Emotional Intelligence: Why It Can Matter More Than IQ

About the Author

Daniel Goleman is an internationally known psychologist who lectures professional groups, business audiences, and college students. As a science journalist, Goleman reported on the brain and behavioral sciences for The New York Times for many years. Currently, he co-directs the Consortium for Research on Emotional Intelligence in Organizations at Rutgers University.

Goleman is a board member of the Mind & Life Institute, which fosters dialogues and research collaborations among practitioners and scientists. Apart from his books on emotional intelligence, Goleman has written books on topics including self-deception, creativity, transparency, meditation, social and emotional learning, eco-literacy, and the ecological crisis.

Goleman has received many awards, including the Washburn Award for science journalism and a Lifetime Career Award from the American Psychological Association. He is also a Fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science.

Sources: danielgoleman.info and “About the Author” section of the book

Our one-sentence summary

Emotional intelligence, an arrangement of skills that stem from knowing and understanding emotions, is essential for a successful life – from job opportunities and economic growth to relationship building and health maintenance – and, fortunately, is something we all can learn.

Publisher’s Summary

“Everyone knows that high IQ is no guarantee of success, happiness, or virtue, but until Emotional Intelligence, we could only guess why. Daniel Goleman’s brilliant report from the frontiers of psychology and neuroscience offers startling new insight into our ‘two minds’—the rational and the emotional—and how they together shape our destiny.

Drawing on groundbreaking brain and behavioral research, Goleman shows the factors at work when people of high IQ flounder and those of modest IQ do surprisingly well. These factors, which include self-awareness, self-discipline, and empathy, add up to a different way of being smart—and they aren’t fixed at birth. Although shaped by childhood experiences, emotional intelligence can be nurtured and strengthened throughout adulthood—with immediate benefits to our health, our relationships, and our work.

With a new introduction from the author, the twenty-fifth-anniversary edition prepares readers to reach their fullest potential and stand out from the pack with the help of Emotional Intelligence.”

Source: Book Jacket

Detailed Summary

Introduction: The 25^th Anniversary Edition & Aristotle’s Challenge

• This book offers a framework that ties together scientific research on emotions, child development, education, leadership, excellence at work, and other topics.
• The concept of Emotional Intelligence has become very popular. Because of that, misinterpretations have become popular. For instance,
  • Emotional Intelligence does not account for 80% of our success. While IQ accounts for up to 20% of professional achievement, there are plenty of other factors that contribute to accomplishment apart from Emotional Intelligence.
  • Emotional Intelligence doesn’t always matter more than IQ, especially in the context of academic achievement.
  • Having Emotional Intelligence means more than being nice.
• As Artificial Intelligence becomes more prominent and replaces people at many job levels, many predict that Emotional Intelligence will become more important.
• The benefits of hiring people with high Emotional Intelligence include increased productivity, higher employee satisfaction, and fewer defections. For the employee, benefits include a better sense of wellbeing and a lessened fear of losing their job to a machine (p. xv).
• In a study called “The Marshmallow Test” kids were told they could eat a marshmallow if they wanted to, but if they waited 20 mins, they would get two. These kids were tracked down in their thirties, and researchers found that among several factors, including IQ and family wealth, cognitive control (waiting the 20 mins) had a stronger correlation with better finances, health, and good citizenship. The good news is cognitive control can be learned.
• What is it that we can teach children so that they do better in life? What is it that leads people with modest IQ to become more successful than someone with high IQ? The difference is Emotional Intelligence, which is self-control, zeal and persistence, and motivation. Impulsivity can be a big problem.
• Aristotle said, “Anyone can get angry – that’s easy. To be angry with the right person, to the right degree, at the right time, for the right purpose, and in the right way –that’s not easy.”
• In The Nicomachean Ethics, Aristotle challenges us to manage our emotions intelligently. Our passions, feelings, and emotions may have wisdom. They guide our thinking and our values. But they can and often go askew. The problem, according to Aristotle, is not emotions per se, but the appropriateness of emotions and expression. 

Part I – The Emotional Brain

Chapter 1: What are emotions for?

• Emotions are behavioral guides, especially in contexts too important to leave to the intellect alone. For instance, loss, danger, building a family, etc.
• When making decisions, our emotions play a very significant role, sometimes surpassing rationale. Regardless of IQ, intelligence can lead to nothing much if emotions take over.
• Emotions are impulses to act. Each emotion plays a key role in behavior, especially as they prepare the body for a given type of response.
  • Anger causes blood to flow to our hands, making it easier to hit an enemy.
  • Fear leads blood to our extremities, often the legs, so that we can escape.
  • Happiness increases brain activity and energy and inhibits negative feelings.
  • Disgust looks the same across cultures, and it allows us to protect ourselves from ingesting something that could cause harm.
  • Sadness helps us adjust to significant loss or disappointment.
• Emotions are biological propensities to act that are further defined by life experience (e.g., family traditions, culture, etc.).
• We have two minds: the one that thinks and the one that feels. The rational and emotional minds operate in harmony so that we can operate properly in the world. But, as semi-independent faculties, sometimes one might overtake the other or they may become at war. This is due to the way our brain has evolved over time.
  • The most primitive part of our brain is the brainstem. It regulates basic functions like breathing. From the brainstem emerges the emotional centers, where the neocortex, the thinking brain, is born.
  • The limbic system is in charge of our emotions, behavioral responses, learning and memory capabilities. The neocortex, where thought occurs, allows for the complexity of emotional life such as our ability to have feelings about feelings. But it is the limbic system that takes care of emotional emergencies (i.e., survival, fight or flight responses, reproduction and caring for our children).

