1198) = -.3.489, p=.001. In factor-wise comparison, married teachers (M=37.71, SD=2.33) demonstrated higher score in emotionality than single teachers (M=35.57, SD=6.799), t (1198) = -2.034, p=.043. Further, married teachers had better wellbeing (M=32.16, SD=5.050) than single teachers (M=29.58, SD=5.117), t (1198) = -3.582, p=.000.  Overall, married teachers significantly showed a higher score (M=145.63, SD=22.057) in all factors as compared to single teachers score (M=135.69, SD=17.905), t (1198) = -.3.489, p=.001.

Table 7. Independent Samples t-test for Gender-Based Comparison of Teachers’ Psychological Well-being

The Independent Samples t-test was run for gender-based comparison of teachers on psychological well-being. According to Table 7, overall, there was a significant difference in the psychological well-being of female and male teacher’s t (1198) = .422, p=.000. Factor-wise analysis showed that female teachers demonstrated more positive relationships with others (M=29.70, S.D.=4.661) than male teachers (M=25.46, S.D.= 4.333), t (1198) = 1.948, p=.004.

Table 8. Independent Samples t-test for Marital Status of Teachers on Psychological Wellbeing

The Independent Samples t-test was run to measure the difference between single and married teachers of psychological well-being. According to Table 4.18, there is a significant difference in the psychological well-being of single and married teachers was found at t (1198) = -2.838, p=.005. In factor-wise comparison, married teachers (M=26.19, SD=4.660) demonstrated a higher score in positive relationships with others than single teachers (M=25.97, SD=4.415), t (1198) = -.338, p=.736. Similarly, married teachers had more Purposeful life (M=26.76, SD=4.415) than single teachers (M=24.86, SD=4.563), t (1198) = -3.005, p=.003.  Overall, married teachers significantly showed a higher score (M=153.54, SD=19.740) in all factors as compared to single teachers score (M=145.74, SD=19.067), t (1198) = -2.838, p=.005.

Discussion

This study found a significant positive relationship between emotional intelligence and the psychological well-being of teachers. The result of this study is similar to various research studies, Avsec, Masnec, and Komidar (2009) showed the level of EI and PWB of university teachers. The population consisted of all teachers in the University of Ljubljana, Slovenia and the sample size comprised 152 teachers; the researchers used a convenient sampling technique to collect the data. Result demonstrated that teachers showed more emotional intelligence in their score and also showed that teachers were better in their well-being while teaching.

Jeloudar, Yunus, Roslan, and Nor (2011) investigated the level of teachers’ emotional intelligence and students of public secondary school. The population of the study was all Malaysian teachers and students. In this study, the sample size consisted of 203 teachers and 2147 students from Malaysia. Data were collected through a convenient sampling technique. Result demonstrated that there was a positive relationship between teachers and students about classroom discipline strategy. Moreover, the a significant relationship between teacher’s EI and age groups.

The purpose of Behloli, Karimi-Motlagh, and Dehghanpour (2015) study was to measure the spiritual intelligence and psychological well-being of teachers. It was descriptive research with a correlational design. The population consisted of all the teachers in the city of Taibad, Iran. The sample size comprised of 310 teachers from elementary and secondary school. Data were analyzed with the help of two questionnaires; the researchers used a multistage sampling technique to gather the data. The result demonstrated that there was a positive relationship between spiritual intelligence and the psychological well-being of teachers. Moreover, secondary school teachers were more intelligent in their score rather than elementary school teachers.

In this study, female teachers demonstrated more intelligent in their emotions than male teachers. This finding is also similar to various research studies; Salami (2010) measured the EI and PWB of teachers. In this study, the sample size consisted of 420 secondary school teachers (200 males and 220 females) from the five states in Southwest Nigeria. The researcher used a simple random sampling technique to collect the data from five states. The findings demonstrated that there was a positive relationship between teacher’s EI and psychological well-being. Moreover, female teachers demonstrated a higher level of emotional intelligence rather than male teachers. Similarly, female teachers showed a higher score in psychological well-being than male teachers.

