Emotional Intelligence in Every Aspect of The Human Life

Emotional analytics are involved in every action, decision and judgment that we undertake. People with emotional intelligence recognize this and use it to manage their life. In the course of the last two decades, this concept has become a very important indicator of a person‘s knowledge, skills and abilities in the workplace, school and personal life. Research proved the role of EI in performance, motivation, decision-making, management, and leadership. Therefore, EI has many benefits when applied efficiently. They entail valuable information about confidence, awareness, conscious decision making and every aspect of the human life. Studies have proven that emotions are constructive and contribute to performance enhancement and well-evaluated decisions. John Mayer and Peter Salovey coined the phrase emotional intelligence in 1990.

Many EI models have developed over the last two decades; they can be divided in three categories: ability, mixed, and trait EI models. The major difference in the three is whether EI an innate human ability or a competence that can be trained into or gained over time. There is variation from strict testing of abilities with scale type models to the subjective questionnaires of self-reporting. Ability models define emotional intelligence as a mental ability. Mixed models of emotional intelligence combine mental ability with personality characteristics such as optimism and wellbeing. While trait models of EI refers to an individual‘s perception of their abilities in emotional conditions. Social and cognitive neuroscience research findings and their wide application within the corporate environment marked a fundamental shift in the perception of emotions. The writings of years of psychology and management also gave way to designing of models about EI concept and working under experimentally valid scenarios.

The elements of emotional intelligence as defined by Reuven Bar On (1996), Daniel Goleman (1995), and Petrides (2000)

1. Self-awareness – Recognise your feelings, understand your swift or prompt responses to events and analyse how your emotions affect your behaviour and performance.
2. Self-Regulation - Manage internal cognitive states, impulses and resources to achieve goals. Identify limiting beliefs.
3. Self-Motivation - Use deep emotional states to move and guide you towards your goals. Enable yourself to take initiatives and to persevere in the face of obstacles and setbacks.
4. Social awareness - Sense, understand and respond to what other people are feeling. Having empathy with others and also comprehending social networks while paying attention to body language cues.
5. Social Skill – Being able to manage, influence and inspire emotions in others. Handle emotions in relationships. Influencing and and inspiring others through effective emotion communication.

Interpersonal Relationships - All relationships, whether work-related or personal, have 3 bases: Fulfiling needs, relating to each other, and exchanging information through feelings, thoughts, and ideas. Reciprocating is important in every relationship so that both parties may benefit. Sharing thoughts and feelings make up stronger and well grounded relationships.

Rationale:

Workplace analysis under terminologies of emotional frameworks is an exciting research agenda. The field of EI is interdisciplinary with collaborations from the biological, physiological, and neurological sciences to understand the mind, body, and behavioural underpinnings of cognitive abilities. These longitudinal cross-disciplinary efforts may be the most effective means for addressing complex issues concerning concepts like EI abilities. People approaching life tasks with emotional intelligence tend to be at an advantage and are able to solve problems adaptively. Framing a problem statement and identifying the emotional experience behind them can help in solving them. People using the EI concept will seek happiness rather than material gains. In itself a complex concept, Emotional intelligence is difficult to measure.

The simplest EQ test is by using self-report questionnaires. The questionnaire ask you to evaluate yourself on abilities, skills, and behaviours. Although, we may not accurately report our own skills and abilities as there is a tendency to exaggerate accomplishments and accepting weaknesses. A second approach is asking people who know you well to do the test, for example, friends, co-workers, boss, and subordinates. The advantage being that other people are likely to give an appraisal that is not inflated, and more accurately analyse how skillful you are in social interactions. A third approach is to use performance tests to measure your EQ. These tests present you with practical problems and ask you to work out the correct answers. In other words, they ask you to demonstrate your EQ skills. These tests are more difficult and expensive to construct. If any individual or organization can convince the business world that they have developed and validated an emotional intelligence test that can accurately and consistently measure EQ it will bring them considerable status and financial reward.

The importance of applying Emotional Intelligence has reached the healthcare field. The domain is still new to the development of EI as a training programme but the changes are taking over. In addition, EI is not very fascinating to the healthcare setup. It has had its terms of compassion and empathy in place for a long time. To evaluate how far the EI trend has seeped into the field of healthcare, researchers conduct many studies.

