The present study has been designed to investigate the non-cognitive variables like anxiety, emotional maturity and social maturity and their relationship with academic achievement and also to see the locale-wise differences on the basis of their anxiety, emotional maturity and social maturity. The study was conducted over a sample of 400 (200 rural and 200 urban) high school students studying in Xth class in 8 different schools (4 urban and 4 rural) affiliated to C.B.S.E, New Delhi. Dr Nalini Rao's Social maturity scale, Singh & Bhargava's Emotional maturity scale and Sharma's General Anxiety Scale for Children, were employed to measure students' social maturity, emotional maturity and anxiety. The aggregate score of the selected students in the C.B.S.E.board examinations was taken to show their level of academic achievement. The results reported that there exists a significant relationship between social maturity and academic achievement as well as between anxiety and academic achievement. No significant relationship is observed between Emotional maturity and academic achievement. Rural and Urban high school students differ significantly in their level of anxiety whereas no significant difference was found between them on the variables of Emotional and Social Maturity.

Academic achievement has great importance for both the student, and those around him/her. There can be no doubt that it is affected by two broad factors: subjective factors or individual factors and objective factors or environmental factors. The subjective factors are related to the individual himself and the objective factors pertain to the environment of the individual. Anxiety, emotional maturity and social maturity are the three individual and non-cognitive factors that may affect the academic achievement of the students.

Anxiety is a state of diffused apprehension. It is vague, non-specific and objective less. Researchers of Weiner (1965) and Kazem (1973) generally agree that certain degree of anxiety may motivate the student and may incline to better academic achievement. El-Anzi Freih Owayed (2005) found negative correlation between anxiety and academic achievement.

According to Walter D. Smits (1974) Emotional maturity is a process on which the personality is continuously striving for greater sense of emotional health, both intra-psychically and intra- personally. Kaur (2001), Gakhar (2003)<6>, Kaur (2004)<9> conducted the studies and revealed no significant relationship between emotional maturity and academic achievement.

Social maturity encompasses attainments in several domains, including independent functioning, effective interpersonal communication, interaction and responsibility i.e. contributing the well being of society (Greenberg, josselson, Knerr and Knerr, 1995). Parents and teachers must be very particular in maintaining interpersonal relationship with the young students in order to challenize their energy in right direction. Sabapathy (1986) and Asthana (1989) found significant relationship between social maturity and academic achievement of adolescents.

The present study has been designed to investigate the non-cognitive variables like anxiety, emotional maturity and social maturity and their relationship with academic achievement and also to see the locale-wise differences on the basis of their anxiety, emotional maturity and social maturity.

• 1. There is no significant relationship esists between Anxiety and Academic achievement of high school students.
• 2. No significant relationship exists between Emotional maturity and Academic achievement of high school students.
• 3. There is no significant relationship exists between Social maturity and Academic achievement of high school students.
• 4. There is no difference between rural and urban high school students in terms of the following variables:

a) Anxiety b) Social maturity c) Emotional maturity.

Descriptive method of research has been followed. For carrying out any kind of research, it is important to check out a design. According to Best (2008), 'all research involves elements of observation, description and the analysis of what happens under certain circumstances'. A systematic procedure is a must to collect the necessary data, which helps to attain the objectives and to test the hypotheses formulated for the study.

The present study is essentially a descriptive survey coupled with causal-comparative method and the technique of bi-variate correlation where the dependent variable is academic achievement and the independent variables are social maturity, emotional maturity and anxiety.

A sample of 400 students (200 Rural and 200 Urban) for investigation has been randomly selected from the four randomly selected districts of Punjab State i.e. Amritsar, Kapurthala, Bathinda and Patiala. From each of the four selected districts one public senior secondary school affiliated to C.B.S.E., New Delhi was selected randomly and another Jawahar Navodiya Vidhalaya affiliated to the same board from the same district was selected. Thus from each district two schools were taken up i.e. one urban and one rural. From each school again, the students were selected randomly from the different sections of the tenth class of the school. The sample was collected by using multistage random sampling technique.

In the present study and Dr. Sharma's General Anxiety Scale for Children (2003), Singh and Bhargava's Emotional Maturity Scale (1999) and Rao's Social Maturity Scale (RSMS) (1998), have been used. Academic achievement score was collected from the results of matriculation examination conducted by C.B.S.E., New Delhi from the school office record.

The scales were administered to the subjects in groups in the regular classroom situation. The instructions were provided on the first page of the scale booklets which were self explanatory. The answers of the subjects were recorded on the scale protocol. Scoring was done according to the instructions given in the manual. Higher anxiety and social maturity score indicates higher level of anxiety and social maturity whereas high emotional maturity scores show lower the level of emotional maturity.

In order to analyze the data, raw scores obtained on the basis of social maturity and academic achievement were converted into T-scores. Pearson's product moment correlation method was used to find out the correlation between anxiety and academic achievement, between emotional maturity and academic achievement and between social maturity and academic achievement scores obtained by the high school students. t-test was applied to see the significance of the differences between rural and urban high school students on the basis of their anxiety, emotional maturity and social maturity.

