- The Traditional Perspective:
- The traditional notion of intelligence as logical or mathematical ability invariably reduces it to cognitive ability. Cognition refers to processes such as memory, attention, language, problem-solving, and planning. Many cognitive processes often involve so-called controlled processes, such as when the pursuit of a goal (e.g., maintaining information in mind like retaining some facts) needs to be protected from interference (e.g., a distracting stimulus like a nagging noise).
- Traditionally, it was believed that emotion, being non-cognitive, can’t facilitate cognitive processes. It was believed that emotions, were counter to cognitive tasks because they are intense feelings. Thus, the earlier notion was either of no relation between emotion and intelligence or negative relation. For example, when we are experiencing negative emotions, like anger or depression, then it becomes very difficult to perform a constructive task, like solving a puzzle or making good decisions
- Emotional Intelligence: Integration of Emotions and Intelligence
- The term was coined by two researchers – Peter Salovey and John Mayer in 1990 he defined EI as the ability to monitor one’s own and other people’s emotions, to discriminate between different feelings and level them appropriately, and to use emotional information to guide thinking and behaviour. Simplistically speaking, it is the ability to channelize emotions for constructive purposes.
- Emotional intelligence refers to ‘the ability to identify, understand, and manage emotions of oneself and that of others.
- Emotional Quotient (EQ) is a measure of one’s EI i.e. through a standardized test, one’s awareness of emotions concerning self and others is known.
- But this term got popular in 1996 from Daniel Goleman’s book ‘Emotional Intelligence: Why It Can Matter More Than IQ’.
