Developing a short-form measure of personal excellence for use among university students in Taiwan

Abstract

To pave the way for integrating cognitive and emotional learning into holistic and total quality education in preparing university students for personal and work excellence, this study was conducted to generate a Chinese version of the personal excellence measure for use with university students in Taiwan. The poor model fit of a translated Chinese Personal Excellence Map (PEM) led to the construction of a shortened version of the measurement. It was proposed that shortening the Chinese PEM would minimise translation bias while improving the measure's psychometric functioning associated with the emotional intelligence-centric construct of personal excellence [Nelson, D. B., & Low, G. R. (2003a). Emotional intelligence: Achieving academic and career excellence. Upper Saddle River, NJ: Prentice Hall; Hammett, R. D. (2007). Personal excellence: The development and validation of a new measure of emotional intelligence. (Unpublished doctoral dissertation). Texas A&M University-Kingsville.]. By virtue of the item and scale elimination procedure, the new short form of Chinese PEM was constructed. Factor structure, reliability and validity of the short-form measure were examined using confirmatory factor analysis. The results indicated that the short-form Chinese PEM offers promise as a psychometrically sound and empirically feasible alternative for use with university students in Taiwan. Pedagogical implications of the rapid assessment and a transformational learning process used to enhance personal excellence levels were discussed.