Associations of trait emotional intelligence and stress with anxiety in Chinese medical students

Background: Medical students are vulnerable to anxiety. Identifying its key influencing factors can potentially benefit both students and their future patients. Trait emotional intelligence (EI) and perceived stress may play important roles in anxiety. The main objective of this study was to examine the associations between trait EI, perceived stress and anxiety among Chinese medical students. Materials and methods: Self-report questionnaires, consisting of the Chinese versions of the Trait Emotional Intelligence Questionnaire-Short Form, the 10-item Perceived Stress Scale, the 7-item Generalized Anxiety Disorder Scale, and demographic section were distributed to 1500 students at three medical universities in China. Hierarchical regression analyses were performed to examine the associations between trait EI, perceived stress and anxiety. Asymptotic and resampling strategies were utilized to examine the mediating effect of perceived stress. Results: A total number of 1388 medical students became final participants. After adjustment for demographics, while trait EI was strongly and negatively associated with anxiety, accounting for 21.1% of its variance, perceived stress was strongly and positively related to anxiety, explaining an additional 10.0% of the variance. Stress appeared to have a mediating effect on the association between trait EI and anxiety in students with high and moderate levels of stress, but not in low stress group. Conclusions: Both constructs of trait EI and perceived stress could be of vital importance to understand anxiety in medical students. Evidence-based strategies to enhance trait EI and reduce perceived stress might be undertaken to prevent and treat anxiety in the students.