EMOTIONAL INTELLIGENCE

What Science Says about the importance of labeling our feelings.

Putting feelings into words: affect labeling disrupts amygdala activity in response to affective stimuli.

Putting feelings into words (affect labeling) has long been thought to help manage negative emotional experiences; however, the mechanisms by which affect labeling produces this benefit remain largely unknown. Recent neuroimaging studies suggest a possible neurocognitive pathway for this process, but methodological limitations of previous studies have prevented strong inferences from being drawn. A functional magnetic resonance imaging study of affect labeling was conducted to remedy these limitations. The results indicated that affect labeling, relative to other forms of encoding, diminished the response of the amygdala and other limbic regions to negative emotional images. Additionally, affect labeling produced increased activity in a single brain region, right ventrolateral prefrontal cortex (RVLPFC). Finally, RVLPFC and amygdala activity during affect labeling were inversely correlated, a relationship that was mediated by activity in medial prefrontal cortex (MPFC). These results suggest that affect labeling may diminish emotional reactivity along a pathway from RVLPFC to MPFC to the amygdala.

Lieberman MD1, Eisenberger NI, Crockett MJ, Tom SM, Pfeifer JH, Way BM.

Here’s What it Means to Us: The Brain’s Braking System

The activity that takes place in the RVLPFC when one labels an emotion acts as a “braking” system for the brain. It slows down the reaction of the limbic system (emotional seat) of the brain. We can literally help kids start “putting on the brakes” to emotional reactions by helping them learn to label feelings. Identifying feelings one of the first parts of social-emotional literacy.

GOOD PARENTING REQUIRES MORE THAN INTELLECT.

It touches a dimension of the personality that’s been ignored in much of the advice dispensed to parents over the past thirty years. Good parenting involves emotion. In the last decade or so, science has discovered a tremendous amount about the role emotions play in our lives.

Researchers have found that even more than IQ, your emotional awareness and ability to handle feelings will determine your success and happiness in all walks of life, including family relationships. For parents, this quality of “emotional intelligence”– as many now call it– means being aware of your children’s feelings, and being able to empathize, soothe, and guide them.

For children, who learn most lessons about emotion from their parents, it includes the ability to control impulses, delay gratification, motivate themselves, read other people’s social cues, and cope with life’s ups and downs.

(Taken from the book Raising an Emotionally Intelligent Child by John Gottman, Ph. D. with permission of the author. Copyright 1997 by John Gottman, all rights reserved.)

What parental behaviors make the difference?

As a research psychologist studying parent-child interactions, I have spent much of the past twenty years looking for the answer to this question. Working with research teams at the University of Illinois and the University of Washington, I have conducted in-depth research in two studies of 119 families, observing how parents and children react to one another in emotionally charged situations. We have been following these children from age four to adolescence. In addition, we are in the process of tracking 130 newlywed couples as they become parents of young infants.

Our studies involve lengthy interviews with parents, talking about their marriages, their reactions to their children’s emotional experiences and their own awareness of the role emotion plays in their lives. We have tracked children’s physiological responses during stressful parent-child interactions. We have carefully observed and analyzed parents’ emotional reactions to their kids’ anger and sadness. Then we have checked in with these families over time to see how their children developed in terms of health, academic achievement, emotional development, and social relationships. Our results tell a simple, yet compelling story. We have found that most parents fall into one of two broad categories: those who give their children guidance about the world of emotion and those who don’t. I call the parents who get involved with their children’s feelings “Emotion Coaches.”

The process of Emotion Coaching

The parents: 

1. Become aware of the child’s emotion.

2. Recognize the emotion as an opportunity for intimacy and teaching.

3. Listen empathetically, validating the child’s feelings.

4. Help the child find words to label the emotion he / she is having.

5. Set limits while exploring strategies to solve the problem at hand.

(Taken from the book Raising an Emotionally Intelligent Child by John Gottman, Ph. D. with permission of the author. Copyright 1997 by John Gottman, all rights reserved.)