The results reveal that the value of 'r' = -.149 (df =398, N= 400) is negatively significant at 0.05 level of confidence, depicting that there is significant negative correlation between Anxiety and Academic achievement of the high school students. Researchers agree that anxiety can be a multifaceted agent. At its simple or optional level it can be a motive, but at its high level it can be a hindrance. Anxiety in its earlier phase puts a person in a state of instability and imbalance. To reduce that tension, the person must remove causes, and here anxiety may be motive to get rid of what upsets an individual. The above results are quite in conformity with the results of studies conducted by Abu Marak (1988), Dodds (1975), El-Anzi (2005) who found negative correlation between Anxiety and Academic achievement.

As per the manual of the Emotional Maturity Scale the students who score less on Emotional maturity scale tend to be more emotionally mature where as students who score high on Emotional maturity scale tends to be less Emotionally Mature. The value of product moment coefficient of correlation found between emotional maturity and academic achievement was of the order of 'r' = -.076 (df = 398 N = 400), which is statistically non-significant indicating the result that there is no significant relationship between emotional maturity and academic achievement of high school students. Kaur (2001), Gakhar (2003), Kaur (2004) conducted the studies and revealed no significant relationship between Emotional maturity and Academic achievement. It indicates that the Emotional maturity does not play any role in Academic achievement of high school students. Muley Patnam and Vasekar (2003) also found non-significant relationship between slum children's Emotional maturity and their Academic performance.

The value of product moment coefficient of correlation between Social maturity scores and Academic achievement scores was found to be of the order of 'r' = .84 (df = 398 N = 400), which is statistically significant indicating the result that there is significant relationship between social maturity and academic achievement of high school students. It may be due to the fact that the maturity develops not only in physical, mental and emotional behaviour but also in social behaviour. Their range of social activities is interwoven with other features of their growth. Moreover, if a student is quite efficient, intelligent and successful at his work, participate in co-curricular activities may give his true contribution in the welfare of the society and in his way become more socially mature. The above results are in line with the findings of Sabapathy (1986) and Asthana (1989) Whereas Aggarwal (2007) reported no significant relationship between these two variables.

The results of Table 1 reveal that there is significant difference in the anxiety of rural and urban high school students as the t-value (4.223) is found to be significant at .05 level. It clearly indicates that rural students are more anxious than urban ones. The reasons for urban student's lower anxiety as compared to rural ones may be due to the fact that urban high schools students are more intelligent active alert and have more facilities for getting education at their disposal and hence react with all situations without being anxious. Moreover, their parents are also educated and help their wards in solving their problems whereas in rural setting, parents are illiterate and students have to help in their parent's work besides getting education. These results are in line with the studies conducted by Shikari (1986) and Yadav (1989) who reported that rural students had greater anxiety than urban students.

Table 1. Comparison between Rural (N=200) and Urban (N=200) High school students on the variables of Anxiety, Emotional Maturity and Social Maturity

The result of t-test applied between the mean scores of rural and urban student's indicates that they do not differ significantly in their Emotional maturity scores as the value of t-test (.933) is found to be non-significant. After comparing their means, it is found that mean Emotional maturity score of urban high school students is higher (less emotionally mature) than those of their rural counterparts. It means although there is no significant difference in Emotional maturity of rural and urban students yet the level of emotional maturity in case of rural students is higher as compared to urban ones. High emotional maturity in rural students may be because rural students face more problems, have lesser means for giving outlet to their emotions and have more toleration power as compared to urban students. The findings of the present study are in resonance with the findings of Harleen (1998) and Kaur (2001) in which rural students were found to be more emotionally mature as compared to urban students.

The result of t-test of significance of the means applied to the group of rural and urban student's points out that the rural and urban students do not differ significantly in their Social maturity scores as the value of t-test (1.168) is found to be not significant. After comparing their means, it is found that mean Social maturity score of urban students is higher than those of rural ones. It means although there is no significant difference in social maturity of rural and urban students yet the level of social maturity in case of urban students is higher as compared to their rural counterparts. The high Social maturity of urban students may be due the fact that in urban setting, environment is calm, congenial; there is more feeling of oneness, students by nature are cooperative, extroverts, more expressive, experienced and intelligent. All these above factors make difference in social maturity of high school students of rural urban areas. The above results are in agreement with the finding of chand (2007) who found no significant difference between rural and urban students on the personal adequacy and inter-personal adequacy.

Hence, the first and third hypotheses stand rejected and the second one stands completely accepted whereas fourth one stands partially accepted.

High anxiety level of the high school students results in low Academic achievement. In other words, Anxiety plays significant negative, social maturity significant positive whereas Emotional maturity plays no significant role in the Academic achievement of high school students. Rural students are found to be more anxious, more emotionally but less socially mature as compared to their urban counterparts.

1. Anxiety is one psychological factor which plays crucial role in the final outcome of all the Students. It is being explored incessantly. Immediate remedial measures are needed to be taken to control, manage and regulate their anxiety level and bring down the same to desirable level by adopting suitable psycho-regulatory techniques. Teachers at the time of examination need to monitor and adopt serious measures of anxiety regulation of their students. Rural students have significantly higher level of anxiety and this deserves immediate attention of teachers and counselors who constantly interact with them.

2. As schools form the role of secondary socializing agents after the family so, teachers and principals should promote, help and encourage the young students for development of social maturity by conducting orientation programmes. It is essential for the teachers and teacher- educators to know and check the level of personality factors like anxiety, emotional maturity and social maturity which directly or indirectly influence the academic achievement of high school students particularly of rural and urban ones so that preventive measures may be suggested regarding their adverse effect in advance.