Chapter 2: Anatomy of Emotional Hijacking

• We all have experienced emotional explosions – neural hijackings. Research suggests that the limbic system reacts fast to perceived threats, signaling the emergency to the whole brain before the neocortex gets a chance to examine what’s really happening. This hijacking occurs in the amygdala, the center of the limbic brain.
• The amygdala processes emotion, but it also stores emotional memory. Research has found that the amygdala can take control over what we do, even as the neocortex still works on coming to a decision. The amygdala is at the heart of Emotional Intelligence.
• Further research has determined that it is the architecture of the brain that gives the amygdala so much power. Signals from our eyes and ears travel to the thalamus, and in a single synapse, to the amygdala. It is a second signal from the thalamus that incorporates the neocortex. That’s why the amygdala responds first.
• Emotional reactions and memories can be formed without our conscious brain participating in the process. It takes us milliseconds to unconsciously comprehend something and decide whether we like it or not.
  • The hippocampus remembers facts, but it is the amygdala that retains the emotional experience that goes with them. The system that informs us about emergencies, through the nerves, releases hormones that prime the body to react. The more intense the arousal, the stronger the imprint.
• One problem that comes from our neural alarms is that the amygdala is sometimes out-of-date, commanding reactions to events that were imprinted in our first years of life.
  • This is especially true for traumatic events. At infancy, the hippocampus and neocortex are not fully developed. The memories we have of our early days come from the amygdala.
  • The amygdala and the hippocampus work together, but each stores and retrieves information independently. Along the amygdala, the prefrontal cortex helps stifle or control our reactions upon a first appraisal so that we can deal with the events at hand more effectively (or at times, adjust to a completely different response). This area of the brain allows us to become more analytic and have more appropriate responses to our emotional impulses.
• To impede emotional hijacking, we need to dampen the signals for activation to the amygdala and the limbic center (e.g., a parent stopping an impulsive child from taking another child’s toy and explaining why it’s not his/her turn).
  • The “off switch” appears to be the left prefrontal lobe, which regulates unpleasant emotions. “The amygdala proposes, the prefrontal lobe disposes” (p.23).
• Research has found that strong emotions can create neural static, which sabotages our working memory (our attention and capacity to complete tasks). Continual emotional distress can cause a deficit in our intellectual abilities.
  • These deficits are not always found in IQ tests. Despite their potential, children under emotional distress are at risk of academic failure and other problems, not because they lack intelligence, but because they lack control over their emotions.
• Research also suggests that feelings are necessary for rational decisions. We have two brains, the emotional and the rational. When these two work well together, Emotional Intelligence rises.

Part II – The Nature of Emotional Intelligence

Chapter 3: When Smart is Dumb

• Grades, SAT scores, and IQ don’t always predict success. While there is a relationship between IQ and type of job, IQ is not a certain predictor, explaining only 20% of life success.
  • A study in 1940 followed people who graduated from Harvard into their middle age and found that those who had the highest scores while in college didn’t necessarily have the best-paying jobs, higher status, or life satisfaction.
• Among many factors that explain success is Emotional Intelligence – being able to motivate yourself, persist despite frustration, control impulses, delay gratification, regulate mood, and develop empathy.
  • “To know that someone is valedictorian is to know that the person is good at achievement measured by grades. It tells nothing about the person’s ability to face vicissitudes of life” (p. 31).
• Emotional life, like math or reading, requires a set of competencies and skills. Emotional aptitude is a meta-ability: how well we can use the skills that we have. People with empathy skills and the ability to recognize their emotions are not just better at adjusting effectively to conflict but are more content with their lives as well.
• Howard Gardner proposed the theory of multiple intelligences. Refuting the IQ view, he argued there are seven key forms of intelligence: verbal, mathematical, spatial, kinesthetic, interpersonal, intrapersonal, and musical.
  • Interpersonal intelligence is the ability to understand other people. Intrapersonal is the ability to understand our moods, emotions, and motivations. It’s self-knowledge.
• Psychologists who studied intelligence used to ignore emotions because of the idea that they only interfere with rationality. Now we know that emotions are essential for thinking.
• Emotional intelligence encompasses five domains:

1. Knowing one’s own emotions: Self-awareness – recognizing a feeling as it happens.
2. Managing emotions: The capacity to handle feelings and soothe oneself.
3. Motivating oneself: Using your emotions in favor of your goals.
4. Recognizing emotions in others: Empathy and people skills.
5. Handling relationships: Managing emotions in others.

• IQ and Emotional Intelligence are not necessarily opposing. They’re just separate. Intellect and emotional acuity can vary from person to person. And while there is a correlation between IQ and some aspects of Emotional Intelligence, the strength of the association is small enough to allow for the argument that they are independent.
• Men with high Emotional Intelligence are socially poised, cheerful, and outgoing, not prone to fear or rumination. They are committed, caring, and comfortable with themselves.
• Women with high Emotional Intelligence are assertive, express their feelings appropriately, and feel positive about themselves. They are also outgoing and sociable, adaptable to stress, and have social poise. They rarely feel anxious or guilty.

Chapter 4: Know Thyself

• It is important to differentiate between being caught up by a feeling and becoming aware of it beforehand. Knowing thyself is being aware of your emotions as you feel them.
• Self-awareness means being aware of your mood and the thoughts about that mood. It’s being able to distinguish and control your emotions. E.g., you could feel enraged and act on it, or you could have a reflective thought, “I am very angry.” The thought signals that your neocortex is active, the first step of gaining control.
• People tend to fall into one of the following styles of dealing with emotions:

1. Self-aware: These people are aware of their mood while they have it. They are autonomous, sure of their boundaries, and in good psychological health. When in a bad mood, they’re able to get out of it without ruminating.
2. Engulfed: These people are usually overwhelmed by their emotions. They can’t escape them, and their mood usually takes control. They do little to escape bad moods because they let their emotions take charge.
3. Accepting: These people are clear about their feelings and accepting of them and their moods. They don’t try to change. There are two subtypes: those who are often in a good mood, so they don’t need to change anything, and those who, despite their clarity, take a laissez-faire attitude to their bad mood (e.g., depressed people).

