Emotional Intelligence in Nursing: Managing Emotions Tied Most to Distress in 704 Nurses

Of four emotional intelligence skills, the ability to regulate your own emotions had the strongest overall links to depression, anxiety and stress symptoms in 704 clinical nurses in Southwest China¹. The study of emotional intelligence in nursing, published in Frontiers in Psychology, found the single strongest link between better emotion regulation and feeling less touchy.

The findingHow Is Emotional Intelligence in Nursing Linked to Stress Symptoms?

Nurses who were better at regulating their emotions tended to report fewer symptoms, most clearly less touchiness, after all other skills and symptoms were taken into account.

The researchers used network analysis. It treats each skill and each symptom as a point, and draws a line wherever two are linked after allowing for all the others. A minus sign means that more of the skill went with less of the symptom.

These were the three strongest links between the two groups. The authors call the second and third small and say to read them with caution. Of the four skills, regulation of emotion also had the largest overall bridge to the symptoms (bridge expected influence −0.268).

The skillsWhat Does Emotional Intelligence Mean Here?

Here, emotional intelligence means four skills measured by the 16-item Wong and Law Emotional Intelligence Scale.

• Self-emotion appraisal: reading your own feelings.
• Others' emotion appraisal: reading other people's feelings.
• Use of emotion: using feelings to drive action and goals.
• Regulation of emotion: managing your own feelings.

Symptoms came from the 21-item Depression Anxiety Stress Scales (DASS-21). The authors used it as a screening tool, not a diagnosis. You can check your own emotional skills with our emotional intelligence test.

Key symptomWhich Stress Symptom Was Most Connected?

Feeling agitated was the most connected symptom, with the highest expected influence of all 21 symptoms (1.203).

Expected influence shows how strongly one point is tied to the rest of the network. Feeling down-hearted and feeling close to panic came next. The authors suggest agitation may reflect the steady demands of nursing: watching patients closely, reacting to sudden events and managing risk. The main results held after allowing for age and years of work.

Who took partWho Was in the Study?

The study surveyed 704 clinical nurses, mainly in Chengdu and Kunming, between January 2021 and March 2022, during the COVID-19 pandemic.

Most were women (90.6%). Their average age was 31.8, with 10.7 years of work on average. Almost half (47.0%) worked in psychiatric hospitals, and 81.5% had faced at least one type of aggression from patients. Tests found no clear difference between nurses with and without that experience, or between psychiatric and other nurses. The authors add that this doesn't prove the networks are the same.

What it meansWhat Does This Mean for Nurses and Other Caring Jobs?

It marks emotion regulation as a skill worth watching in nurses' mental health, not a proven fix.

The authors suggest agitation may deserve attention in check-ups, along with low mood and feeling close to panic. They point to earlier research suggesting emotional intelligence training may help nurses manage stress, but this study did not test any training. If stress, low mood or worry gets in the way of work or life, talk to a doctor or mental health professional.

Thinking about caring work? Our career test shows which kinds of work fit you. See how types such as the ISFJ Defender and ESFJ Consul handle stress, or browse all 16 personality types. For more, read our stories on emotional intelligence and life satisfaction and neuroticism and anxiety.

QuestionsEmotional Intelligence in Nursing: FAQ

SourcesThe Study and Our Sources

Written byArjun VardhanNews & Research WriterNumbers checked byLeon FalknerData & Research Analyst