THE ROLE OF FAMILY CONSTELLATIONS ON DEVELOPMENT OF EMOTIONAL INTELLIGENCE AMONG REGULAR UNDERGRADUATE STUDENTS IN NAKURU COUNTY, KENYA

Abstract

The study sought to assess the influence of Family constellations on psychosocial adjustments of regular third year undergraduate Students in Nakuru County, Kenya. The specific objective was to determine the influence of family constellations on emotional intelligence of regular undergraduate third year Students in Nakuru County, Kenya. The study used a mixed-method research approach and adopted a cross-sectional survey research design. The target population was 2862 third year regular undergraduate students from five selected universities. A random sample of 307 students forming a 90.6 percent response rate participated in the study. Stratified random sampling was used to distribute the sample in the five selected universities. Primary data was collected using semi structured questionnaire and interview schedule, while secondary data was collected from existing documents about the topic under study. Quantitative data was analyzed using descriptive statistics (frequencies, percentages and means) and inferential statistics (ANOVA and Chi Square tests) with the aid of Statistical Package for Social Sciences version 26.0 for Windows while qualitative data was analyzed using thematic content analysis. The study findings indicate that majority of the respondents came from dual (nuclear) parent families. There was no statistically significant difference in the emotional intelligence of regular third year undergraduate students from different family structures. The study recommends that there is a need for parents to maintain a unified family structure in order to encourage holistic psychosocial development and adjustment of their children in universities. The output of the study would be a tool for learning and professional development in psychological counselling discipline equipping the mental health service providers, educators, guidance and counselling committees in our learning institutions with the new knowledge of family constellations and psychosocial adjustment among ongoing undergraduate students in the universities