Psychometric Validation of the Trait Emotional Intelligence Questionnaire-Child Short Form (TEIQue-CSF) in a Greek Population

Round 1

Reviewer 1 Report

This paper presents a relevant and timely psychometric validation of the TEIQue-CSF in a Greek-speaking child population. While the study offers valuable contributions to cross-cultural emotional intelligence research, it would benefit from improvements in language clarity, methodological detail, and emphasis on practical implications.

It is recommended that the final Greek version of the TEIQue-CSF used in the study be included as an appendix or supplementary material.

Author Response

Dear Reviewer 1

Thank you for the thorough and constructive feedback on our manuscript. We appreciate your insights and will carefully address each point in the revised version.

Title: We agree that including the term “Psychometric Validation” will better convey the study’s nature and will revise the title accordingly. We are open to modifying the title accordingly. However, we are unsure whether changes to the title are permissible at this stage of the submission process. We would appreciate further guidance from the editorial team regarding whether such a revision can be implemented.

Abstract: We will eliminate repetitive mentions of the questionnaire’s name, clarify the key findings with specific reliability values for each factor, and emphasize the study’s applicability and main conclusions.

Introduction: To avoid redundancy, we will reduce repeated references to the TEIQue, TEIQue-SF, and TEIQue-CSF, and strengthen the connection between previous validation studies and our current research aims. The importance of validating the TEIQue-CSF in the Greek population will be highlighted more explicitly.

Methods: Additional details will be provided regarding the correlations between the identified factors and the invariance analysis performed, ensuring methodological clarity.

Results and Discussion:

• Results will include more comprehensive information about factor correlations and invariance analysis.
• The discussion will be expanded to highlight practical implications in educational and clinical settings, clarifying how the findings could inform interventions or assessments in children.
• We will more thoroughly compare our results with previous studies, focusing on factor structure and cultural characteristics of the sample.
• The practical relevance of using the TEIQue-CSF in educational and child psychology will be strengthened.
• Additional recommendations for future research, including validation in other cultural contexts and age groups, will be included.

Conclusion: We will specify the unique contributions of this study to the literature on the TEIQue-CSF, provide concrete future research directions, and discuss practical implications for professionals in educational and child psychology contexts.

References: We will ensure that all cited references are directly relevant to the research topic.

Figures and Tables: We will review all figures and tables to confirm clarity and presentation quality.

English Language and Style: We will improve the language to enhance clarity and flow throughout the manuscript.

Supplementary Material: We will include the final Greek version of the TEIQue-CSF as an appendix or supplementary material, as recommended

 

Reviewer 2 Report

This study offers a timely and valuable contribution to the field of emotional intelligence assessment in children, particularly by validating the Trait Emotional Intelligence Questionnaire - Short Form for Children (TEIQue-CSF) in a Greek-speaking sample. This study addresses an important gap in the literature by providing evidence of the psychometric soundness of the TEIQue-CSF in a specific cultural and linguistic context given the growing cross-cultural application of psychological instruments. This is highly relevant considering that emotional intelligence in childhood is related to multiple dimensions of well-being, social functioning, and academic performance.
The robust methodological design is one of the main strengths of this study. Exploratory and confirmatory factor analyses were conducted on a large and representative sample, with appropriate statistical criteria and clear presentation. The identification of a seven-factor structure expands the existing body of knowledge and offers an alternative to the more common four- or two-factor models in previous validations. In addition, the authors provide meaningful cross-cultural comparisons that reinforce the theoretical importance of the results and support the adaptability of the TEIQue-CSF.
The manuscript would benefit from more explicit operational definitions of the emerging factors. Although the factor loadings are clearly described, providing a conceptual justification for each dimension would improve the interpretability and practical applicability of the instrument. Furthermore, although the study describes associations with gender and BMI, additional validation through convergent and discriminant analyses with external constructs—such as empathy, anxiety, or social behaviour—would strengthen the claims about the validity of the questionnaire construct.
In summary, this study represents a relevant and methodologically rigorous contribution to the field of child emotional intelligence assessment. It reinforces the cross-cultural applicability of the TEIQue-CSF, while opening avenues for future research aimed at refining its structure and deepening its theoretical integration.

Desirable (not necessary, but highly recommended):

It would be very helpful if the authors included more explicit operational definitions of the seven factors identified through exploratory factor analysis (Table 3).

Although the labels assigned to each factor are intuitive and the items are detailed in Tables 3 and 4, the main text does not provide a clear theoretical interpretation of each factor’s psychological representation.

These definitions should be included at the end of the “Results” section (possibly as a short paragraph after Table 4 or in the description of Figure 1) or at the beginning of the “Discussion” section, where the factors found are interpreted. This would allow the reader to more accurately understand each dimension’s psychological content and facilitate its application in clinical, educational, or research contexts.

