Experiences That Matter: Unraveling the Link Between Extracurricular Activities and Emotional and Social Competencies

Abstract

Emotional and social competencies have been shown to be extremely desirable in young people for their successful entry into the labor market. Their development has been studied primarily as a result of formal training in the educational and work domains, whereas relatively little is known about the role played by extracurricular activities in promoting these types of competencies. Non-working personal experiences are often used as proxies to assess the emotional and social competencies of candidates in recruitment and selection phases. However, this inference is not based on clear scientific evidence. Drawing on experiential learning theory, this study investigated empirically the relationship between a range of extracurricular activities (volunteering, cultural activities, experience abroad, sport) and the competency portfolio of graduates. Data were collected from a sample of 324 graduates through a structured survey and a multi-rater assessment of their emotional and social competencies. The results of the Partial Least Square-Path Modeling in general provide support for the positive association between experiential extracurricular activities and emotional and social competencies, although not all relationships are supported. The present study contributes to advance in the understanding of the determinants of emotional and social competencies by examining their relationship with a broad range of extracurricular activities. Moreover, it discusses implications for higher education and human resource management.

Hackathons as extracurricular activities: Unraveling the motivational orientation behind student participation

“…Previous research on ECA participation used various theoretical lenses to form and embody their analyses. Cortellazzo et al [14] adopted experiential learning theory [40] to empirically disentangle the connection between ECAs (cultural activities, sport, volunteering, experience abroad) and emotional and social competencies. Griffiths et al [29] conducted a similar study but grounded the investigation on self‐efficacy theory [5] and self‐concepts of student self‐efficacy.…”

Beneficios de la intervención ante el Trastorno de Estrés Postraumático en soldados. Una revisión sistemática

“…El servicio militar lleva asociado en determinados casos secuelas emocionales, como sería en el caso de los despliegues en misiones de paz, relacionado con síntomas físicos (Engelhard et al, 2011) o, incluso, psicológicos (Pintado y Rodríguez, 2019). De este modo, sería interesante tener presente que la IE favorece a un mayor bienestar personal (Cortellazzo et al, 2021;Soriano-Sánchez y Jiménez-Vázquez, 2022b), lo que podría permitir al castrense sentirse más comprometido con la institución organizacional y establecer unas adecuadas relaciones interpersonales (Bui et al, 2017). Al igual sucede con el constructo de la resiliencia, ya que sugiere permitir al soldado hacer frente a las diversas situaciones de estrés (Naifeh et al, 2022).…”

“…Por consiguiente, la Inteligencia Emocional (IE) constituye el constructo que permite la regulación de las emociones, al permitir al individuo hacer frente a las distintas situaciones estresantes (Soriano-Sánchez y Jiménez-Vázquez, 2022b), puesto que favorece a la comprensión los sentimientos propios y los del resto (Azilah et al, 2020). De hecho, dicha variable psicológica impulsa a un mayor bienestar personal (Cortellazzo et al, 2021). Las emociones, por su parte, son concluyentes en las conductas propias e interpersonales, afectando a los vínculos y relaciones con los demás, siendo necesarias para nuevos aprendizajes y para el bienestar personal (Shuo et al, 2022).…”

An Experiential and Blended Learning Approach to Promote Emotional Intelligence among Learners in Higher Education - A Systematic Review

“…Kolb explains a four-stage learning cycle, through which learners construct knowledge; the stages are: concrete experiences, reflective observation, abstract conceptualization, and active experimentation (Kolb, 2015, p. 31-61). Moreover, the study conducted by Cortellazzo et. al (2021) and the systematic review performed by Bonesso et al (2020) found an experiential learning approach plays a crucial role in learners' acquisitions of socioemotional competences.…”