Hypothesized model of the relationship between affective behaviour, emotional intelligence and success of out-of-school youths in cell phone maintenance enterprise

Jimoh Bakare (Faculty of Vocational and Technical Education, Industrial Technical Education, University of Nigeria, Nsukka, Nigeria)
Ifeanyi Benedict Ohanu (Faculty of Vocational and Technical Education, Industrial Technical Education, University of Nigeria, Nsukka, Nigeria)
Taiwo Olabanji Shodipe (Faculty of Vocational and Technical Education, Industrial Technical Education, University of Nigeria, Nsukka, Nigeria)

Rajagiri Management Journal

ISSN: 0972-9968

Article publication date: 3 March 2023

Issue publication date: 10 August 2023

821

Abstract

Purpose

Many youths are out-of-school with few having the basic sustainable skills to earn a living. Some of the engaged ones have interpersonal relationship and other problems that can sustain the successes of their business. Therefore, this study is set to investigate the relationship between affective behaviour, emotional intelligence and success of out-of-school youths in cell phone maintenance enterprise.

Design/methodology/approach

Purposive sampling technique was used to select the sample. Of the total, 350 out-of-school youths who are engaged in cell phone maintenance enterprise in computer village Ikeja, Lagos State, Nigeria, were used as a sample, but 292 samples with completely filled research instrument were used for the study. Data collected were validated through the principal component analysis and the hypothesis tested through the confirmatory factor analysis using AMOS and SPSS.

Findings

The result of the study showed that affective behaviour and social skills do not necessarily predict but self-motivation predicts the career success of out-of-school youths in cell phone maintenance enterprise. Self-awareness, emotional regulation, social awareness and emotional receptivity significantly influence affective behaviour towards success in their chosen career.

Practical implications

This study enhances the cell phone maintenance association or group to adopt the participation of on-the-job training of their members to help them build good relationship and self-esteem. The training will improve their emotional intelligence and further enhance the creation of a formidable emotional intelligent workplace team.

Social implications

The study affirms that the constructs of emotional intelligence are predictors of career success among out-of-school cell phone maintenance. It boosts their moral and psychological behaviours towards building good customer relationship which culminates into success in their career area. This study also motivates the out-of-school youths that success is multifaceted that involves building adequate personal and social relationship within the circle of their co-maintenance personnel and customers.

Originality/value

This study showed that success in any chosen career involves adequate training, inter- and intra-personal relationship and building adequate emotional intelligence to overcome the varying challenges that may be encountered. Also it indicated that personal development in a chosen career is essential and career successes can be built around personal goal orientation rather than building it in circle of people around. The study does not totally neglect social relationship because no man can live and succeed in isolation.

Keywords

Citation

Bakare, J., Ohanu, I.B. and Shodipe, T.O. (2023), "Hypothesized model of the relationship between affective behaviour, emotional intelligence and success of out-of-school youths in cell phone maintenance enterprise", Rajagiri Management Journal, Vol. 17 No. 3, pp. 254-277. https://doi.org/10.1108/RAMJ-06-2022-0102

Publisher

:

Emerald Publishing Limited

Copyright © 2023, Jimoh Bakare, Ifeanyi Benedict Ohanu and Taiwo Olabanji Shodipe

License

Published in Rajagiri Management Journal. Published by Emerald Publishing Limited. This article is published under the Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY 4.0) licence. Anyone may reproduce, distribute, translate and create derivative works of this article (for both commercial and non-commercial purposes), subject to full attribution to the original publication and authors. The full terms of this licence may be seen at http://creativecommons.org/licences/by/4.0/legalcode


Introduction

It is appalling to see an increase in the rate of out-of-school children and youths. Vayachuta et al. (2016) viewed out-of-school youths as the fraction of the populace between the ages of 3–25 years that do not go to school or dropped out-of-school during the academic programme or basic education programme. To be out-of-school signifies that there is a low chance to access the core basic skills, knowledge, attitude and morales with appropriate certification towards these achievements and this serves as a constraints towards employability, well-being, reduced poverty and economic growth and development (Ngware et al., 2018). Ugomma (2014) viewed of out-of-school youths as young boys and girls in school age bracket, from primary, secondary and tertiary, but are not in any of these school systems. This action leads to a lot of societal problems emanating as a result of idle-abled youths most especially in underdeveloped and developing countries.

The twist in the economic dimension of these countries culminated into a quest to curb the menace of unemployment among out-of-school youths. The government, private and public individuals and some non-governmental agencies encouraged youths to learn a trade and invest their time judiciously so as to meet the present economic demand. Therefore, many of them learn a trade and diverse handiwork ranging from shoe making, hairdressing, fashion and style, baking and other engineering activities (Shodipe and Ohanu, 2021) like cell phone maintenance enterprises.

Maintenance is the core skills required in cell phone enterprise. It is a process of keeping tools and machineries used in cell phone repairs and services in good working condition and prevention of wastage of material resources while preventing injuries of the personnel. The goal of maintenance is to achieve a high degree of machine availability and retain the equipment in proper condition, which jointly helps to meet the production system's target throughout (Gopalakrishnan et al., 2022; Subramaniyan et al., 2020; Ohanu et al., 2020; Bakare et al., 2018).

