Date of Award

Fall 2019

Document Type

Dissertation Restricted

Degree Name

Doctor of Public Administration (DPA)

Department

Public Policy and Administration

Committee Chairperson

Kristen B. Crossney, Ph.D

Committee Member

Michelle Wade, Ph.D

Abstract

An emotionally intelligent judge is essential to today’s bench and the greater criminal justice system. The relationships between emotional intelligence, secondary traumatic stress experience, gender and term of office are explored in this research with the goal of providing insight to judicial administrators and educators tasked with the professional development and continuing education of judges. The results indicated that there are statistically significant relationships between emotional intelligence and STSE scores in a number of areas. Of the four emotional intelligence sub-factors, self-control is the most strongly related to STSE score, followed by well-being and sociability. The emotionality sub-factor had a very weak relationship to STSE score. Gender and term of office had no statistically significant relationship of effect on STSE score. Finally, emotional intelligence score was determined to be a statistically significant predictor of STSE score. With a trend in judicial education toward a deeper understanding of human behavior and interpersonal relations, this research supports increased attention in the areas of emotional intelligence and secondary traumatic stress in judicial officers.

Keywords: emotional intelligence, secondary traumatic stress, judges

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