Biology of Feelings
Part of the value of emotional intelligence comes from grounding in rigorous science. Advances in neurobiology provide invaluable insight into the way emotions function in the brain and body. For example, recent research demonstrates that “thinking about feeling” has a physiological effect. In other words, these “soft skills” have a biological basis. A team at UCLA used fMRI (functional magnetic resonance imaging, a tool that shows very specific brain activity) to assess how emotion is regulated. In the study, 30 adults, ages 18-36, where given different mechanisms for processing emotional datum. It turns out that naming emotions reduces the emotional reaction (in the amygdala, the part of the brain responsible for fight-flight- freeze reactions). 6
Physiological Effects of Emotional Intelligence
This graph shows that when subjects name emotions, more activity in the cortex correlates with reduced activity in the amygdala, showing that naming feelings helps reduce reactivity.
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White Paper The Business Case for Emotional Intelligence
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