Motivating out-of-school youths to engage in cell phone maintenance is an essential task that propels success and higher output in the chosen career. Motivated youths will perform well by promoting knowledge, determination and shaping a course for others (Smith et al., 2020; Chintalloo and Mahadeo, 2013). Motivation is expressed as the characteristics that cause for an action (Markus, 2016). It is a combination of needs, force and incentive, but, command systems and financial incentives may decrease motivation (Jacobsen et al., 2014).

Previous literature identified motivation and other contingent factors for workers (Kuykendall et al., 2020; Bottomley et al., 2016) and verified positive effects of workers motivation level on their success in a chosen career (Chmielewska et al., 2020; Jiang et al., 2021), most research studies on motivational theories are based on employed personnel, employee, managers and employers in public and private sectors.

Extrinsic and intrinsic motivations have a huge role to stimulate youths to achieve success in cell phone maintenance (Khan et al., 2013). Intrinsic motivation provides inner motivations and has a positive relationship with success at work and an improved work performance (Chien et al., 2020), while extrinsic rewards and working conditions such as pay, benefits and job security have been focused to increase motivation level (Stringer et al., 2011), some literature studies paid attention to the role of workers feeling at work such as achievement, recognition and responsibility in boosting motivation levels (Herzberg et al., 1959; Herzberg, 1968). According to their findings, workers would be better motivated and increase productivity when they experience these feelings at work, compared to when they are provided with better working conditions such as high pay and job security.

Several other studies of this magnitude have been carried out in several fields of specialization and cultures; Malaysian retail sector (Teck–Hong and Waheed, 2011), private educational institute at Dhaka city corporation (Islam and Hossain, 2018), on call center employees (Hulya et al., 2012), SMEs in Ghana (Yeboah and Abdulai, 2016), SME in Bandung, Indonesia (Tesavrita and Suryadi, 2012), high school teachers in Turkey (Ataliç et al., 2016) etc. This study focused on out-of-school youth in cell phone maintenance enterprise in Lagos state, South West region in Nigeria. This study is unique because these categories of people are viewed in the community in the region in a way that reduces their self-esteem. Despite the way they are viewed, this study intends to look at the hypothesized model of the relationship between their affective behaviour, emotional intelligence and their success in their chosen career with consideration on their self-awareness, self-motivation, emotional regulation, social awareness, social skills and emotional receptivity which may foster their affective behaviour toward career satisfaction/successes. Therefore, the following research questions guide the study: to what extent will out-of-school youth's affective behaviour influence their career success, to what extent will emotional intelligence influence their career success and what impact would out-of-school youths emotional intelligence have on their affective behaviour? To enhance readability, the research work is organized in the following order: Introduction, Literature review, Methodology, Data analysis, Result presentation, Conclusions and implications.

Literature review

Career satisfaction/success

Career success is the perceived achievement individuals have accumulated as a result of their work experience (De Vos et al., 2021; Akkermans et al., 2020). Career satisfaction is a measure of individuals’ contentment of their chosen career whether partially (having affinity for a particular segment of the career) or totally which emanates from the nature of the job/career like monthly income, stress management, leadership style, resource management etc. Career satisfaction is a personal evaluation of existing conditions on the job that may arise due to the experiences on the job (Hulya et al., 2012). Anju and Sona (2011) reiterate that career satisfaction is associated to one's feeling of satisfaction and propels the enthusiasm to work. Locke (1976) defined career satisfaction “as the pleasurable emotional state resulting from the appraisal of one's job as achieving or facilitating the achievement of one's job values”. With previous knowledge of the concept, career satisfaction is a multidimensional psychological response to one's job having other components of cognitive (evaluative), affective (emotional) and behaviour (Clark et al., 2020; Forest et al., 2011).

Herzberg's motivation theory of career satisfaction

This study is based on the Herzberg's motivator hygiene theory of career satisfaction. This theory is considered the most appropriate over other theories due to its emphasis that job satisfaction and dissatisfaction emanates from diverse sources. He believed that satisfaction is dependent on motivators, and dissatisfaction is dependent on hygiene factors. He further clarified that motivators are intrinsic to the career, and hygiene is extrinsic to the job (Locke, 1976). Ataliç et al. (2016) explained that motivation factors are stimulants to human behaviour which are inherent in the career but not extrinsically influenced by the environment. Recognition, advancement, promotion, achievement and responsibility are intrinsic factors that influence the motivation of human behaviour (Ataliç et al., 2016).

Hygiene factors prevent dissatisfaction, but they do not lead to satisfaction. They are necessary only to avoid bad feelings at work (Teck–Hong and Waheed, 2011). These factors include but not limited to job security, status, administration, supervision etc. In this study, due to the area of specialization of the sample, they are sole proprietors and decide the future of their businesses; hence, as shown in Figure 1 we focus solely on the motivator factors that enhance individual's behaviour in his chosen career. Therefore, we hypothesize that:

H1.

There is a significant relationship between affective behaviour and success of out-of-school youths in cell phone maintenance enterprises.

H2.

There is a significant relationship between self-motivation and success of out-of-school youths in cell phone maintenance enterprises.

H3.

There is a significant relationship between social skills and success of out-of-school youths in cell phone maintenance enterprises.

