The effects of cultural and emotional intelligence on care in nursing

Abstract

This study was conducted to find out the effects of cultural intelligence, which is one of the strategies used in managing intercultural differences, and emotional intelligence which enables individuals to understand and manage their own emotions, to understand others’ emotions and develop their self-confidence, on care behaviour, which is the basis of the nursing profession. This descriptive and cross-sectional study was conducted in a city hospital between 01.09.2019 and 01.03.2020. The data were collected from nurses in the hospital who volunteered to participate in the study within the dates above. The sample was not selected, and 225 nurses who volunteered to participate in the study were included in the study. The total mean score of the participants from the cultural intelligence scale was 47.558±12.092, while the full scores from the factors were 7.9208±2.857 (min 4-max 20) for metacognitive factor, 15.963±4.89 (min 6-max 30) for cognitive aspect, 12.004±3.656 (min 5-max 25) for motivational factor and as 11.821±3.493 (min 5-max 25) for behavioural factor. The total mean score of the participants from the Caring Behaviors Inventory was 5.053±0.819, while the total scores from the factors were 5.045±0.823 for the assurance factor, 5.208±1.240 for the knowledge and skill factor, 4.994±0.831 for respectful factor and 4.949±0.842 for connectedness factor. The total mean score of the participants from the Emotional Intelligence Scale was 141.367±18.656, while the full scores from the factors were 44.563±5.96 for optimism/mood regulation, 18.940±4.15 for the use of emotions and 33.493±7.565 for evaluation of emotions. Cultural intelligence and emotional intelligence were found to have an effect on caring behaviours of nurses. Although there was no direct significant correlation between cultural intelligence total score and caring behaviours total score, there was a significant correlation between cultural intelligence factors and caring behaviours. There was a significant correlation between caring behaviours of nurses with high emotional intelligence.