• People with Alexithymia are people who appear to not have emotions. Rather, they don’t know how to put into words what they are feeling. Somatizing, which is different from a psychosomatic disease (when emotional problems cause actual health problems) is when people mistake an emotional ache for physical ones.
  • While the cause for alexithymia is still being studied, it is believed that it relates to a disconnection between the limbic system and the neocortex.
• There is most likely a spectrum of people’s ability to sense their emotions. But emotional life is often unconscious as well.
  • Emotions guide us in moments of key importance, like deciding whether to trust someone. These instances, gut feelings, are somatic markers that serve as an alarm that calls out on potential danger. The key to good decision-making is to become attuned to your emotions.
• To identify an emotion, listen to your body. Physiological showings of emotion typically occur before we become conscious of what we are feeling.
• Another approach is to bring awareness of the emotion. For instance, someone might be oblivious to their irritability. Pointing it out respectfully can bring the feeling to the frontal cortex, allowing them to reevaluate and try to change their mood.

Chapter 5: Passion’s Slaves

• Instead of being slaves to our emotions, the goal is to reach temperance – not suppression. Every emotion has its value and only becomes a problem when feeling it excessively.
• We do not need to avoid unpleasant feelings. We need to make sure they don’t go unchecked for too long and also learn how to displace them with good moods.
• There are different types of anger. The amygdala is the main source of rage, but it is the neocortex that perpetuates it, especially in cases of revenge or outrage.
  • Anger is usually triggered by a sense of threat, both physical or symbolic (i.e., threats to our self-esteem or our dignity).
  • Stress creates adrenocortical arousal, which lowers our threshold for getting angry. That’s why those under a lot of stress tend to get upset more easily.
  • Escalating anger occurs when a sequence of provocations each triggers the emotion. These provocations include thoughts of our own. Each builds on top of the previous hormonal momentum until we reach a point where we cannot be reasoned with.
  • The best way to deal with anger is to reframe situations in a positive light. Another approach is to challenge your triggering thoughts.
  • To cool down, strategies include getting away from the situation or person, distracting yourself (ideally with something pleasant), and exercising. Key in all of these is stopping the train of thought that’s upsetting us.
  • Venting and catharsis, though they can make you feel better sometimes, are among the worst ways of cooling down. These strategies pump you up and get you angrier. You should not suppress your emotion but shouldn’t act on it either.
• Worrying, the basis for anxiety, works only when it leads us to solve a potential problem or danger in an anticipated manner. The difficulty is with chronic worry – the uncontrollable worry that might lead to phobias, obsessions and compulsions, and panic attacks.
  • Anxiety can come in two forms: cognitive (worrisome thoughts) or somatic (physiological symptoms such as sweating, heart racing, and muscle tension).
  • Insomnia is due to constant worrying, particularly because of intrusive thoughts. Worrying can become habitual because there is a benefit to worrying. Worry can become reinforcing when we treat it like an amulet that wards off evil – we believe that if we don’t worry the danger or problem will happen.
  • Another benefit to worrying is that it actually soothes anxiety. By thinking about the solution, we stop thinking about the problem, reducing sweating and heart racing.
  • To deal with chronic worry, the first step is to become self-aware. Catch the episode as soon as possible. With practice, you can stop the spiral of anxiety. Challenge the worrisome thoughts and critique the main assumptions.
• Melancholy and sadness have important benefits. They enforce reflective retreat, allow for mourning, and enable psychological adjustment. Severe cases of depression require professional help, but we all can learn to deal with ordinary melancholy.
  • An important determinant of how long depression will last is how much people ruminate. Worrying about the causes of depression makes it worse.
  • A popular belief is that staying alone to deal with sadness helps face the issue. But research shows loneliness and isolation only increase sadness. Socializing can be good, but sometimes might just prolong the mood. Finally, crying helps alleviate sadness, but it sometimes extends rumination.
  • One particularly effective strategy is to question your thoughts and their validity and think of positive alternatives. Another strategy is to purposely schedule distracting, but pleasant, events.
    • Some people naturally seek to deal with sadness by watching a sad movie, reading a tragic novel, or listening to sad music. That’s not helpful.
  • Exercising, cognitive reframing, and helping others are among the best strategies to deal with continual sadness.
• Some individuals are natural repressors. These were people who were once thought to be very bad at regulating their emotions. More recent research has found that they are actually quite proficient at it and should instead be called
  • Unflappables can turn negative emotions into positive ones. And while research shows that they do feel the physiological reactions to threats that spark negative emotions, they are not faking their lack of upset, sadness, etc. They have a neural mechanism that allows their brain to keep that information from them.