Affective behaviour

Affective behaviour is a mental phenomenon that is unique for conscious experience, subjective feelings, emotions and mood (Trandafilović et al., 2013). Affective behaviour was used interchangeably as affective commitment to refer to as “positive feeling of identification with, attachment to and involvement in the work organization” (Jang and George, 2012). They lay emphasis that individuals with their own businesses have a positive affective behaviour. Affective behaviour, also referred to as affective delivery, is a way by which individuals express their social desired emotions during service transactions (Potipiroon et al., 2019; Prentice, 2016). In empirical reviews, affective behaviour adds value to the success of an organization. It includes enhancement of quality customer relationship (Stokic et al., 2019), foster customer's recommendation to others and boost consistent patronage of services (Gilboa et al., 2019). Affective behaviour is solely dependent on individuals’ well-being. Employee or individuals’ affective well-being is not limited to enhancing his quality of health but also builds affective business–customer relationship to yield high productivity and low turnover rate (Xu et al., 2019; Breitbart et al., 2015; Kok et al., 2013; Inceoglu et al., 2018).

Emotional intelligence

Emotional intelligence is the ability to recognize and regulate one's own emotions to empathize with others, to build and maintain relationships and to cope with stress and adversity. The concept of emotional intelligence varies with research studies and different application areas. Mayer et al. (2016) define emotional intelligence as “the ability to perceive, understand, manage and use emotions to facilitate thinking”. Emotional intelligence is the application of mental abilities to solve problems, cope with rising demands, understands self and developing relationship with others (Bar – On, 2006; George et al., 2022; Selvi and Aiswarya, 2022). It enhances job performance, career development and stimulates satisfaction by making sure that individuals build positive relationships, team work and social investment (Thory, 2016; Lu and Fan, 2017). Koubova and Buchko (2013) and Oden et al. (2015) lay more emphasis that emotional intelligence allow individuals to manage their emotions, manage stress, productive while undergoing stress and to maximally adjust to changing situation in the organization. Since emotional intelligence involves understanding self and managing relationship with others, Mehta and Singh (2013) classified that individuals must possess personal and social competence (PcSc) to build effective relationships.

Mehta and Singh (2013) further sub-divided the PcSc into SSEs which are personal competence into self-awareness, self-motivation and emotional regulation, while social competence into social awareness, social skills and emotional receptivity.

Personal competence

Competence is a fundamental feature exhibited in human beings and serves as basis for individual personality development. Kamprath and Mietzner (2015) assert that personal competence forecast certain human behaviour. Individual's personal competence is attributed to abilities such as “ability to act autonomously and to solve problems independently”, “flexibility”, “ability to cooperate”, “practical ethics and moral maturity” (Delamare and Winterton, 2013). Out-of-school youths with high level of personal competence are likely to have special skills and abilities that enable them to be successful in their chosen career. Such persons may have higher cognitive and behavioural self-management skills, and these factors can lead to more effective decision-making and task persistence (Ghanizadeh, 2017).

On the other hand, out-of-school youths with low personal competence skills often feel overwhelmed when faced with new tasks and stressful circumstances in their workplace. This situation will culminate into an ineffective decision-making in which problems are solved using short-term, incomplete, or maladaptive solutions and reduced productivity (Ghanizadeh, 2017).

Hence, there is a need to critically examine the influence of certain personal competence on the affective behaviour of cell phone maintenance enterprises. Therefore, we hypothesize that:

H4.

Out-of-school youth in cell phone maintenance enterprises self-awareness has a significant influence on their affective behaviour.

H5.

Out-of-school youth in cell phone maintenance enterprises self-motivation has a significant influence on their affective behaviour.

H6.

Out-of-school youth in cell phone maintenance enterprises emotional regulation has a significant influence on their affective behaviour.

Social competence

Social competence is necessary in our everyday life. Social competence is the ability to handle social interactions effectively. It refers to the ability to get along with others, form and maintain appropriate relationships and responding in adaptive ways in social settings (Ke and Moon, 2018). Therefore, it is essential that individuals relate well with customers and colleague in his workplace. Several research studies have been carried out on emotional intelligence with different approaches; Nawaz and Gomes (2018) have studied the effect of emotional intelligence on social competence and formulated hypotheses on the constructs of social competence to influence EI, emotional intelligence and leadership style (Li et al., 2016; Suhaila and Zahra, 2013), learning strategies (Hasanzadeh and Shahmohamadi, 2011), training teachers (Gilar – Corbi et al., 2018) and so on. We have a different view about the application of emotional intelligence especially in the area of social competence. Hence, we hypothesize that:

H7.

Out-of-school youth in cell phone maintenance enterprises social awareness has a significant influence on their affective behaviour.

H8.

Out-of-school youth in cell phone maintenance enterprises social skills has a significant influence on their affective behaviour.

H9.

Out-of-school youth in cell phone maintenance enterprises emotional receptivity has a significant influence on the affective behaviour.