The addition of these definitions would also reinforce the instrument’s interpretive validity, which is a key aspect in cross-cultural adaptation studies.

Author Response

 

Thank you for the insightful and detailed review of our manuscript. We appreciate your positive evaluation of the study’s contribution and methodological rigor, and we welcome your constructive suggestions to further strengthen the paper.

1. Operational Definitions of Factors:
   We agree that providing explicit operational definitions for the seven factors identified through exploratory factor analysis will enhance the interpretability and practical utility of the instrument. We will include concise theoretical descriptions of each factor either at the end of the Results section, following Table 4, or at the beginning of the Discussion section, to clarify the psychological meaning of each dimension. This addition will aid readers in understanding the factors’ content and support their application in clinical, educational, and research settings.
2. Theoretical Interpretation:
   We will expand the discussion to offer a clearer theoretical interpretation of each factor’s psychological representation, linking the factor labels with relevant literature to reinforce the instrument’s interpretive validity in the Greek cultural context.
3. Further Validation Suggestions:
   Although the current study did not include convergent and discriminant validity analyses with external constructs such as empathy, anxiety, or social behaviour, we acknowledge that such analyses would indeed strengthen construct validity. We will explicitly mention this as a direction for future research to deepen the validation and theoretical integration of the TEIQue-CSF in diverse populations.

Round 2

Reviewer 1 Report

Rather than changing the title, I suggest simply complementing it by adding the term “Psychometric Validation,” which can still be implemented at this stage.

Rather than changing the title, I suggest simply complementing it by adding the term “Psychometric Validation,” which can still be implemented at this stage.

Author Response

Dear Reviewer 1

That will be done. I will add the term “Psychometric Validation” to the title as you suggested, without changing the original title!

Thank you for your help

Reviewer 2 Report

This study offers a timely and relevant contribution to the literature on children’s EI assessment. Although the TEIQue-CSF has been validated in other cultural contexts, evidence from Greek-speaking populations is lacking. This study addresses this gap using a rigorous methodological design that combines exploratory and CFAs on a large sample of children.

One of the study’s major strengths is the identification of a seven-factor structure—extending the previously reported traditional four- or two-factor models. The inclusion of operational definitions for each factor in the revised manuscript further enhances its interpretability and practical utility in educational and clinical contexts.

The study would benefit from a more in-depth theoretical discussion of each factor and a stronger integration with the existing conceptual frameworks of EI research. Moreover, future studies should consider externalizing additional evidence of convergent and discriminant validity.

In summary, this work meaningfully advances the cross-cultural validation of the TEIQue-CSF and contributes to the development of culturally sensitive tools for assessing childhood emotional competencies.

Necessary corrections:

• Results section (after Table 4): The decision to retain factors with Cronbach's α close to .60 (e.g., Adaptability, α = .62) is acceptable given exploratory purposes, but this limitation should be explicitly acknowledged in the Discussion as it may affect the stability of the factor structure.

Desirable improvements:

• Discussion (p. 11): The interpretation of each factor would benefit from clearer theoretical anchoring. For example, the “Positive mood” and “Sociability” factors could be contextualized about existing emotional intelligence or developmental psychology frameworks (e.g., Petrides et al., Mayer & Salovey).

• Lines 180–210 (Discussion of gender and BMI differences): While these findings are statistically supported, further theoretical elaboration would be useful to explain why girls consistently report higher emotional competencies or why BMI is negatively associated with multiple factors.

No additional statistical review is required, as the statistical procedures (EFA, CFA, internal consistency, group comparisons) are appropriate and well reported. However, it would be beneficial for the authors to explicitly justify the selection of cut-off thresholds (e.g., factor loading ≥ .40, α ≥ .60) in line with psychometric conventions.

The English could be improved to more clearly express the research. Although the text is understandable as a whole, it contains grammatical and stylistic errors (“havehas,” “representrepresenting,” ‘Pertides’ instead of “Petrides,” etc.), which affect fluency and clarity. A professional linguistic review is recommended.

Author Response

Deae Reviewer 2

Thank you for the valuable feedback. We will explicitly acknowledge the limitation regarding retaining factors with Cronbach’s α close to .60 in the Discussion section. Additionally, we will enhance the theoretical grounding of the factor interpretations, particularly for “Positive mood” and “Sociability,” by referencing established emotional intelligence and developmental psychology frameworks. We also plan to provide a more detailed theoretical explanation for the gender and BMI differences observed. Finally, we will include a clear justification for the selected cut-off thresholds in accordance with psychometric conventions.

Thank you for your help