Emotional Intelligence / Emotional Understanding

Emotional Intelligence is an ability construct that augments established intelligence theories with emotion-based abilities. This form of intelligence comprises abilities such as the accurate perception of emotions, the ability to understand the causes and consequences of emotions (Emotional Understanding), and the ability to regulate emotions effectively (Emotion Management). Within this domain, our research activities focus on the construction of new maximum performance tests, particularly for Emotional Understanding, using new assessment approaches. In addition, our main methodological focus is on addressing the vexing issue of finding and justifying the scoring keys for items.

One approach to specify a scoring key that does not depend on data is to deduce correct item responses from existing established emotion theories for the assessment of emotional knowledge. This approach has been used in the literature for years now. For example, the development of the now quite prominent Situational Test of Emotional Understanding (STEU) is based on this scoring rationale. A different more recent approach is a construction principle that is based on logic: the Acquisition-Application (AcquA) task design (formerly referred to as Empathic Agent Paradigm, EAP). The AcquA task design has become the main focus of our research efforts in the interpersonal domain. This is possible, because the principle is not tied to the domain of emotions but can be applied to almost any aspect of interpersonal behavior and cognition, including the personality of others and social behavior.

Interested in collaborating with us? Considering a Bachelor or Master Thesis in Psychology or an internship in this area? Great! Please contact us -> Prof. Dr. Ralf Schulze & Dr. Maike Pisters