Methodology

Sample

The researchers carried out the study in computer village Ikeja, Lagos State, South West Nigeria, which is the centre hub of cell phone and electronics maintenance enterprise in the country within 2019–2020. As at this period, there are 475 registered members of the association of cell phone maintenance within the hub. Purposive sampling technique was used to gather samples. The sample technique was used because the study focused on the drop out-of-school cell phone maintenance experts. These sets are unique and are few within the area of study. So the research instrument was administered on their meeting day. 350 cell phone maintenance personnel who dropped out-of-school were present, but we had 292 fully completed and returned questionnaire. Therefore, the sample used in the study is 292 cell phone maintenance personnel. This yielded 83.4% return rate of the responses collected which formed the basis of our sample. A copy of the consent form was attached to the instrument, and the samples read the statement of confidentiality before responding to the questionnaire. During this exercise, it was discovered that the sample focus either dropped out of secondary school, have vocational training with inability to proceed to higher education or rather dropped out of their university education programme which was as a result of several ranging problems/challenges.

Measures

The instrument for data collected was a structured questionnaire that was adapted from the previous research studies. The research instrument contains three main constructs of affective behaviour, career success and emotional intelligence (see appendix).

Affective behaviour scale. It is a 20-item scale (Hofmann and Kashdan, 2010). It measured the attitude of out-of-school youth in cell phone maintenance enterprise. The statement of the scale is “people usually can't tell how I am feeling inside”. It was measured on a 5-point Likert scale of 5 (Extremely true of me) – 1 (Not true of me at all).

Emotional intelligence. It is a 69-item scale with two major dimension of personal competence with sub-dimensions of (self-awareness, self-motivation and emotional regulation) and social competence with sub-dimensions of (social awareness, social skills and emotional receptivity) (Mehta and Singh, 2013). Social awareness contains 11 items, emotional regulation contains 15 items, self-motivation contains 9 items, social awareness contains 10 items, social skills contain 13 items and emotional receptivity contains 11 items. The statement in the scale for self-awareness – “I understand the relationship between my feelings and what I think, do and say”, self-motivation – “I am result – oriented with a high drive to meet objectives and goals”, emotional regulation – “I usually feel depressed for one reason or the other”, social awareness – “I understand the way others think, feel and behave”, social skills – “I am skilled at the art of convincing others” and emotional receptivity – “I help others in coming out of difficult situations”. It was measured on a 5-point Likert scale of 5 (Extremely high competence) – 1 (Extremely low competence).

Career satisfaction scale. It is a 5-item scale (Greenhaus et al., 1990). It measures the successes of out-of-school youths in cell phone maintenance enterprise. It was measured on a 5-point Likert scale of 5 (strongly agreed) – 1 (strongly disagreed). The adopted instruments were subjected to various validity checks to ensure their appropriateness.

Results

In analysing the descriptive, exploratory factors and confirmatory factors, SPSS version 25 was used to assess the exploratory factor analysis, and AMOS SPSS version 23 was used to assess the confirmatory factor analysis of the structural model. It shows the adequacy with the reduced dimension of the latent variable and regression of the constructs.

Demographic characteristics

The demographic characteristics considered in the study involved several factors such as gender, age, education level, marital status, monthly income, cost of workplace, years of informal training, years of experience. The participant demographic characteristics are shown in Table 1.

Reliability and validity analysis

The internal consistency coefficient of the instrument was adequate with an overall Cronbach’s alpha value of 0.814 (George and Mallery, 2003). The internal consistency coefficients of the eight constructs are indicated in Table 2. The result showed that the study has a good internal consistency.

To ascertain convergent validity, an exploratory factor analysis (EFA) was performed with varimax rotation which yielded a Kaiser–Meyer–Olkin (KMO) of 0.805 with p < 0.000. Certain elements from the research tool with factor loadings below 0.50 bench mark were removed retaining elements above the benchmark (Pantouvakis, 2006). Eight factors with eigenvalue greater than 1 converge with the maximum iteration of 25. The communalities account for 79.5% of the constructs, while a total variance of 81.24% was explained. This allowed 94 items from 8 exogenous variables to be reduced to 29 items. The others items were deleted since their factor loadings are less than the threshold of 0.7.

In Table 2, the convergent validity of the construct is sufficient with AVE < 0.5 and Cr > 0.6 (Fornell and Larcker, 1981). Likewise, as shown in Tables 2 and 3, the discriminant validity (the square root of the average variance explained) of each variable is more than the cross-loadings of the constructs from the correlation matrix (Gefen and Straub, 2005). Hence, the study has sufficient validity and reliability.

Confirmatory factor analysis

This study went through the assessment of maximum likelihood to estimate the model parameters with goodness of fit indices (GFI), adjusted goodness-of-fit index (AGFI), normed fit index (NFI), incremental fit index (IFI), Tucker–Lewis index (TLI), comparative fit index (CFI), root mean square residual (RMR), root mean square error of approximation (RMSEA) to validate the fitness of the model to the data (see Table 4). The model fit indices of the study yielded a good fit (Ohanu and Shodipe, 2021) as indicated in Table 3.

The result yielded various effects as shown in Figure 2 and Table 5 the sub-constructs of emotional intelligence, affective behaviour and career success. The sub-constructs of emotional intelligence (emotional regulation, emotional receptivity and social skills) have a positive direct link with affective behaviour, while self-motivation, self-awareness and social awareness have a negative direct link with affective behaviour. Self-motivation and social skill have a negative direct link with career success, while affective behaviour has a positive direct link with career success. Also, emotional regulation and emotional receptivity have a positive indirect effect, while self-awareness and social awareness have a negative indirect link with career success.