Emotional intelligence tests are not widely accepted and controversial outcomes follow. By conducting studies, we try to understand how well the industry (healthcare) is receptive to EI and if it affects their behavior. To help us understand the professionals better, it is important to first correlate and validate what affects and what does not significantly affect EI. Numerous studies show the relationship between EI, its dimensions and other personality traits. Very few studies look beyond stress level and satisfaction and are thus very narrow. For a generalized approach towards EI, we here evaluate its own dimensions and certain demographics, which affect the training of healthcare professionals.

We tried a different layout by questioning what high Emotional Quotient had to do with doctors; who are well trained in their fields and how exactly consistent was research with actual clinical practices.

Different models of EI have different dimensions, however the most accepted dimensions are the ones formulated by Dainel Goleman (1995). The dimensions of Self-awareness, Self regulation, Self motivation, Social awareness and Social skills. This model is consistent and used in most research studies.

Demographics also have a significant effect on Emotional intelligence as the emotional quotient directly corresponds to the individual’s experiences, rountine and beliefs. To inculcate the effects these would have on a generalised data analysis, we should refine the survey form by literature study and analysing previous data.

Review of Literature/Literature Review:

There are a myriad of tests available to measure EQ by Bar-On (1997); Goleman and Rhee (1999); Mayer, Salovey, and Caruso (2002); Wong and Law (2002); Petrides and Furnham (2003); and Tett, Fox, and Wang (2005); EIA (Emotional Intelligence Appraisal); EIP (Emotional Intelligence Profile); and the IEI (Index of Emotional Intelligence).

It was found that both ability and trait models related caring behaviours in nurses to EI (Adams and Iseler, 2014; Araque, 2015; Dafeeah et al., 2015; Ezzatabadi et al., 2012; Kaur et al., 2013, 2015; Rego et al., 2010; Sommaruga et al., 2017). The methodology to assess care also varied including physical/general care (Adams and Iseler, 2014; Kaur et al., 2013, 2015), emotional care (Araque, 2015; Dafeeah et al., 2015), and both aspects (Ezzatabadi et al., 2012; Rego et al., 2010; Sommaruga et al., 2017).

The papers by Araque (2015), and Rego et al. (2010), provided a more comprehensive view on EI roles. Four studies suggested a relationship between physician trait EI and caring (Bamberger et al., 2016; Dafeeah et al., 2015; Dugan et al., 2014; Sommaruga et al., 2017). Self-report of EI in two studies (Dafeeah et al., 2015; Sommaruga et al., 2017) while two studies linked patient care to the physician’s EQ (Bamberger et al., 2016; Dugan et al., 2014). Ezzatabadi et al. (2012) suggests that job satisfaction of nurses was influential in EI and it playing a mediating role between EI and quality of care.

Other potential factors for future investigation include psychological ownership (Kaur et al., 2013), trust of patients (Weng, 2008), and patient-doctor relationship (Weng et al., 2011b), all positively related to EI and affecting behaviour. The available evidence suggests that there is a relationship between both ability and trait EI and caring in nurses. Furthermore, health services sometimes consider implementing training programmes focused on developing EI skills, as there is evidence they can be increased via interventions (Nelis et al., 2009; Nooryan et al., 2011; Pool and Qualter, 2012). Thus resulting in beneficial outcomes for both nurses and patients.

There is quite some evidence that emotion management can help improve healthcare delivery and experience but there is little focus on healthcare-specific data or models of measuring emotional intelligence. Most complaints about doctors relate to poor communication and not their clinical competence. Hence improving communication in health care is an area of interest in both policy and practice targets. An emphasis on the insights into our own and others’ emotions as described by models of EI; it may offer an explanation as to why some practitioners are better at delivering patient centred care than others.

Being able to assess and analyse the patient’s emotional needs can have a positive affect pain relieving and improve the accuracy of history taking and diagnosis. If clinicians are able to understand patients’ emotional reactions to prescribed treatments or lifestyle advice they can understand what treatment would be more acceptable to them. Being able to read and manage emotions is an important skill for any health professional and can also enhance patient-centred care, improve the professional-patient relationship, and increase patient satisfaction.