In this research, married teachers showed a higher score in their emotional intelligence rather than unmarried teachers. This finding is also similar to various research studies; Ishak, Mustapha, Mahmud, and Ariffin (2006) measured the emotional intelligence of Malaysian teachers in the workplace. The population of the study was all public secondary school teachers from Malaysia. In this study, the sample size comprised 100 teachers, including married and unmarried; the researcher used a simple random sampling technique to collect the data. The result showed that married teachers of public secondary school were more intelligent in their emotions and behavior at the workplace rather than unmarried teachers.

Another finding of this study was on the psychological well-being of teachers. The result of the study is similar to various research studies. The purpose of Ilgan, Ozu, Ata, and Akram (2015) study was to measure the relationship between PWB and the quality of school work life. The population of the study was 120 public school teachers from the six provinces in Turkey. The sample size comprised 784 teachers; the researchers used a cluster random sampling technique to collect the data. Result demonstrated that teachers showed a higher level of PWB and quality of school work life.

Mehdinezhad (2012) investigated the relationship between teachers’ well-being and their efficiency. The population of the study was all high schools’ teachers in 9^th and 10^th grade in the city of Zahedan, Iran. Qualitative approach used to conduct the study; data were collected with the help of two questionnaires. The demonstrated showed that there was a moderately high positive relationship between teachers’ well-being and teacher efficiency. Moreover, 10^th-grade teachers showed a higher score in their well-being and efficiency rather than 9^th-grade teachers.

In this research, married teachers showed a higher level of psychological well-being than unmarried teachers. This finding is also similar to various research studied, Damasio, Melo, and Silve (2013) described PWB and quality of life among school teachers. The population of the study was 57 private and public school in the city of Campina Grande, Paraiba, Brazil and the sample size of the study comprised 517 teachers including married and unmarried teachers. The results showed that married teachers more powerful in their psychological well-being and quality of life and unmarried teachers showed lower score in their well-being and quality of life. These variables showed unique relationship for people with high and low level.

Some of the previous studies found that unmarried teachers demonstrated a higher score on psychological well-being rather than married teachers, Akram (2019) measured the psychological well-being among teachers working within the university in Pakistan. The population of the study was four public, and private universities and the sample size comprised 437 university teachers. The researcher used a multistage sampling technique to gather data from teachers. A questionnaire on psychological well-being was used to conduct this study. Result demonstrated that female and unmarried teachers showed a higher score in their well-being. Moreover, male and married teachers showed a lower score in their well-being.

Some previous studies showed a relationship between EI and PWB in students. The purpose of De-Lazzari (2000) study was to measure the relationship between EI and PWB in Catholic high school students. The population was all high school students in the city of Lower Mainland of British Columbia. The sample size comprised 155 students (38 males and 33 females) from grade nine and (34 males and 50 females) from grade ten. Data were collected with the help of two questionnaires. The findings demonstrated that there was a positive correlation between grade nine and grade ten students. Result showed that grade ten students were more intelligent in their emotions and well-being rather than grade nine students.

The results of the study are mixed but quite interesting. The female teachers were better in emotional intelligence; the reasons may be that female teacher are more social with their colleagues, care for their colleagues, and care for psychological well-being. Further studies might be conducted to understand why female teachers are better in their emotional intelligence. Similarly, female teachers were better in psychological well-being score as compared to male teachers. Moreover, married teachers demonstrated higher score in emotional intelligence rather than unmarried teachers. Similarly, married teachers demonstrated higher score in psychological well-being rather than unmarried teachers. There was strong positive relationship between emotional intelligence and psychological well-being of teachers.  However, further studies might be conducted to explore the reasons. The findings lead to the idea that linking teacher emotional intelligence with teacher psychological well-being is quite important.

Recommendations

1.         Male and married teachers should be given the training to improve emotional intelligence.

2.        Male and single teachers should be trained to improve psychological well-being.