In Table 5, the proposed hypotheses were assessed with their estimate, standardized regression and critical ratio for decision-making. Byrne (2001) affirmed that a critical ratio (CR) above ±2.58 is sufficient to accept a hypothesis with a p-value less than 0.05.

Discussion of the findings

This study was conducted with the purpose to find out the relationship between affective behaviour, emotional intelligence and success of out-of-school out youths in cell phone maintenance enterprise. In the study, the minimum amount of the independent variables were accounted for with a total variance explained of 81.24%, while others remained unaccounted for towards the success of out-of-school youths in cell phone maintenance enterprise.

The results of the study extend the robustness of the theory of career satisfaction with the inclusion of six sub-constructs from the PcSc of emotional intelligence of out-of-school youths in cell phone maintenance enterprise. The results of the study indicated that out-of-school youths in cell phone maintenance affective behaviour do not have influence on their career success, personal competence from their emotional intelligence influences their career success and both personal and social competences of their emotional intelligence have influence on their affective behaviour.

The results from the study revealed that there is a positive but an insignificant direct relationship between affective behaviour and success of out-of-school youths in cell phone maintenance enterprises. Hence, hypothesis 1 was unaccepted. The result of the study is inconsistent with the findings from previous studies. Judge and Kammeyer – Mueller (2007) suggest that personality traits have a cordial relationship with career success and job performance. They argued that individuals' behaviour will determine his employability and the successes attained in the chosen career. Likewise, Walsh et al. (2018) in their study suggest that positive affective behaviours pay evaluate dividends which emanate from considerable evaluation (reinforcement) from coworkers, subordinates and manager from the workplace, and this enhances the pursuit for successes in the workplace.

The success of out-of-school youths in cell phone maintenance enterprises has a negative direct but significant relationship with their self-motivation. Therefore, hypothesis 2 was accepted. The result of the study is coherent with the findings of Mahenthiran and Shanthakumary (2012) who found a positive relationship between self-motivation for achievement, job performance and job satisfaction. Also, a previous study affirmed that intrinsic motivation positively influences successful learning which is similar to workplace performance (Ferreira et al., 2011; Jaramillho and Spector, 2004).

The success of out-of-school youths in cell phone maintenance enterprises has negative direct and insignificant relationship with the social skills. Therefore, hypothesis 3 was unaccepted. The result of the study does not comply with assertions from certain literature which sees social skills as an entity that can be positively influenced, therefore individuals who possess these skills may and may not likely to stay more on the job while considering other peoples’ skill for greater performance (Sergin and Givertz, 2003; Borghans et al., 2006). But Zatkova and Polacek (2015) affirmed that there is a linkage between social skills and managerial position. Their result concluded that social skills positively influence success in the managerial positions and the career growth of the managers.

Self-awareness of out-of-school youths in cell phone maintenance enterprises has a negative but significant direct influence on affective behaviour. It also has a negative indirect link with their successes. Therefore, hypothesis 4 was accepted. The result of the study aligns with some previous studies that found a significant relationship between consumers' self-awareness and their affective satisfaction (Hwang and Lee, 2019). Likewise, Judge et al. (2007), Çetin and Aşkun (2018) suggested in their study that workers affective behaviour towards work performance is influenced by their self-awareness. Also, Ugur et al. (2015) asserted that increasing self-awareness coupled with intrinsic motivation of individual's potentials will facilitate their behavioural choices.

Self-motivation of out-of-school youths in cell phone maintenance enterprises have negative and an insignificant direct influence on affective behaviour and a negative indirect link with their career success. Hence, hypothesis 5 was unaccepted. The result of the study is inconsistence with the belief of Brown (2003) that affective commitment is an effective measure of organizations performance. Hence, employees with strong affective commitment will be motivated to perform excellent and contribute immensely to the growth and development of the organization. Also, Kian et al. (2014) that affective job satisfaction is focused on individual internal factors or behaviour and their experiences from the chosen job.

Emotional regulation of out-of-school youths in cell phone maintenance enterprises has a positive and significant direct influence on affective behaviour and a positive indirect link with their career successes. Hence, hypothesis 6 was accepted. The finding of the study gained the support from the study of Lockwood et al. (2014) who found a positive and a moderating effect of emotional regulation strategies on the association between affective and prosocial behaviours. Also, Schraub (2011) found a negative prediction of emotional strain during a significant work-related activities and affective well-being of employees. Alam and Singh (2022) and Forgas (2000) aligns that individuals are supposed to regulate their affective state without external influence. Erber and Erber (2000) suggest that since emotions are generated in a social environment, individuals should express their emotions to align with the norms of the society they live.

Social awareness of out-of-school youths in cell phone maintenance enterprises have negative but significant direct influence on their affective behaviour and a negative indirect link with their career successes. Therefore, hypothesis 7 was accepted. The result of the study is consistent with the study of Eyup (2016) who found social awareness and self-concealment to have a significant relationship with life satisfaction. Also, Shojaei and Siuki (2014) found a positive and significant relationship between social awareness and innovative work behaviour.

