Leadership

EQ Can Be Taught, Research Finds

By Jessica Stillman

Updated on: May 26, 2009 / 8:44 PM EDT / MoneyWatch

The Find: A raft of research points to the link between high EQ (emotional intelligence) and success at work, and new science shows that people can train and improve their EQ.
The Source: A post on the British Psychological Society's Research Digest blog.

The Takeaway: When it comes to CEOs the most important characteristics for success may not be touchy-feely people skills, but for those managing in the middle an ability to move fluidly and comfortably through a variety of tricky and potentially emotional social interactions is a key ability. But what if you're not the kind of person to whom these things come naturally; what if you don't have an effortlessly high EQ? Is the situation hopeless?No, says new research.

Belgian researchers trained 19 students in how to better understand and handle their and others' emotions in four weekly sessions lasting two and a half hours each. The results?

After training and at six-month follow-up, the training students but not the control students showed improvements in aspects of 'trait' emotional intelligence normally considered immutable, including improvement in emotion identification and emotion management (of self and others' emotions). Surprisingly perhaps, 'emotional understanding' showed no improvement.

For most of us, I wager, having the boss intellectually understand the theory of how to deal with people is far less important than having him or her actually do it properly, which means we can agree with the scientists when they call the study results "promising." They do acknowledge, however, that results are preliminary and more research is needed. To read the full write-up, pick up the journal Personality and Individual Differences.
(Image of EQ presentation by MichelleRichmond, CC 2.0)