Chapter 6: The Master Aptitude

• The emotional brain can overpower thinking to the point that we can become paralyzed. Students who are anxious, angry, or depressed tend to have difficulty learning, as emotions shift attention to personal preoccupations instead of focusing on the task at hand.
• Think back to the Marshmallow Test. Among other findings, this research provides evidence that resisting impulse is an important psychological skill. Because emotions are triggers for action, self-control is key. The ability to delay an impulse, and the strategies employed to do so, allow us to maintain effort – from keeping a diet to pursuing professional goals.
  • How these four-year-olds performed on the Marshmallow Test, and their ability to delay gratification, was indicative of their SAT scores later in life – choosing to wait for the second marshmallow was a stronger predictor of IQ.
• One particular emotion that can keep us from learning is worry. There are two forms of anxiety in students. The first type fogs the brain and limits our ability to study or take a test. The second type motivates people to study harder, leading to success.
• In the same way that negative emotions adversely impact cognition, positive emotions such as enthusiasm and confidence can boost achievement.
• What separates successful people from unsuccessful people is the ability to maintain arduous practice and routine for years. Research has found that emotional traits such as enthusiasm allow for persistence in times of setbacks.
• Another key emotion is hope. Research found hope to be a better predictor of college grades than SAT scores (which are highly associated with IQ). Students with high hope set themselves higher goals and know how to work hard to obtain them.
  • People who are hopeful share other traits that help them become successful: being able to maintain motivation, reassurance, and flexibility in the path to their goals.
• Optimism, similar to hope, is also associated with success. The expectation that things will turn out all right keeps people from falling into apathy and depression. The optimistic see failure as something that can be changed; the pessimist blames themselves for failure and ascribes it to a characteristic that they cannot change.
• Flow refers to the state of being completely absorbed in a task. It represents the ultimate harnessing of emotions. Flow is the opposite of rumination.
  • To enter into a state of flow, we need balance between a task too challenging that it’s frustrating and too easy that it’s boring. Flow allows for constant improvement.
  • To some, flow happens a little bit more naturally when performing a task that they love (e.g., painting or playing an instrument). But we can learn to enter flow. First, intentionally focus your attention on the task at hand. This requires considerable effort, as you have to get calmed and focused enough to feel it. But once you lock in, it takes on a force of its own, making the task appear effortless and pleasurable. 

Chapter 7: The Roots of Empathy

• Empathy comes from self-awareness. The more we know and understand our own emotions, the better we are at reading those of others. The ability to know how another feels is helpful in many areas, from sales and management to relationships and marriage.
• People’s emotions are usually understood unconsciously via nonverbal cues: tone of voice, gestures, facial expression, etc. People with a better ability to understand these cues tend to be more popular, be more sensitive, and do better at school, regardless of IQ.
• Research has found that infants show traces of empathy. It is at this time that Emotional Intelligence begins to develop. Infants show empathy when they cry because they’ve seen another child cry. This is called motor mimicry, and it is the origin of empathy.
• How children develop empathy depends on how their parents discipline them. They are more empathetic if their parents focus on the distress their behavior caused someone else, instead of focusing on the bad behavior. E.g., “Look how sad your behavior made her feel” vs. “That is very naughty.”
• Another factor that builds empathy later in life is attunement: when a child’s feelings and emotions are accepted and reciprocated. While the parent needs to match the baby’s level of excitement, it’s more about demonstrating understanding of their emotions.
  • Misattunement has great costs. When parents consistently fail to show empathy for the baby’s emotions, they begin to avoid expression, and eventually even feeling.
  • Some children learn to imitate their parents’ moods (e.g., a baby will imitate a depressed mother’s anger and sadness). Reparative relationships (with other relatives or friends) can help, offering other opportunities for attunement.
  • Limited chances for attunement and emotional neglect are associated with criminality. There are also cases in which misattunement (and emotional abuse) leads to hypervigilance of others’ emotions. This is a form of post-traumatic hyperalertness to emotions, associated with personality disorders.
• The root of morality is empathy, as it is through it that people are more likely to help others.
• Those who commit serious crimes cannot usually feel their victims’ pain. While treatment for criminals usually involves perspective-taking, psychopaths and sociopaths are incapable of compassion and empathy.
  • Sometimes lack of care stems from neural defects. Psychopaths tend not to show the normal brainwaves that people show when exposed to trigger words like “kill.” They also show no signs of fear when about to receive electric shocks. Research suggests that their lack of fear keeps them from understanding fear and pain in others.
  • It is worth noting that while biological patterns play a role in criminality, “the criminal gene” does not guarantee that a person will become a criminal, and not all criminals have this “biological marker.” Lack of empathy in individuals can sometimes be due to psychological and social factors. 

Chapter 8: The Social Arts

• Handling relationships depends on our ability to manage other people’s emotions. Emotional aptitude is the ability to not only know the other person’s feelings, but also act in a way that adapts properly to those feelings.
• Social competence refers to how well we can express our own feelings. Display rules influence such expression. These rules are a social consensus, which varies among cultures, in termf of what and when emotions are appropriate to show. Based on these display rules, how well we employ the following strategies reflects one factor of Emotional Intelligence:

1. Minimizing the display of emotions. E.g., hiding being upset or sadness to avoid making others uncomfortable or attracting unwanted attention, or out of respect.
2. Exaggerating the emotional expression. E.g., seeking to make others feel better, or manipulating a situation such as a child wanting their parent to reprimand a sibling.
3. Substituting one emotion for another. E.g., giving positive but false assurance or feedback, to avoid being impolite, disrespectful, or hurtful of others’ feelings.

• In every interaction, we send emotional signs that affect those around us. Emotional Intelligence means possessing the skills that make others feel comfortable in our company.
• Emotions are contagious. A probable explanation for this phenomenon is that we imitate emotions displayed by others unconsciously, whether through facial expressions or tone of voice.
  • Some people are more susceptible than others to emotional contagion. They are more sensitive; they have an automatic nervous system that is more easily triggered.
• The degree of emotional rapport people feel in any interaction can be seen in the synchronization of their movements. The more synchrony, the more they like each other.
• Emotional attunement is another indicator of interpersonal ability. If people can adequately adjust to others’ moods or sway others into theirs, their interactions will be more effective. People who are not skilled at attunement have difficulty fostering relationships, as people tend to feel uncomfortable around them without knowing why.
• The following are four separate abilities of interpersonal intelligence:

1. Organizing groups: initiating and coordinating networks – the skills of a leader.
2. Negotiating solutions: preventing or resolving conflict – the talent of a mediator.
3. Personal connection: having empathy and connections – the ability of a team player.
4. Social analysis: detecting feelings, motives, and concerns – the insights of a counselor. 