Social skills of out-of-school youths in cell phone maintenance enterprises have a positive but insignificant direct influence on their affective behaviour and a positive indirect influence on their career successes. Therefore, hypothesis 8 was unaccepted. The result of the study is inconsistent with the contribution of Shayan and Gatab (2012) who found social skills acquisition to be a source of happiness and success with considerable support from family members, education and friends. Chen (2006) explained that social skills should be taught to develop socially accepted pattern of behaviour and likewise contributes to a positive relationship which deters negative social competencies.

Emotional receptivity of out-of-school youths in cell phone maintenance enterprises have a positive and significant direct influence on affective behaviour and a positive indirect influence on their career successes. Therefore, hypothesis 9 was accepted. The result of the study is consistent with the findings of Lee and Lim (2010) that found a significant relationship between emotional receptivity and the construct of other latent variables. Also, Nawaz and Gomes (2018) found that emotional receptivity of an organization team have high influence on the organization citizenship behaviour.

Conclusion

The out-of-school youths can achieve greater success in cell phone maintenance enterprise since their affective behaviour have been modified by their emotional intelligence which is a function of effective expression of their self-awareness, self-motivation, emotional regulation, social awareness, social skills and emotional receptivity.

It is evident in the study that personal competence of out-of-school youth in cell phone maintenance enterprise will enhance affective behaviour towards career successes while their social competence may not necessarily be needed for such. This is an indication that personal development in a chosen career is essential, and career successes can be built around personal goal orientation rather than building it in circle of people around. The study does not totally neglect social relationship because no man can live and succeed in isolation.

Also there are several factors that can facilitate the success in a chosen career. It indicated that affective behaviour and an element of personal competence (self-motivation) does not influence career success, but an element of social competence (social skills) is a determiner of career success of out-of-school youth in cell phone maintenance enterprise.

Practical implications

Social implications

The study affirms that the constructs of emotional intelligence are predictors of career success among out-of-school cell phone maintenance. It boosts their moral and psychological behaviours towards building good customer relationship which culminates into success in their career area. This study also motivates the out-of-school youths that success is multifaceted that involves building adequate personal and social relationship within the circle of their co-maintenance personnel and customers. Also, it enhances the cell phone maintenance association or group to adopt the participation of on-the-job training of their members to help them build a good relationship and self-esteem.

Academic implications

With the substantive support gained from previous studies, emotional intelligence can be taught in schools (regular, technical based or vocational training centres) (Brackett et al., 2011). Therefore, the school-based training or vocational training should be structured in a way that builds students, instructors and programme coordinators to develop skills to recognize and regulate their emotions in order to make quality decisions, build supportive relationships, acting prosocially and regulating their feelings in order to experience substantive wellbeing. This common step will positively influence the school-based training or vocational training curriculum to contain programme of activities that will improve human relationship.

Managerial implications

The study assert that emotional intelligence could assist out-of-school youths in team building process among themselves, facilitates setting up attainable goals, vision and culture in their workplaces by team playing. An emotional intelligent out-of-school youth identifies problems, traces it causes and proposes logical solutions in a way that will improve rational thinking. Emotional intelligence is a tool that stimulates their affective behaviour and guides the success of members of the work team, provides a sense of security and improves interpersonal relationships within their group. Also, continuous training of these set of youths will improve their emotional intelligence and further enhance the creation of a formidable emotional intelligent workplace team.

Limitations

Although the study made a plausible contribution to the theory of career satisfaction, building block events of customer relationship, self-esteem and positive effects of self-motivation, it still encountered some limitations despite declines in several motivating factors. At first, it was discovered that the study is gender related, most of the participants are male. So the extent to which outcome of the study will be generalized is limited. The area of the study is also limited, since the study is carried out in South–West Nigeria. Hence, the result of the study may be affected since there are varying factors that influences human affective behaviours, emotional intelligence and career successes across different regions.

Implication for further studies

With several limitations encountered, further studies can be carried out by increasing the scope of the studies, increasing the population and sample size and area of the study. Also, the methodology used in this study can be replaced with other substantive methodologies and adding other variables that will influence the outcome of the study.

Figures

Hypothesis formulation and theoretical framework

Figure 1

Hypothesis formulation and theoretical framework

Regression and path diagram of the latent variables

Figure 2

Regression and path diagram of the latent variables

Demographic characteristics

CategoryNos. of responses%
Gender
Male28597.6
Female72.4
Age
21–254515.41
26–308930.48
31–356622.6
36 and above9231.51
Education level before dropping out-of-school
Secondary school8428.77
OND6823.29
HND7425.34
BSc6622.6
Marital status
Single12743.49
Married16054.79
Divorced56.85
Monthly income (N1000)
31–405819.86
41–509733.22
51 and above13746.92
Cost of workplace rentals (N1000 per annum)
151–20011037.67
201–25013947.6
351 and above4314.73
Years of experience
0–5 yrs15051.36
6–10 yrs7023.97
11–15 yrs5017.12
16 and above227.53

