Dispatches from the 10th Annual Congress on Emotional Intelligence

Muir has just returned from attending the 10th Annual Congress on Emotional Intelligence held in New Haven, CT by The International Society of Emotional Intelligence (TISEI) and the Yale Center for Emotional Intelligence.

In a quick highlights review, here are some of the takeaways:

• Peter Salovey’s and John Mayer’s initial article on emotional intelligence in 1990 languished for over five years before it started to have an impact.
• Having an emotional ally (whether someone related or not) who can provide consistent warmth, emotional safety and nonjudgmental feedback promotes emotional health.

• Personal intelligence, where perception is critical, rather than “thing-oriented” intelligence is what makes us able to navigate better in our relationships.

• Personal beliefs that emotions matter and that we have agency in managing emotions is a mindset that is self-fulfilling, predicting positive emotional states. And in leaders, that mindset promotes employees’ wellbeing.

• Those who have the ability to accurately detect and calm their own heart rate have higher emotional intelligence and make more money.

• Those workers who achieve their preferred emotional state while working (which may not be only positive feelings) through self-management in fact get better work results.

• The MCAT, which is administered to those applying to medical school, includes an emotional intelligence portion.

• Cortisol from stress blocks testosterone, which in turn shrinks muscles.

• If emotions aren’t regulated, cortisol from stress results in downward freefall of memory ability after 99 seconds.

• Women’s cortisol levels go up faster than men’s during stress but come down faster after the stress is regulated.

One disappointment is typical–while research continues to refine and clarify what exactly emotional intelligence is and how it can be measured, very little is discussed about effective interventions that raise aspects of emotional intelligence that we all say are teachable. What a conference that would be!

In a wrap up session, where over 35 nations were represented, one of the principals surprisingly chose to rant about his particular political view.

Safe space?