The Yale Center for Emotional Intelligence

A emotional intelligence theory body of research supports that emotional intelligence (EI) is associated with better performance in personal and professional life. In fact, EI has been linked to higher levels of job satisfaction and even longer-term career success. This has fueled increased interest in understanding how EI influences outcomes, as well as the development of new ways to teach and assess this construct. However, the field of EI is still evolving and many researchers offer a variety of definitions, models, and measurement tools. The Yale Center for Emotional Intelligence is one such organization that uses scientific evidence to develop effective approaches for teaching and assessing EI across the lifespan.

Unlocking Emotional Wisdom: Exploring Emotional Intelligence Theory

The Yale Center focuses on using an innovative, empirically grounded approach that combines social and emotional learning with cognitive processes, including attention, memory, regulation, reasoning, awareness, and monitoring. This approach is called RULER, and it has been shown to improve student academic achievement and social skills. The center also collaborates with teachers and schools to implement its research-based model in a range of settings.

One issue with the ability EI theory, as formulated by Mayer and Salovey in 1997, is that it blurs the distinction between abilities that relate to oneself and those that relate to others. For example, a person who is good at perceiving emotions in himself or herself should be able to do the same for other people. However, this is not always the case.

Another issue is that some of the tasks used to measure EI are difficult for most people to do accurately, for instance spotting fake smiles. As a result, the modal score often used as an indicator of EI is misleading and should be removed from future research.

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