Part III – Emotional Intelligence Applied

Chapter 9: Intimate Enemies

• Divorce rates are continually increasing. The reduction in social pressures such as the stigma of divorce and wives’ economic dependence on husbands help explain the increase in divorce rates. But fostering Emotional Intelligence is essential for marriages to survive.
• One of the main reasons that couples fight is that the roots of emotional expression and understanding differ between males and females. This is due in part to biological differences, but also social patterns, particularly, how parents raise their children.
  • Research shows boys and girls are taught different lessons on how to handle emotions. The tendency is for parents to discuss emotions with girls and to teach boys to hide their emotions (except for anger).
  • When they grow up, men and women expect different things out of a conversation. She will seek and appreciate emotional connections a lot more than he. He will minimize emotions that relate to vulnerability (like guilt) a lot more than she.
• According to research findings on marital conflict, constantly attacking character rather than action is a predictor of divorce. E.g., “You are so selfish and uncaring” critiques the person as a whole. “When you forgot my laundry, it made me feel like you don’t care about me” critiques the action and describes personal feelings.
• Another two elements that predict divorce are contempt and disgust. Both of these are easily expressed through body language. The constant show of these emotions has a negative physiological effect on the spouse, increasing the likelihood of health issues.
• Stonewalling, or refusing to interact with another person, is the ultimate defense for emotional distress. It is another predictor of divorce.
• One way to rely on Emotional Intelligence to improve marriage and reduce conflict is to become aware of toxic thoughts and challenge them. E.g., in a conversation, the husband might say, “Should I put the kids to bed?” thinking that the wife doesn’t understand that he needs silence to work. She might respond by saying, “Don’t worry, I’ll do it,” while thinking “there he goes again, complaining about the kids being too loud when they play.”
  • These types of toxic thoughts tend to escalate into victimization and righteous indignation, which fuels anger, hurt, and conflict.
• Flooding refers to the frequent emotional distress spouses feel from their partner’s negativity and out-of-control feelings. Flooding is a big sign that a marriage is in trouble.
• Women have more tolerance for small conflict than men. Thus, husbands are more prone to flooding and stonewalling. This is also because women tend to criticize character instead of action more than men. Once men start stonewalling, wives become distressed.
  • To avoid this toxic cycle, men should stop evading small disagreements and conversations about feelings, which becomes easier when they learn that their wives raise these topics out of love. They should also be careful not to offer practical solutions to their wives too early on, as what women want is empathy, not advice.
  • Women need to make an effort not to attack the husband’s character, express contempt, and lash out. They also need to remind and reassure their love for their husbands, despite their complaints about any of their actions.
• A good and healthy couple’s fight focuses on one topic only. Partners allow each other time to express their point of view while the other listens carefully and empathetically. In a healthy relationship, in each conflict, at least one person is trying to de-escalate tension. Complaints are not allowed to become personal attacks. Most importantly, the couple keeps calm or is open to strategies to calm themselves when things begin to escalate.
  • These strategies can be learned and practiced. It is better to rehearse during encounters that aren’t as stressful, but practicing allows people to acquire the emotional circuitry to react in this way in future conflicts.

Chapter 10: Managing with Heart

• Emotional Intelligence is a relatively new idea for business, as many believe empathy and compassion can interfere with organizational goals and keep us from making tough decisions. The reality is that the better the interpersonal skills, the better the future of the workers and organization.
• Leadership is not domination. It is the art of persuading and guiding people toward a common goal. This includes being able to provide helpful critiques, create an atmosphere of collaboration, and network effectively.
• Feedback is necessary for corporations to grow. Like marriage, when criticism focuses on character and not actions, it leads to defensiveness, avoidance of responsibility, and stonewalling. And the employee will not improve.
• Most problems in performance don’t suddenly appear. They are usually a result of slow build-up due to management failing to be prompt and constructive with their criticism.
• To provide proper critique, focus on the person’s actions and behavior. If people think their character is the problem, they won’t be able to change. They lose hope and stop trying.
• Other advice for proper feedback includes:
  • Be specific. Pick an event that illustrates the main issue. Start by saying what the person did well, then express what’s wrong, and then explain how it can be changed.
  • Offer a solution. Provide useful feedback by pointing to the way to fix the problem.
  • Be present. Don’t avoid confrontation by writing critiques on emails or similar means. Do it face-to-face and in private.
  • Be sensitive. Show empathy and stay attuned to the impact of your words and your non-verbal communication.
• Those at the receiving end of the criticism can make the experience more valuable by taking it as an opportunity to grow rather than as a personal attack. Watch out for the impulse of being defensive. Instead, take responsibility and own your mistakes. If the discussion gets difficult, ask to continue the meeting later, giving both parties space and time to cool down. Finally, see the criticism as a way to work together to solve the problem.
• Diversity in an organization is important because, although bias and prejudice are often unconscious, they can take a significant toll on the company. Many corporations invest in diversity courses, but these can sometimes backfire, making differences more salient.
• Prejudice is often learned at a very young age, making it hard to weed it out. What the company needs to do is be clear about the norms that the group must take against any form of discrimination.
  • Naming biases and objecting to them on the spot, although respectfully, establishes a clear atmosphere that discourages this type of behavior.
  • To speak up against bias, for the feedback to be received openly, and to avoid defensiveness, rely on the strategies to provide feedback described above.
• Knowledge workers are those whose productivity relies on added value. Nowadays, employee expertise is highly specialized and depends on the coordination of a team.
• All teams have a group IQ. But the most important element of group success is not the sum of everyone’s IQ but the sum of their Emotional Intelligence.
  • Controlling and dominant people lack a basic element of Emotional Intelligence, as they fail to recognize what constitutes appropriate and reasonable give-and-take.
  • How well people work in a network depends on their ability to manage their emotions and motivation. Successful teams are able to coordinate their work, build consensus, see things from others’ perspectives (both teammates and customers), be persuasive, and promote cooperation.

