Introduction: Problem solving is an important skill for living in nowadays world. Due to their professional
responsibility and occupation in a complicated therapeutic environment, nurses should be skillful enough for
problem solving in order to handle them. Therefore, this study was performed to determine the effect of
problem solving course on nursing students' emotional intelligence of Shiraz University of Medical Sciences
in year 2008.
Methods: This quasi-experimental study was performed on 43 senior nursing students of Shiraz University
of Medical Sciences. Primarily students were asked to complete questionnaires of demographic data and
“Bar-On" test for emotional intelligence evaluation. Then, they were randomly divided into two groups of
experimental (N=20) and control (N=23). Six sessions of problem solving course based on D'zurilla and
Goldfride social problem solving protocol, was performed for students of experimental group. Emotional
intelligence assessment repeated for both groups immediately and 2 months after training. Data was
analyzed through statistical tests of Mann Whitney, Wilcoxon, Repeated Measure ANOVA, and Pearson
correlation Coefficient.
Results: Standardization of emotional intelligence scores among students of experiment group showed a
statistically significant difference for these scores achieved immediately (105.87±9.82) and 2 months after
intervention (109.44±9.56) compared to the one before (101.22±10.93) intervention (p<0.01). The mean
score of problem solving skill among students of experiment group showed also a statistically significant
difference comparing the scores achieved immediately after intervention (8.31±77.75) and 2 months after
that (8.00±78.75) to that of before intervention (11.95±71.35) (p<0.01). This is while control group showed
no statistically significant difference considering these variables. Only 20 percent of students enjoyed a high
emotional intelligence before intervention, while this increased to 40 percent of high intelligence and 10
percent of very high emotional intelligence 2 months after intervention.
Conclusion: Problem solving skills lead to promotion of emotional intelligence among students of
experiment group compared to control group. This result was stable not only immediately after intervention
but also after two months. Therefore problem solving education in various nursing domains such as
education, research, management and clinic, is recommended
