In this Article we will
1) Discuss the importance of Social quotient and emotional quotient
2) Understand why intelligence quotient (IQ) alone is not enough in developing someone’s overall personality
3) See how and why in today’s world a strong EQ and SQ are needed to lead a successful life.
If you are a parent, a guardian or a teacher reading this, please try to understand why in today’s world it has become so important to become an emotionally and socially intelligent being to lead a life of contentment and success.
If we are aiming to create future leaders, thinkers and change makers, we should prepare our kids in such a way that they think, feel and behave sensibly.
Why are we obsessed with IQ?
Right from our childhood we are made to believe that students with higher IQ levels shine more in life. Students who can solve mathematics and physics problems proficiently are considered as the fittest of the lot.
Thanks to this perception, we put our entire effort in improving or polishing the intelligence quotient of kids while neglecting other equally important quotients.
In this article we will try to understand why a good IQ alone cannot be the ‘only’ criterion for success. Let us analyze why for an overall development of someone’s personality it is so important to put equal emphasis on both Emotional Quotient (EQ) as well as Social Quotient (SQ) too.
However as David Caruso said- “It is very important to understand that emotional intelligence is not the opposite of intelligence, it is not the triumph of heart over head – it is the unique intersection of both”, so this article should not be seen as a comparison between intelligence and (emotional +social) quotients.
Are you concerned about your child’s EQ?
Does your kid get tensed very easily or are they too emotional? Is your teenage boy bad at anger management? Have you observed your kids getting panic during adversities or unpleasant situations? These are some of the probable indications that you need to work on your child’s emotional intelligence
The problem with most Indian parents is their reluctance or ignorance when it comes in addressing their child’s emotional or mental status. Ask any Indian parent about their kid’s mental health and they will instantly certify the kid to be in perfect health without even trying to check or analyze the status.
It pains me to put Department of Higher Education’s (under MHRD) report which states that we have lost 27 crucial lives due to suicides across 10 Indian Institutes of Technology (IITs) between 2014 and 2019. The question we need to ask ourselves here is- Why these highly talented students who have cleared one of the toughest entrance exams of the country could not pass the exam of life?
Apart from thermodynamics, fluid mechanics, programming and VLSI is there anything else we should have taught them? May be a basic course on EQ?
Prepare your child to fight the hardships of life on their own. Teach them the art of:
i) Handling failures: All the successful revolutions, scientific breakthroughs and good things have come to men after series of failures. Failures are the stepping stones to success, they say!
But what if we lack the very basic skill to cross these stepping stones? What if quitting seems easier to us than facing temporary setbacks?
Failure handling is one of the most important skills you as a parent should instill in your kids.
ii) Self motivation: We guardians cannot always be there with our children everywhere to motivate them.
Teach them the basics of self motivation so that they can steer their life during the tough times all alone by themselves.
iii) Communicating their feelings: Some people are bad at expressing their emotions. Explain to your kids why it is so important to share feelings with friends, mentors and family members.
And now let us understand the importance of the social quotient
1) A new study carried out by researchers from the Cognitive Neurology and Alzheimer’s Disease Center (CNADC) shows that keeping strong and genuine friendships helps to defer mental decline during old age.
2) Another research conducted at the National Human Genome Research Institute (NHGRI) stated that strong social interaction increases the survival rates of patients undergoing cancer treatment.
What I am trying to explain here by sharing these researches is that people with strong and genuine social network have higher mental as well physical health.
Imagine a life where you have all the worldly success that you have ever dreamt of and you are celebrating one of your grand evenings with – ‘no one’! Would you still consider yourself as successful?
I have always believed in the power of relationships and consider bonding with people (genuine ones, not those superficial corporate relations) as one of the most important aspects of my life.
You cannot win the race of life all alone. Today whatever you have achieved in life is the result of a large number of people’s efforts who came in your life from time to time.
Starting from your parents who showed you the world, the teachers who taught you the basic life skills to those stupid friends who laughed and cried with you and the ex-lover who helped you to become more matured and strong by breaking you, endless people have contributed to your growth.
So socializing with people is important!
Why socially intelligent people succeed?
“I’ve learned that people will forget what you said, people will forget what you did, but people will never forget how you made them feel.”
Maya Angelou has described in a single quote why socially intelligent people leave a mark in people’s hearts and live forever.
When we surround ourselves with good people, our adversity handling capacity improves as it is always less painful to fight a battle with friends and well wishers than fighting it all alone.
Use the following techniques to improve the social intelligence of your kid(s):
i) Teach them the importance of relationships: Explain your kids why relationships are not a burden (as movies and serials project). Research based studies suggest that poor relationships and lonely life in fact major sources of stress and mental problems.
ii) Empathy: Empathy is the ornament of a true human being. If your kid is empathetic toward his fellow mates, he will understand the value of his social circle and in due course of time more genuine people will be attracted to his life.
Moreover graduates with higher empathy end up having more successful careers. Know how!
iii) A socially intelligent person will never indulge in unnecessary arguments and debates with people around him. Explain to your kids why hurting people’s ego in order to prove a point is not a wise thing to do.
Read Dale Carneage’s classic worldwide best seller ‘How to win friends and influence people’ to understand this more deeply
iv) Take them outdoors: Right from their boyhood days encourage your kids to mingle with other kids and take part in social activities and team games. Your kid will learn to interact with people of varied mindset.
Please See
EQ and SQ are closely related. A person with strong EQ will have better chances of becoming socially intelligent as they have better control over their emotions (like anger, frustrations etc) while in a social gathering. Schutte et al [1] conducted a series of studies in the year 2001, where they found significant links between high EI and more successful interpersonal relations. The participants in the study who exhibited higher levels of EI also showed better social skills and greater tendency to form meaningful relationships.
1) Schutte, N.S., Malouff, J.M., Bobik, C., Coston, T.D., Greeson, C.S., Jedlicka, C., Rhodes, E., & Wendorf, G. (2001). Emotional intelligence and interpersonal relations. The Journal of social psychology, 141 4, 523-36. doi.org/10.1080/00224540109600569