Chapter 11: Mind and Medicine

• Because our mental wellbeing is in part due to an illusion of invulnerability, and sickness threatens this illusion, emotions such as fear and anxiety can take over when we are diagnosed with a serious disease. The problem is worsened when medical personnel don’t react to our emotional needs when tending to our physical condition.
• People’s emotional states can play a significant role not only in their vulnerability to a disease but also in their recovery. While it is unproductive for medical models to dismiss the idea of the mind influencing the body, it’s as equally fruitless to believe that diseases can be entirely treated or prevented by pure positivism. The truth is somewhere in between.
• Research suggests that the immune system is the body’s brain; it can learn. And emotions impact the immune system. Emotions also influence the production of hormones. Many that are released under stress are associated with suppression of immune resistance.
• While it is not clear whether the range of these changes is significant enough to make a medical difference, there are other significant associations between emotions and health.
  • Panic and anxiety increase blood pressure. It is risky for a surgeon to operate on someone whose veins are distended by pressure of blood.
  • Anger has also been associated with an increased risk of heart conditions. In an experiment, patients were asked to recount a moment in which they were upset. The researchers found their pumping efficiency dropped enough for it to be a risk to their heart function. And patients said they weren’t as mad recounting the story as they were during the actual events. Further research on chronic anger found it is a strong predictor of cardiac arrest.
    • This doesn’t mean we should suppress anger. Rather, it speaks to the importance of empathy to avoid hostility and develop a trusting heart.
  • Anxiety and stress have also been found to exacerbate medical problems. Long-term sustained stress has been associated with damage to the hippocampus and memory loss. It is also a predictor of a weakened immune system, as people with more stress in their lives are more likely to catch colds.
  • Depression has been found to worsen medical conditions and is associated with earlier death due to the condition (not the depression itself). Untreated depression can complicate the diagnosis of other conditions because its symptoms, such as loss of appetite and lethargy, are easily mistaken for other diseases. It can also affect patients’ attitudes, decreasing the likelihood of compliance with medical regimes.
• Positive emotions have shown to have a subtle but significant effect on health. Optimism and hope have been associated with greater coping skills, better adherence to healthy behaviors (e.g., exercise and balanced diets), and compliance to medical regimes.
• Isolation doubles the chances of sickness and death. Solitude is not isolation. It’s the sense of being cut off and not having emotional support that increases medical risks. However, negative relationships can also take a toll on our health and wellbeing.
• Research continually provides evidence that medicine needs to embrace the role of emotions for treatment and prevention purposes. Helping people better manage their emotions (i.e., anger, anxiety, depression, pessimism, loneliness) is a form of prevention. 

Part IV – Windows of Opportunity

Chapter 12: The Family Crucible

• Family is the first to teach us about Emotional Intelligence: how we feel about ourselves, expect others to react to our feelings, think about feelings, and express our emotions.
• Several studies show that how parents treat their children determines a lot of how the person is going to grow and develop Emotional Intelligence. Couples who have more emotional competency in their marriage are also more effective in teaching their children how to handle emotions.
• The three most common parenting styles that are proven to negatively impact Emotional Intelligence are:

1. Ignoring feelings. These parents treat children’s emotions as trivial and don’t seize the opportunity of an emotional upsetting situation to help the child learn.
2. Being too laissez-faire. These parents recognize the child’s feelings, but believe the child can decipher how to handle the emotion in whatever way he/she prefers.
3. Being contemptuous, not respecting the child’s feelings. These parents are disapproving and harsh (in terms of criticism and punishment).

• When parents are emotionally adept, children get along better with their parents, are more affectionate, and have less tension around them. They become biologically relaxed (i.e., have lower levels of stress hormones), are more popular and better liked by their peers, and are better capable of paying attention in class and learning more effectively.
• The seven key ingredients for effective learning, which are also related to Emotional Intelligence, are:

1. Confidence: a sense of control over one’s body and behavior.
2. Curiosity: enjoying the learning process and pleasure in discovering things.
3. Intentionality: the wish and capacity to impact, being competent and persistent.
4. Self-control: the ability to control own actions in age-appropriate ways.
5. Relatedness: the ability to engage and understand others.
6. Communication skills: the wish and ability to share ideas and feelings with others.
7. Cooperativeness: the ability to balance personal needs with those of others.

• Every interaction between parents and their children has emotional tones. The repetition of these messages and experiences forms their core emotional capacities.
  • Parents who discipline their children arbitrarily, based more on their moods than the child’s needs, tend to raise bullies. They are violent in their words and actions, modeling aggressiveness. They severely punish their children or let them run havoc at home. There are no expectations, because they discipline them capriciously.
  • Parents who abuse their kids remove all empathy from them, as they leave an imprint on the brain that is difficult to mend. 

