Relationship between emotional intelligence and disaster response self-efficacy: A comparative study in nurses.

Background: Nurses who constitute an important part of the health system play a critical role in all stages of disaster management, especially in providing care for disaster victims. It is essential for nurses to have adequate education and qualifications to reduce disaster-related mortality and morbidity rates in the community. The qualifications of nurses depend not only on their knowledge and skills but also on their emotional abilities such as empathy and stress management. Emotions can impact individuals' levels of self-efficacy in disaster response, and it may help explain the differences in self-efficacy among nurses.

Objective: This study aimed to investigate the relationship between emotional intelligence and disaster response self-efficacy, and compare the scores between hospital nurses and National Medical Rescue Team nurses.

Design: A cross-sectional design.

Settings: This research was conducted at Bezmialem Foundation University Hospital and National Medical Rescue Team in Istanbul, Turkey.

Participants: This study included 565 nurses from two different institutions.

Methods: A survey consisting of the Demographic Information Form, the Modified Schutte Emotional Intelligence Scale, and the Disaster Response Self-Efficacy Scale was administered to the nurses. The data collected from March to April of 2022 was analyzed using SPSS 25.0 program. The differences and relationships among variables were determined by using Chi-square tests, student's t-tests, Pearson correlation, and linear regression analyses.

Results: Of the 565 participants, 219 (38.8%) were hospital nurses and 346 (61.2%) were NMRT nurses. NMRT nurses scored significantly higher in emotional intelligence (131.45 ± 6.15 versus 129.75 ± 6.01) and disaster response self-efficacy (80.71 ± 11.38 versus 77.77 ± 11.33) than hospital nurses (p < 0.05). In addition, emotional intelligence was found to be significantly and positively correlated to disaster response self-efficacy (r = 0.885, p < 0.05).

Conclusions: The emotional intelligence and disaster response self-efficacy were positively correlated, and both levels of NMRT nurses higher than hospital nurses. These findings suggest that healthcare organizations should take the emotional intelligence of nurses as an important means to improve their disaster response selfefficacy. It can improve the quality of disaster response to obtain well self-efficacy by developing the emotional intelligence of nurses.