Hhianu, F., Manasia, L.(2014).

Socio-emotional intelligence for successful higher military

education. A case study approach. Procedia - Social and Behavioral Sciences 142 ( 2014 )
389 395, ScienceDirect.
.
Critic Analysis

- Military psychology -
1. Introduction

The article refers to Socio-emotional intelligence for successful higher military

education. In the context of higher military education, socio-emotional intelligence has been
considered a core-competency (SEC).
The process of communication of emotions between 2 persons is complex, and lot of
elements can influence the occurrence of the emotions and interpretation of this occurrence.
The ability of decoding the occurrences of emotions of other people in the social context is an
important ability in human interactions day by day.
This article is important because the study is because it proposes a training program
design to improve the socio-emotional competency of the students participating in the
research. The training program is aimed at developing and improving dimensions of socio-
emotional competency by using specific well targeted training strategies, methods and tools.
There is a growing interest in increasing socio-emotional skills in military professionals
due to performance-related reasons. In this context, the training of the future operative
officers is a topical issue, a challenge to the higher educational system. Socio-emotional
intelligence is a reality that should be studied not only for psychological and educational
considerations, but also for social and professional reasons. This paper aims at analyzing the
socio-emotional competency in students attending bachelor courses to become operative
officers. Socio-emotional skills represent a product of the emotional development and social
learning, increasing subjects performances both in personal and professional activities. The
persons who develop them have the advantage of successfully coping with personal and
professional challenges.
My overall impression of the article in general terms, is that I find interesting the fact that
the results of the study will help at building a training, special for the five for students
development in the intelligence field.

2. Method

The research focus was to assess the socio-emotional competency (SEC) of the students in
intelligence field in order to design a training program. The training program addresses the
five dimensions of the socio-emotional competency in order to improve professional skills,
but also social and individual life quality.

Research objectives
This research study aims at investigating the socio-emotional competence in students
in intelligence field. The study we propose is guided by the following three research
objectives (O):
O1: To diagnose the level of SEC development in students in intelligence field.
O2: To figure out the socio-emotional profile of the students in intelligence field.
O3: To foresee vulnerable areas of the SEC in students in intelligence field to be addressed by
specific training programs.

Hypotheses
According to the previous research objectives, the following research hypotheses can by
formulated:
H1: If the teachers in higher education (intelligence field) are aware of the importance of the
SEC, then their instructional strategies will also focus on the development of the socio-
emotional competency.
H2: The research supposes there are gender differences regarding SEC levels of development
in students in intelligence field.

Research population
As a usefulness of the article, I consider important the part where the population are
the students, so the objectives can be researched more clearly. This research was conducted on
the population of students following a bachelor program in intelligence field at Alexandru
Ioan Cuza University. Thus, in the context of this census study it was preferred to collect data
from every member of the population rather than choosing a sample, due to the small number
of students and their socio-demographic profile. 127 students, aged 19-25, 85 males and 42
females, participated in this research.

Research methods and tools

To support this research study was proposed a multidimensional model to explain and
operationalize the SEC. The model depicts two macro dimensions, namely the social
intelligence (SQ) and the emotional one (EQ). The two-macro dimensions encompass five
factors: motivation (M), selfregulation (SR), self-awareness (SA), empathy (E), and social
skills (SS).
As a strength, the study was instrumented through a hybrid research methodology
blending co-participative observation, questionnaire-based inquiry, and documents analysis,
namely individual evaluation reports. Co-participative observation aimed to assess socio-
emotional students behavior in different social and academic contexts. A questionnaire was
used to assess socio-emotional intelligence. The original instrument was designed by Robert
Wood and Harry Tolley (Wood & Tooley, 2003). As a usefulness of the study, the
questionnaire was translated from English into Romanian, and adapted for the population of
military students, having a good score of the internal consistency (Cronbachs alpha = .78,
with positive inter item correlations). Furthermore, we will refer this tool as the
multidimensional questionnaire (MDQ). Currently, we are in process to validate the
questionnaire on military students population. The MDQ is a self-report questionnaire
measuring socio-emotional intelligence on five scales or dimensions, following the theoretical
model exposed in a previous section: motivation (M), self-regulation (SR), self-awareness
(SA), empathy (E), and social-skills (SS). The questionnaire describes 25 life situations or
scenarios; five for each dimension. The conditions seek to evaluate (based on the level of
development and the level of usage) both the individual and social components of the socio-
emotional intelligence. The Cronbachs alpha quoeficient slightly varies from .74 to .80 for
the five scales, with positive inter-items correlations.

Results

The research results reveal that the investigated students population has an optimal
level of SEC (see Table 1). More than half of the respondents have a very high socio-
emotional intelligence. Considering that the number of respondents with high and very high
level of emotional intelligence is about 93%, it can be assumed that the initial selection for
entering a bachelor program in intelligence field is rigorous and focused on SEC.

