Emotional inteligence
82/661discern and respond appropriately to the moods, temperaments,motivations, and desires of other people." Inintra-personal intelligence, the key to self-knowledge, heincluded "access to one's own feelings and the ability todiscriminate among them and draw upon them to guidebehavior." 11SPOCK VS. DATA WHEN COGNITIONIS NOT ENOUGHThere is one dimension of personal intelligence that isbroadly pointed to, but little explored, in Gardner's elaborations:the role of emotions. Perhaps this is so because,as Gardner suggested to me, his work is sostrongly informed by a cognitive-science model of mind.Thus his view of these intelligences emphasizes cognition—theunderstanding of oneself and of others inmotives, in habits of working, and in putting that insightinto use in conducting one's own life and getting alongwith others. But like the kinesthetic realm, where physicalbrilliance manifests itself nonverbally, the realm ofthe emotions extends, too, beyond the reach of languageand cognition.While there is ample room in Gardner's descriptionsof the personal intelligences for insight into the play ofemotions and mastery in managing them, Gardner andthose who work with him have not pursued in great
83/661detail the role of feeling in these intelligences, focusingmore on cognitions about feeling. This focus, perhapsunintentionally, leaves unexplored the rich sea of emotionsthat makes the inner life and relationships so complex,so compelling, and so often puzzling. And it leavesyet to be plumbed both the sense in which there is intelligencein the emotions and the sense in which intelligencecan be brought to emotions.Gardner's emphasis on the cognitive elements in thepersonal intelligences reflects the Zeitgeist of psychologythat has shaped his views. Psychology's overemphasison cognition even in the realm of emotion is, inpart, due to a quirk in the history of that science. Duringthe middle decades of this century academic psychologywas dominated by behaviorists in the mold of B. F. Skinner,who felt that only behavior that could be seen objectively,from the outside, could be studied with scientificaccuracy. The behaviorists ruled all inner life, includingemotions, out-of-bounds for science.Then, with the coming in the late 1960s of the "cognitiverevolution," the focus of psychological science turnedto how the mind registers and stores information, andthe nature of intelligence. But emotions were still offlimits.Conventional wisdom among cognitive scientistsheld that intelligence entails a cold, hard-nosed processingof fact. It is hyperrational, rather like Star Treks
- Page 32 and 33: 32/661To better grasp the potent ho
- Page 34 and 35: 34/661them. Because this part of th
- Page 36 and 37: 36/661the family unit and the long-
- Page 38 and 39: 2Anatomy of an Emotional HijackingL
- Page 40 and 41: moment passes, those so possessed h
- Page 42 and 43: 42/661feeling, as well as any feeli
- Page 44 and 45: 44/661It is in moments such as thes
- Page 46 and 47: 46/661did he realize that the girl
- Page 48 and 49: 48/661LeDoux overturned the prevail
- Page 50 and 51: original signal goes straight from
- Page 52 and 53: messages from the brain to regulate
- Page 54 and 55: 54/661memories date from the first
- Page 56 and 57: 56/661falling—illustrates the pow
- Page 58 and 59: sensory information that have not b
- Page 60 and 61: 60/661to the amygdala, but to the n
- Page 62 and 63: 62/661zones to the emotional urgenc
- Page 64 and 65: 64/661capacity of attention that ho
- Page 66 and 67: 66/661the amygdala, whatever the ne
- Page 68 and 69: PART TWOTHE NATURE OFEMOTIONALINTEL
- Page 70 and 71: 70/661After transferring to a priva
- Page 72 and 73: course it accounts for. But what da
- Page 74 and 75: 74/661level of young people of comp
- Page 76 and 77: 76/661margins of games rather than
- Page 78 and 79: 78/661competencies and gifts, and c
- Page 80 and 81: 80/661varieties of intelligence. In
- Page 84 and 85: 84/661Mr. Spock, the archetype of d
- Page 86 and 87: you get that are essential for inte
- Page 88 and 89: 88/661for instance, so highly value
- Page 90 and 91: the subtle social signals that indi
- Page 92 and 93: 92/661adept in the realm of mind bu
- Page 94 and 95: 4Know ThyselfA belligerent samurai,
- Page 96 and 97: 96/661faculty of mind in writing of
- Page 98 and 99: 98/661• Self-aware. Aware of thei
- Page 100 and 101: 100/661Temple University, to assess
- Page 102 and 103: 102/661Gary was emotionally flat, c
- Page 104 and 105: 104/661silent. When her therapist t
- Page 106 and 107: 106/661Elliot's tumor, growing just
- Page 108 and 109: 108/661accepting virtually every po
- Page 110 and 111: 110/661It may be that a talent for
- Page 112 and 113: 112/661just out of his awareness an
- Page 114 and 115: 114/661proportionate to circumstanc
- Page 116 and 117: 116/661have treated them, leaving t
- Page 118 and 119: worked themselves into a rage in or
- Page 120 and 121: explain why some views about it are
- Page 122 and 123: are so much more prone to anger if
- Page 124 and 125: subsided, and a third on top of tho
- Page 126 and 127: can no longer think straight. When
- Page 128 and 129: it stops that angry train of though
- Page 130 and 131: Tice found that ventilating anger i
82/661
discern and respond appropriately to the moods, temperaments,
motivations, and desires of other people." In
intra-personal intelligence, the key to self-knowledge, he
included "access to one's own feelings and the ability to
discriminate among them and draw upon them to guide
behavior." 11
SPOCK VS. DATA WHEN COGNITION
IS NOT ENOUGH
There is one dimension of personal intelligence that is
broadly pointed to, but little explored, in Gardner's elaborations:
the role of emotions. Perhaps this is so because,
as Gardner suggested to me, his work is so
strongly informed by a cognitive-science model of mind.
Thus his view of these intelligences emphasizes cognition—the
understanding of oneself and of others in
motives, in habits of working, and in putting that insight
into use in conducting one's own life and getting along
with others. But like the kinesthetic realm, where physical
brilliance manifests itself nonverbally, the realm of
the emotions extends, too, beyond the reach of language
and cognition.
While there is ample room in Gardner's descriptions
of the personal intelligences for insight into the play of
emotions and mastery in managing them, Gardner and
those who work with him have not pursued in great
Change language