Introduction: Study of effective factors on development or academic performance is rather complex because this concept has extensive dimensions which both environmental and individual factors affect it. Two important factors in student achievement are emotional intelligence and shyness. This study was aimed to predict student achievement of pre-university students based on their emotional intelligence and shyness in 2016.

Methods: This cross-sectional study was conducted using the multi-stage cluster sampling, which 120 boys and girls pre-university students of Tehran's 2 region education in the academic year 2015-2016 who were studying in mathematics were selected. Research instruments were Schutte's emotional intelligence questionnaire and shyness test. To analyze data, regression analysis was used by using SPSS version 23.

Results: The results showed that there was a significant correlation between emotional intelligence and shyness in students’ academic achievement. Also, girls' student achievement cannot be predicted on the basis of shyness, emotional intelligence and emotional intelligence components but this is so for boy's students. Other finding showed that among the components of emotional intelligence only manage your emotions has a positive and significant correlation with student achievement but this correlation was not observed for other components of emotional intelligence and shyness.

Conclusion: The findings of the current study indicated that students’ academic achievement can be predicted based on emotional intelligence. Thus, strength of emotional intelligence accompanied with other effective factors in student achievement can enhance their performance.