Chapter 13: Trauma and Emotional Relearning

• Traumatic events (whether repeated abuse or a one-time horrendous situation) can turn into memories in the emotional circuitry, later becoming triggers.
• Unlike natural catastrophes (e.g., hurricanes, tornadoes, earthquakes, etc.), violent acts (e.g., abuse, war) are more destructive to our mental wellbeing, because victims feel they’ve been selected for malevolence. This perception stamps victims’ memories.
• Post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) is among the most severe forms of emotional hijacking. Traumatic events trigger the amygdala to such a strong degree that chemical alterations occur and stamp the brain, resulting in people reacting to ordinary life events as if they were emergencies.
• All uncontrollable stress can impact our biology. If a person feels like they have control over the situation, no matter how minor, they will fare better than those who feel completely helpless. Helplessness makes the situation overwhelming, triggering PTSD.
  • Some of the changes in the limbic circuitry and the amygdala are in the locus coeruleus – what regulates the secretion of adrenaline and noradrenaline, the hormones that mobilize the body for emergencies.
• In PTSD, this system becomes hyperactive. The brain will secrete these hormones in excessive doses in response to situations that hold little to no real threat (usually because it reminds the brain of the original trauma).
  • The pituitary gland is also impacted, leading to excessive secretion of CRF –the stress hormone that mobilizes fight-or-flight responses.
• Research suggests that constant exposure, even to mild stress during childhood, makes people more vulnerable to trauma-induced brain changes (including PTSD). Their brains become primed to look for danger.
• While PTSD and similar conditions mean the learning and memory mechanisms in the brain have gone askew, relearning can occur. Such a process requires the neocortex.
• Research has found that children heal from emotional trauma spontaneously through games, play, art, and fantasy. Through this process, they recall, rethink, and replay the trauma – which is one of the main steps that have been found to help adults recover from traumatic events.
• Therapy proposes three stages for recovery: attaining a sense of safety, remembering the details of the trauma and mourning the loss it brought, and reestablishing normal life.
  • These steps help patients understand that their jumpiness and nightmares, their hypervigilance, and their panic attacks are all symptoms of PTSD.
  • Retelling and recounting the story helps rationalize the events so that the emotional circuitry can understand the traumatic event. Through this process, the memory starts to be transformed, including its emotional effect.
  • Mourning is also necessary for the person to eventually let go and start looking ahead, to hope, and to rebuild his/her life.

Chapter 14: Temperament is Not Destiny

• Temperament refers to the moods that typify our emotional tendencies, and are usually defined at birth. To different degrees, we all have a favored emotional range.
• There are four temperamental types: timid, bold, upbeat, and melancholy. Each of these is based on different patterns in brain activity. Our temperament will, to a degree, determine what triggers our emotions, how long they’ll last, and how intensely we will feel them.
  • There are two dimensions of temperaments: one runs from boldness to timidity and the other from upbeat to melancholy.
• Children who are overly sensible and fearful tend to become shy adults. The circuitry in the brain makes them more easily reactive to stress. Those with a bolder temperament have a higher threshold for the amygdala’s response to stress, being less easily frightened and more naturally outgoing and eager to explore.
  • Timid children probably inherited chronically high levels of norepinephrine and similar hormones that more easily activate the amygdala. Because of these brain chemicals, sensitive children are at a higher risk of developing anxiety.
• Naturally cheerful children tend to be more positive, upbeat and easygoing. These are individuals who have more activity on the left frontal lobe compared to those who tend to melancholy – kids who have more activity on the right frontal lobe. Those who tend to be melancholy are more easily discouraged, have sourer moods, and become more negative.
  • People with clinical depression have lower levels of brain activity in the left frontal lobe. This doesn’t mean that all who are naturally born with more right frontal lobe activity will become depressed. Only people at the extremes (about 30%) are at risk.
• The tendency to lean towards melancholy or cheerfulness and timidity or boldness emerges within the first year of life, suggesting an innate predisposition. However, emotional lessons in childhood can have a profound impact, either amplifying or muting such inclinations.
  • Parents play a major role in teaching their children how to deal with their timidity. Some parents tend to protect their children from becoming upset and others expose their children to small struggles in hopes that they’ll learn to adapt. Research suggests that the second approach will help children overcome shyness and anxiety.
  • Some children will learn to overcome shyness naturally, particularly those with higher social competence: those who are more empathetic, cooperative, generous, considerate, and who develop meaningful friendships.
• Pruning refers to the process of losing the less used neural connections and strengthening the most utilized connections. These connections are called synapses. Most of the pruning process occurs during childhood and puberty. Through this process, emotional experiences help children overcome timid or melancholic tendencies.
  • Emotional self-control finalizes its development around late adolescence. However, the brain remains plastic throughout life. And while childhood experiences better modify brain synapses, adults can strengthen synaptic connections. Emotional habits are malleable through life, even if they require a more sustained effort.

