Exploring emotional intelligence in children using the trait emotional intelligence questionnaire: a systematic review

BACKGROUND

Measuring psychological constructs in children presents unique challenges, as careful consideration of children's cognitive and socioemotional development is needed. The Trait Emotional Intelligence Questionnaire-Child Form (TEIQue-CF) was developed within the theoretical underpinnings of trait Emotional Intelligence theory and is predicated on primary aged children. This review aims to systematize the scientific literature on the TEIQue-CF, its corresponding short form, the TEIQue-CSF and the translated versions of these tools to identify the key outcomes predicted by these forms in children aged 8-13 years.

METHOD

A search was conducted in Google Scholar, PubMed, Scopus, Web of Science and APA PsycArticles in June 2024. This review was guided by the latest version of the Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic reviews and Meta-Analyses (PRISMA) guidelines.

RESULTS

Conducted search identified 40 studies that investigated child emotional intelligence measured via TEIQue child forms. The key findings cover several topics related to the emotional aspects of children's personalities, such as their intra- and interpersonal relationships, school life, cognition, and creativity.

CONCLUSIONS

This systematic review revealed that trait Emotional Intelligence measured via the TEIQue child forms provide reliable results and is valid, as it has been linked to key childhood variables. This review also provides guidance for future research on the topic of trait Emotional Intelligence in children by highlighting current research limitations to avoid the likelihood of misleading research findings.

The Relationship Between Teacher-Student Relationship and Adolescent Emotional Intelligence: A Chain-Mediated Mediation Model of Openness and Empathy

BACKGROUND

As the role of emotional intelligence has been increasingly explored, researchers generally agree that emotional intelligence is a better predictor of individual success. And fortunately, emotional intelligence is somewhat easily shaped. Schools are important microsites for the shaping of an individual's emotional intelligence. Good teacher-student relationship contribute to the shaping and development of students' emotional intelligence.

OBJECTIVE

Based on the theory of developmental contextualism, the current study aims to identify the relationship between good teacher-student relationship and students' emotional intelligence, and the mediating roles of students' openness and emotional intelligence.

METHODS

In this study, a total of 352 adolescents (11-15 years old) from two schools were surveyed using the teacher-student relationship scale, big five inventory openness subscale, and emotional intelligence scale.

RESULTS

Teacher-student relationship were positively correlated with students' openness, empathy, and emotional intelligence. Teacher-student relationship positively predicted students' emotional intelligence; students' openness and empathy played a fully mediating role in teacher-student relationship and emotional intelligence.

CONCLUSION

The closeness and supportiveness of the teacher-student relationship were positively related to students' openness, empathy, and emotional intelligence were positively correlated.

Students' Trait Emotional Intelligence and Perceived Teacher Emotional Support in Preventing Burnout: The Moderating Role of Academic Anxiety

The current study sought to investigate the role of trait emotional intelligence and perceived teacher emotional support in school burnout. Furthermore, the moderating role of academic anxiety in these relationships was examined. A sample of 493 Italian high school students (81.9% female) aged 14–19 years (M = 16.27, SD = 1.48) was involved in the study. A latent moderated structural equation approach was performed to test the hypothesized model. The results showed that both trait emotional intelligence and perceived teacher emotional support were negatively associated with school burnout. Moreover, academic anxiety moderated the relation between perceived teacher emotional support and school burnout. Specifically, when the level of anxiety was high, the protective role of perceived teacher emotional support toward burnout was weakened. Findings are discussed in light of the protective role of resources on burnout and considering the detrimental impact of academic anxiety in school settings.

Deception Detection and Truth Detection Are Dependent on Different Cognitive and Emotional Traits: An Investigation of Emotional Intelligence, Theory of Mind, and Attention

Despite evidence that variation exists between individuals in high-stakes truth and deception detection accuracy rates, little work has investigated what differences in individuals' cognitive and emotional abilities contribute to this variation. Our study addressed this question by examining the role played by cognitive and affective theory of mind (ToM), emotional intelligence (EI), and various aspects of attention (alerting, orienting, executive control) in explaining variation in accuracy rates among 115 individuals (87 women; mean age = 27.04 years [ SD = 11.32]) who responded to video clips of truth-tellers and liars in real-world, high-stakes contexts. Faster attentional alerting supported truth detection, and better cognitive ToM and perception of emotion (an aspect of EI) supported deception detection. This evidence indicates that truth and deception detection are distinct constructs supported by different abilities. Future research may address whether interventions targeting these cognitive and emotional traits can also contribute to improving detection skill.