Female subjects have a better average level of socio-emotional competence than the males do
(Table 2): MeanF (41.95) > MeanM (38.58). 43.4% of respondents with a very high level of
SEC are females. Therefore, all the subjects with a medium level of SEC are males.
Further, the paper focuses on analysing the distribution of research subjects relative to each of
the fifth dimensions of the SEC: SR, SA, E, M, and SS. Fig. 2. Respondents' distribution
according to: a) self-regulation; b)self-awareness (N = 127) reveals that over 90% of students
are characterized by a high and very high level of selfregulation. Only 5% of respondents
have an average level of this ability. Furthermore, the self-regulation ability is an overt
personality trait in military students: Mean = 5.57 (Table 3).

Unlike the self-regulation ability, self-awareness and social skills have an optimal but
not excellent level of development. 5% of the sample are described by a non-satisfactory level
of self-awareness (Fig. 2. b). The fifth structural components of the socio-emotional
intelligence develop a positive correlational relationship. Thus, by increasing self-awareness,
it will also increase the level of social skills (and vice versa). Anticipating, one of the core
directions of the training program will focus on self-awareness and social skills. Related to
the other dimensions of SEC, over half of the respondents have a very high motivation (Fig.
3). There is, however, the percentage of 3.1% with poor to average motivation. Over 80% of
respondents have a high level of empathy; meanwhile only 2% are low empathic (Fig. 4. a).
Over 70% of respondents have a very high level of social skills, and about 8% of respondents
don to have this ability at an optimal level (Fig. 4. b).

Optimal scores have been calculated for social skills in the case of women. Over 85%
of women demonstrate a high and very high level of social skills. A lower percentage of 60%
of men shows the same level of social skills as women do. To conclude, there are significant
gender differences regarding all the five components of SEC. Females score better than men
do.

A training program to support SEC. Brief proposal

As argued before, the research was meant to improve curriculum and instructional
practices regarding the socioemotional intelligence. The research results described in the
previous section depict that the male subjects have lower scores than female subjects do.
Although, the subjects have optimal scores of SR, M and E, the training program will address
all the five dimensions of the SEC. The long-term goal is to train the SEC as a holistic
composite personality structure. The training design is based also on two relevant criteria: a)
the effectiveness of the program (the type of program that will bring the greatest benefits for a
very large number of students, the costbenefit approach), and b) the institution requirements
and policies regarding training (Ghergu, 2007). The training program will address the
students in intelligence field. In addition, training activities have a double function: to train
students SEC and to provide the participants with tools to scaffold individual training and
regulation in various life contexts. We assume the program will have a positive influence not
only on the learning outcomes and professional performances of future officers, but also on
the military system itself. Based on bibliographical research (Ghergu, 2009) and the results of
the needs analysis carried out with the program direct beneficiaries, we propose the training
program to be implemented on a weekly basis, during and an academic semester. Training
activities will cover 40 hours of instructional time, delivered in face-to-face and asynchronous
sessions. Thus, the training program blends traditional instruction with digital one, supported
by a learning management system. Mainly, the program will be a practical one, mainly
(Vaughn, 2008), based on five instructional modules according to the five dimensions of the
SEC model. Training activities are designed following the pebble-in-the-pond instructional
design model (Merril, 2002). According to this model, acting in a life or professional situation
produces ripple effects. To form and develop SEC, we propose a progressive approach
starting form a central point, namely a problem. This is the action level (A), where the
students face a problem to solve, a whole task of the type that learners will be taught to
accomplish by instruction (Merrill, 2002, p. 42). The second ripple states the progression. In
terms of SEC, the progression reffers to reflection (R) in order to decompose the problem into
its elements and to associate knowledge and skills needed to solve the problem. The next
ripple is to improve behavior, to work on self-optimization, related to the launched problem.
The last two ripples focus on self-regulation (S) and evaluation (E). Thsese define a complex
level of the SEC. The ripples are now expanded sufficiently to engage the learners in
authentic and effective behavior.
Following the ARISE (act, reflect, improve, self-regulate, evaluate) method, training activities
are designed. Based on the four-level evaluation model (Kirkpatrick & Kirkpatrick, 2006), the
training program will be assessed: a) level 1: reaction (we can deduct how well is accepted a
program and how can it be improved in the future from a reactions' analysis); b) level 2:
learning - observed in the personality inventory analysis applied in the end of the training
sessions; c) level 3: behaviour - the evaluation will be made through the students' practical
activities or later professional activities analysis; d) level 4: outcomes - a higher productivity,
lower costs, improved quality,greater visibility. The program goals are set out in the form of
the desired results.

3. Discutions

A weakness is that the sample is gender unbalanced. There is a predefined number of

male and female students that can be enrolled in a bachelor program provided by a military
university. Usually, the number of the male students is greater than the number of the female
students. Furthermore, I can consider this unbalanced gender distribution as a limit of the
study.
I consider that this article reviews very analytical the methodology of the study.
Furthermore, the usefulness of the results of this study are converted into a training
programme for the students in inteligence field. In addition, the details about the training
programme is complex and gives understanding of the development of the future training.
I expect to see a future study based on the results of the training program for the same
students that take part into the training.

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