Part V – Emotional Literacy

Chapter 15: The Cost of Emotional Illiteracy

• Since 1970, the average child has worsened in the following areas on a yearly basis:
  • Withdrawal and social problems – children prefer to be alone, are secretive, lack energy, and feel unhappy, all while being overly dependent.
  • Anxiety and depression – they become isolated and lonely, have extensive fears and worries, and a need for perfection, all while feeling unloved, nervous, and sad.
  • Attention and thinking problems – they have difficulty paying attention, concentrating, sitting still, and controlling their thoughts. They act without thinking and do poorly in school.
  • Delinquency and aggressiveness – they lie and cheat more, are mean, demand attention, destroy others’ belongings, disobey authority, are stubborn, moody, and have a hot temper.
• Aggressiveness is associated with social rejection. Unusually aggressive people tend to have deep biases – assumptions of hostility from their counterparts – and difficulty understanding what is actually going on.
  • Children who tend toward aggressiveness have a low threshold for upset, getting easily peeved by mild things and developing habits of striking out.
  • Most children who end up in delinquency tend to have lower IQ scores than their peers, but impulsivity is three times a stronger predictor than IQ.
  • Timely help can change negative attitudes and keep angry children from sustaining their impulsive behaviors as they grow older. Research suggests training sessions that teach children about empathy and social cues work in reducing aggressiveness.
• Since the 1970s, not only have the rates of depression increased but people are getting diagnosed at younger ages. While there is evidence of genetics playing a role, it appears that social and environmental factors are increasingly leading to more child and teenage depression. Pessimistic habits of thought predispose children, but problems in relationships appear to be the strongest trigger.
  • Experts have different theories that explain the incidence of child depression:
    • There’s been a clear erosion of the nuclear family – divorce rates are increasing, parents have less time available to spend with their children, and most children now grow up without knowing their extended families.
    • The industrialization era has led to parents not spending time at home – parents pay less attention to their children’s needs.
    • There’s been an increase in individualism and a fading of larger beliefs – people now have fewer resources that can buffer failure. A larger perspective (e.g., a belief in God and the afterlife) helps perceive setbacks as temporary and not as personal defeat, which often leads to hopelessness.
  • Depression can be prevented with timely help. Most children show signs of hopelessness before they develop depression. In children, medication is not a clear alternative, as they metabolize it differently than adults. The best preventive strategy is teaching children that anxiety, sadness, and anger don’t just happen. They have control over their feelings and can change the way they think.
• Eating disorder rates are also increasing. While many theories seek to explain this phenomenon, the most promising research shows that emotional deficits, along with the spread of unnatural beauty standards, are the most influential factors leading to eating disorders. Obesity has also been linked to emotional deficit.
  • Obsession with weight is not, in and of itself, sufficient to explain eating disorders. Those who lack awareness of their feelings (i.e., difficulty differentiating emotions) can’t comprehend body signals and have weak social skills, are more prone to developing obesity, anorexia, or bulimia, among others.
  • The best strategy to treat and prevent these conditions is to teach children how to identify their feelings and how to soothe their emotions effectively.
• Dropping out of school is more common among social rejects. These are usually individuals who lack emotional awareness and empathy. They don’t understand emotions in others and can’t identify emotions within themselves. Again, programs that teach children about emotional intelligence and how to build friendships have been proven to be the best strategies to prevent dropouts and treat social rejection.
• Substance use disorder (SUD), although to a degree biologically predisposed, is more common among individuals who have difficulty soothing their emotions. They turn to drugs and alcohol to find emotional relief, eventually becoming dependent.
  • While access to substances is easier now than in the 1970s, and children and teenagers are trying substances at younger ages, addiction has also been found to be dependent on high levels of agitation, impulsivity, and boredom.
  • The most successful approach to overcoming addiction is to learn to handle and soothe these feelings.
• The key to avoiding most of the issues covered above is prevention. Social and environmental factors may influence these disorders, but emotional competence plays a key role over and above family and economic forces.
  • Those who are resilient to the strongest hardships (including poverty and abuse) share in common a highly developed Emotional Intelligence. 

Chapter 16: Schooling the Emotions

• Self Science is a class at the Nueva School in California. The course covers feelings and emotions, a topic otherwise ignored in most schools. With the family nucleus being threatened by social change, and the rate of crime and psychological conditions on the rise, it’s necessary that schools teach about emotional skills.
• Parents and teachers should impart lessons on emotional competence regularly. Through experience and repetition, children’s brains will develop the neurological pathways for emotional regulation and self-control to become habitual.
• Self Science and similar programs teach children that conflict begins through bad communication. We make assumptions, jump to conclusions, and send messages that make it hard for others to understand us. As such, they learn to reduce the risk of conflict by channeling their emotions properly and engaging in great efforts to express their opinion and points of view without aggressiveness, blaming, or yelling.
  • Children also learn that when they feel any emotion, there is a cause for it. E.g., If they feel anger, they are taught to question where it comes from. Is it jealousy? Hurt? They learn, too, that there is always a choice in how to react or respond.
  • Topics in this curriculum include self-awareness (not only recognizing and naming emotions, but recognizing personal strengths and weaknesses), emotion management, taking responsibility, commitment, and empathy.
• Because teachers are understandably resistant to taking extra time from the basic courses to create a new class, other programs have blended lessons on Emotional Intelligence into the subjects already being taught. One of these programs is the Child Development Project, which offers prepackaged materials that fit into the existing courses and help teachers rethink how to discipline their students.
• Parents can start coaching their kids from infancy. Preschool years are crucial to laying foundations, as the years of transition (into grade school, junior high, and middle school) require children to count on these skills to adapt and adjust. Puberty is also a crucial time for emotional and social lessons, as children go through biological and cognitive changes.
• The emotional lessons must be taught per the child’s development. The youngest grades should focus on self-awareness, relationships, and decision-making. By fourth or fifth grade, lessons should focus on empathy, impulse control, and anger management. After sixth grade, lessons can more directly focus on temptations (sex, drugs, drinking).
• Colloquially, Emotional Intelligence is sometimes referred to as character: the psychological muscle that is needed for appropriate conduct. Character rests on self-discipline and self-control. Schools have a central role in cultivating character. Beyond lectures, children need to build and practice emotional skills.

To learn more about emotional intelligence, check out our Overview here.

Appendices

This book contains six appendices:

• Appendix A: What is Emotion?
  • Experts differ in how they define and classify emotions. Goleman provides his definition of emotion, describes the basic emotions, and presents us with their close “cousins.”
• Appendix B: Hallmarks of the Emotional Mind
  • Goleman covers the two most prominent scientific models of emotions – both of which distinguish emotions from the rest of the mental life.
• Appendix C: The Neural Circuitry of Fear
  • Goleman describes how fear works in the brain and how it manifests in life.
• Appendix D:T. Grant Consortium – Active Ingredients of Prevention Programs
  • Goleman provides a “recipe” that describes the most effective programs that help people develop their emotional skills.
• Appendix E: The Self Science Curriculum
  • Goleman describes the main components of the Self Science curriculum.
• Appendix F: Social and Emotional Learning – Results
  • Goleman goes over different projects that boost social and emotional learning and describes the impact the programs have had on their participants.