Convergent, discriminant and Cronbach’s alpha reliabilities

Latent constructs ItemsFactor loadingsConvergent validityDVCronbach alpha
CRAVE
Affective behaviour
Affective behaviourI am good at hiding my feelingsAB30.8730.860.760.870.75
People usually can't tell when I am upsetAB40.876
Emotional intelligence
Self awarenessI am aware of my goals and valuesSA30.8770.910.780.880.87
I am aware of my strengths and weaknessesSA40.898
I try to learn from experiencesSA50.876
Emotional regulationI can avoid external temptations in order to fulfil my dreamsER250.9190.910.840.920.85
I smoothly handle multiple demands, shifting priorities and rapid changeER260.922
Self-motivationI am determined in achieving goals despite obstacles and setbacksSM310.8400.920.740.870.91
I possess good confidence in taking sole responsibility and taking decisions by my ownSM320.894
I hold myself accountable for meeting my objectivesSM330.898
When working in team, I like to depend upon other's ideas than my ownSM340.825
Social awarenessPeople think that I am optimistic and self-confident personSAW370.8380.940.760.870.93
Others think that I lack confidence in interacting with othersSAW380.903
I show sensitivity and understand others' point of viewSAW390.907
I recognize and reward people's strength, accomplishments and developmentsSAW400.903
I respect and relate well to people from different backgroundsSAW410.824
Social skillI make and maintain personal friendships among work associatesSS530.8270.950.780.880.96
I maintain a balance between work and relationshipSS540.890
I promote a friendly and cooperative climateSS550.923
I look for opportunities to work in a teamSS560.908
I find it difficult to get friendly with someone who is not known to meSS570.912
I like to cooperate with others in accomplishing a taskSS580.859
Emotional receptivityOthers find it comfortable to disclose their personal problemsEMR610.8330.940.760.870.92
I help other people feel better when they are in bad moodEMR620.879
I offer useful feedback and identify people's needs for developmentEMR630.902
I listen well, seek mutual understanding and fully welcome sharing of informationEMR640.905
I guide the performance of others while holding them accountableEMR650.849
Career success
Career successI am satisfied with the progress I have made towards meeting my goals for incomeCS30.9400.930.880.940.88
I am satisfied with the progress I have made towards meeting my goals for advancementCS40.941

Note(s): CR: composite reliability; AVE: average variance explained; DV: discriminant validity

**The overall Cronbach's alpha coefficient of the instrument is 0.814

Mean, standard deviation and inter-correlations of the latent variables

ConstructsMeanStd. Dev12345678
Affective behaviour4.410.721
Self-awareness4.300.86−0.0961
Emotional regulation4.200.920.156**0.173**1
Self-motivation3.740.99−0.0430.0570.0291
Social awareness3.501.05−0.173**0.1040.0100.216**1
Social skills3.431.15−0.0180.108−0.0280.372**0.249**1
Emotional receptivity3.241.090.145*0.0430.008−0.0710.032−0.0011
Career success3.591.090.015−0.0670.014−0.1080.001−0.049−0.0391

Note(s): **p < 0.01; *p < 0.05

Summary of model fit

Fit indexModel fit indicesRecommended threshold
χ2/df2.81≤3Good fitYu (2002)
RMSEA0.079≤0.08Good fitMarsh et al. (2004)
IFI0.901≥0.85Good fitShahbaz et al. (2014)
PGFI0.6790–1.0Good fitJoreskog and Sobom (2001)
RFI0.840≥0.85Good fitJoreskog and Sobom (2001)
AGFI0.766≥0.85Good fitJoreskog and Sobom (2001)
TLI0.890≥0.85Good fitHu and Bentler (1999)
GFI0.802≥0.85Good fitLomax and Schmacker (2012)
CFI0.901≥0.85Good fitHu and Bentler (1999)
PCLOSE0.000≥0.005Good fitJoreskog and Sobom (2001)
NFI0.855≥0.85Good fitJoreskog and Sobom (2001)

Note(s): That GFI and AGFI are influenced by the sample size; hence, GFI and AGFI ≥ 0.80 is an acceptable good fit (Sica and Ghisi, 2007)

Model path, regression and hypothesis testing

HypModel pathsEstimateS.E.C.R.pDecision
1CSAB0.0050.1150.0440.965Unaccepted
2CSSM−0.1430.052−2.7570.049Accepted
3CSSS−0.010.064−0.1640.869Unaccepted
4ABSA−0.1210.046−2.6350.034Accepted
5ABSM−0.0040.051−0.0720.943Unaccepted
6ABER0.1410.0542.5980.015Accepted
7ABSAW−0.1520.051−2.9840.003Accepted
8ABSS0.0290.0410.7090.478Unaccepted
9ABEMR0.1180.0462.5840.011Accepted

Note(s): AB – Affective behaviour; SA – Self-awareness; ER – Emotional regulation; SM – Self-motivation; SAW – Social awareness; SS – Social skills; EMR – Emotional receptivity, CS – Career success