Enhancing the Prediction of Emotionally Intelligent Behavior: The PAT Integrated Framework Involving Trait EI, Ability EI, and Emotion Information Processing

Emotional Intelligence (EI) has been conceptualized in the literature either as a dispositional tendency, in line with a personality trait (trait EI; Petrides and Furnham, 2001), or as an ability, moderately correlated with general intelligence (ability EI; Mayer and Salovey, 1997). Surprisingly, there have been few empirical attempts conceptualizing how the different EI approaches should be related to each other. However, understanding how the different approaches of EI may be interwoven and/or complementary is of primary importance for clarifying the conceptualization of EI and organizing the literature around it. We introduce a theoretical framework explaining how trait EI, ability EI, and emotion information processing – a novel component related to EI recently introduced in the literature (e.g., Fiori and Vesely Maillefer, 2018) – may contribute to effective emotion-related performance and provide initial evidence supporting its usefulness in predicting EI-related outcomes. More specifically, we show that performance in a task in which participants had to infer the mental and emotional states of others, namely a Theory of Mind task, was predicted jointly (e.g., interaction effects) by trait EI, ability EI, and emotion information processing, after controlling for personality and IQ (N = 323). Our results argue for the importance of investigating the joint contribution of different aspects of EI in explaining variability in emotionally laden outcomes.

The Relation of Alexithymic Traits to Affective Theory of Mind

Little research has focused on the contributors to adult theory of mind (ToM) even though there is reason to suspect individual differences in performance in neurotypical samples. Alexithymia, a term that references an impaired ability to attend to and verbally label emotions via ongoing introspection, is a useful construct through which to explore how socially relevant dimensions of emotion processing enable ToM. As 1 study has explored alexithymia vis-à-vis cognitive ToM, this study examined the relationships between facets of alexithymia and affective ToM while controlling for the potential confounds of empathy, verbal ability, and negative affect. A nonclinical sample of adults (N = 86) completed the Toronto Alexithymia Scale, the Reading the Mind in the Eyes Test, the Mehrabian and Epstein Scale of Emotional Empathy, the Profile of Mood States, and the Wechsler Abbreviated Scale of Intelligence. Hierarchical regression analysis showed that externally oriented thinking contributed unique variance to affective ToM, confirming an inverse relationship between alexithymia and affective ToM but highlighting the need to parse alexithymia into discrete facets when exploring its relevance to social cognition.

Differential influence of 5-HTTLPR - polymorphism and COMT Val158Met - polymorphism on emotion perception and regulation in healthy women

Converging evidence indicates that a considerable amount of variance in self-estimated emotional competency can be directly attributed to genetic factors. The current study examined the associations between the polymorphisms of the Catechol-O-methyltransferase (COMT Met158Val) and the serotonin transporter (5-HTTLPR) and specific measures of the self-estimated effectiveness of an individual's emotion perception and regulation. Emotional competence was measured in a large sample of 289 healthy women by using the Self-report Emotional Ability Scale (SEAS), which includes two subscales for the assessment of emotion perception and regulation in the intra-personal domain and two subscales for the assessment of emotion perception and regulation in the inter-personal domain. Participants' reports of effective emotion regulation in everyday life were associated with the COMT Met-allele, with women homozygous for the Val-allele scoring lowest on this scale. Self-estimated effectiveness of emotion perception of the individual's own emotions was related to the 5-HTTLPR. Both homozygous groups (s/s and l/l) rated their intra-personal emotion perception less effective than participants in the heterozygous s/l group. Taken together, the results indicate that genetic variants of the COMT and 5HTTLPR genes are differentially associated with specific measures of the self-estimated effectiveness of an individual's emotion perception and regulation in the intra-personal domain.

Role of theory of mind and executive function in explaining social intelligence: a structural equation modeling approach

OBJECTIVES

Social intelligence is the ability to understand others and the social context effectively and thus to interact with people successfully. Research has suggested that the theory of mind (ToM) and executive function may play important roles in explaining social intelligence. The specific aim of the present study was to test with structural equation modeling (SEM) the hypothesis that performance on ToM tasks is more associated with social intelligence in the elderly than is performance on executive functions.

METHODS

One hundred and seventy-seven participants (age 56-96) completed ToM, executive function, and other basic cognition tasks, and were rated with social intelligence scales.

RESULTS

The SEM results showed that ToM and executive function were strongly correlated (0.54); however, only the path coefficient from ToM to social intelligence, and not from executive function, was significant (0.37).

CONCLUSIONS

ToM performance, but not executive function, was strongly correlated with social intelligence among elderly individuals. ToM and executive function might play different roles in social behavior during normal aging; however, based on the present results, it is possible that ToM might play an important role in social intelligence.