{"id":51258,"date":"2020-03-02T12:22:41","date_gmt":"2020-03-02T20:22:41","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/world.edu\/?p=51258"},"modified":"2020-03-02T12:22:41","modified_gmt":"2020-03-02T20:22:41","slug":"understanding-emotions-is-nearly-as-important-as-iq-for-students-academic-success","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/world.edu\/understanding-emotions-is-nearly-as-important-as-iq-for-students-academic-success\/","title":{"rendered":"Understanding emotions is nearly as important as IQ for students\u2019 academic success"},"content":{"rendered":"

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The ability to understand emotions contributes almost as much to students\u2019 grades as their IQ.<\/p>\n

Past studies show two personal qualities are important for student academic success \u2013 intelligence and conscientiousness.<\/p>\n

IQ scores\u00a0explain about 15%<\/a>\u00a0of the differences between students\u2019 grades. Conscientiousness, such as having the diligence to do enough study,\u00a0explains about 5%<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Our\u00a0recent research<\/a>\u00a0has found emotional intelligence explains 4% of differences between students\u2019 achievement. But the ability to understand emotions, a component of emotional intelligence, explains about 12% of differences in students\u2019 grades.<\/p>\n

What is emotional intelligence?<\/strong><\/h4>\n

Different researchers use slightly different definitions of emotional intelligence.<\/p>\n

Some define emotional intelligence as the ability to perceive, use, understand and manage your own and other people\u2019s emotions. This is called \u201cability emotional intelligence\u201d.<\/p>\n

Others also include character traits such as optimism, impulse control and the ability to motivate yourself. This is called \u201cmixed emotional intelligence\u201d because it is a mix of abilities and character traits.<\/p>\n

We examined the findings of more than 150 studies on the link between emotional intelligence and academic performance. These studies included more than 42,000 students and 1,246 different estimations of the size of the relationship between emotional intelligence and academic performance.<\/p>\n

Some of the studies in our analysis used rating scales to assess emotional intelligence. Here, test-takers might rate their emotional abilities with items like \u201cI am aware of the non-verbal messages other people send\u201d or rate their mixed emotional intelligence with items like \u201cI am motivated to succeed\u201d.<\/p>\n

Others tested emotional intelligence directly by measuring participants\u2019 emotional abilities with skill-based tasks. For example, test takers might be asked to identify which emotion is expressed in a face.<\/p>\n

We found that, overall, emotional intelligence explained about 4% of differences in students\u2019 academic achievement. But some emotional intelligence types were more important than others.<\/p>\n

Skill-based emotional intelligence, such as reading people\u2019s faces, explained 6% of differences in academic achievement, but self-ratings of emotional abilities explained 1% of differences. So, emotional skills assessed from the outside are more important for students\u2019 academic performance than students\u2019 self-ratings (or self-beliefs) about their emotional skills.<\/p>\n

But some emotional skills were more important than others. The two most important emotional skills for academic success were\u00a0understanding emotions<\/strong>\u00a0and\u00a0managing emotions<\/strong>.<\/p>\n

Students who can\u00a0understand emotions<\/strong>\u00a0can accurately label their own and others\u2019 emotions. They know what causes emotions, how emotions change and how they combine. Students who can\u00a0manage emotions<\/strong>\u00a0know how to regulate their emotions in a stressful situation. They also know what to do to maintain good social relationships with others.<\/p>\n

Emotion management<\/strong>\u00a0skills accounted for 7% of differences in academic performance . Emotion understanding skills accounted for 12%. That is, understanding emotions is more important for student success than conscientiousness (5%) and almost as important as students\u2019 IQ (15%).<\/p>\n

Emotionally intelligent students\u00a0tend to be<\/a>\u00a0more intelligent as well as more conscientious. But our study found it wasn\u2019t just that emotionally intelligent students were also more likely to be intelligent and conscientious.<\/p>\n

We applied a statistical technique called meta-regression to examine what the effect of emotional intelligence would be if everyone had the same level of conscientiousness and intelligence.<\/p>\n

For students who had the same levels of conscientiousness and intelligence, emotional intelligence was still linked with higher academic performance.<\/p>\n

For students with the same levels of intelligence and conscientiousness:<\/p>\n