Appendix

Affective behaviour scale

  1. People usually can't tell how I am feeling inside.

  2. I have my emotions well under control.

  3. I can tolerate having strong emotions.

  4. I can avoid getting upset by taking a different perspective on things.

  5. I often suppress my emotional reaction to things.

  6. It is ok if people see me being upset.

  7. I can calm down very quickly.

  8. I am able to let go of my feelings.

  9. I am good at hiding my feelings.

  10. People usually can't tell when I am upset.

  11. It is ok to feel negative emotions at times.

  12. I can get out of a bad mood very quickly.

  13. People usually can't tell when I am sad.

  14. I can tolerate being upset.

  15. I can act in a way that people don't see me being upset.

  16. I know exactly what to do to get myself into a better mood.

  17. There is nothing wrong with feeling very emotional.

  18. I could easily fake emotions.

  19. I can get into a better mood quite easily.

  20. I can hide my anger well if I have to.

Emotional intelligence scale

Self-awareness

  1. I understand the relationship between my feelings and what I think, do and say.

  2. I recognize how my feelings affect my performance

  3. I am aware of my goals and values

  4. I am aware of my strengths and weaknesses.

  5. I try to learn from experiences.

  6. I am open to continuous learning, self-development, new perspectives and honest feedback.

  7. I am able to show sense of humour and perspective about myself.

  8. I present myself with self-assurance; I have “presence”.

  9. I am organized and careful in my work

  10. I usually go for original ideas while solving a problem.

  11. I am able to make sound decisions despite uncertainties and pressures.

Emotion regulation

  1. I usually feel depressed for one reason or the other.

  2. I feel happy and satisfied about my life.

  3. I can predict clearly whether my emotion is happy or sad.

  4. I am someone who is original and don't copy others.

  5. I am quite a cheerful and lively person

  1. I can win over stress without getting too nervous

  2. I manage my impulsive feelings and disappointing emotions well.

  3. I keep myself positive, composed and calm even in frustrating situations.

  4. I think clearly and stay focused under pressure.

  5. I know how to keep myself calm in conflicting and upsetting problems.

  6. I get carried away with my imagination and daydreaming most often.

  7. I feel cool, relaxed and stress free most of the times.

  8. When I hear bad news, I usually can’t control myself and feel sad and miserable.

  9. I can avoid external temptations in order to fulfil my dream.

  1. I smoothly handle multiple demands, shifting priorities and rapid change.

Self-motivation

  1. I am result-oriented with a high drive to meet objectives and goals.

  2. I continuously learn in order to improve my performance.

  3. Before beginning something new, I usually feel that I will succeed.

  4. I pursue goals beyond what's required or expected of me.

  5. I am determined in achieving goals despite obstacles and setbacks.

  6. I possess good confidence in taking sole responsibility and taking decisions by my own.

  7. I hold myself accountable for meeting my objectives

  8. When working in team, I like to depend upon other's ideas than on my own.

  9. I am generally motivated to continue, even when situations become worse to handle.

Social awareness

  1. I understand the way others think, feel and behave.

  2. People think that I am optimistic and self-confident person.

  3. Others think that I lack confidence in interacting with others.

  4. I show sensitivity and understand others' point of view.

  5. I recognize and reward people's strengths, accomplishments and developments.

  6. I respect and relate well to people from different backgrounds.

  7. I see variety in people as opportunity, creating an environment where diverse people can prosper.

  8. It's quite easy for me to understand the non-verbal messages(facial expressions) of others.

  9. I can tell how others are feeling by listening to their tone of voice.

Social skills

  1. I am skilled at the art of convincing others.

  2. I am easy to get friendly and possess good social skills.

  3. I promote open communication and ready to accept both bad and good news.

  4. I am extremely polite and respectful to others irrespective of the unfavourable circumstances.

  1. I handle difficult people and tense situations with diplomacy and tact.

  2. I encourage open discussion and debate.

  3. I look foward to relationships that are mutually useful.

  4. I keep others in a team and build a strong bond.

  5. I make and maintain personal friendships among work associates.

  6. I maintain a balance between work and relationships.

  7. I promote a friendly and cooperative climate

  8. I look for opportunities to work in a team.

  9. I find it difficult to get friendly with someone who is not known to me.

Emotional receptivity

  1. I like to cooperate with others in receptivity accomplishing a task.

  2. I help others in coming out of difficult situations.

  3. I extend support and advice to others when needed.

  4. Others find it comfortable to disclose their personal problems.

  5. I help other people feel better when they are in bad mood

  6. I offer useful feedback and identify people's needs for development

  7. I listen well, seek mutual understanding and fully welcome sharing of information.

  8. I guide the performance of others while holding them accountable.

  9. I am more of a leader than a follower.

  1. I act as a mediator in resolving conflict between two parties.

  2. I can easily detect the differences between others' feeling and behaviours.

  3. It is not easy for me to accurately select people's feeling back to them.

Career success scale

  1. I am satisfied with the success, I have achieved in my career.

  2. I am satisfied with the progress, I have made towards meeting my overall career goals.

  3. I am satisfied with the progress, I have made towards meeting my goals for income.

  4. I am satisfied with the progress, I have made towards meeting my goals for advancement.

  5. I am satisfied with the progress, I have made towards meeting my goals for the development of new skills.

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Further reading

Auger, P. and Woodman, R.W. (2016), “Creativity and intrinsic motivation: exploring a complex relationship”, The Journal of Applied Behavioral Science, Vol. 52 No. 3, pp. 342-366, doi: 10.1177/0021886316656973.

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Tahir, I.M. and Abubakar, N. (2007), “Service quality gap and customers satisfactions of commercial banks in Malaysia”, International Review of Business Research Papers, Vol. 3 No. 4, pp. 327-336.

Corresponding author

Taiwo Olabanji Shodipe can be contacted at: olabanji.shodipe.pg93157@unn.edu.ng

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