Emotional intelligence key to children's success

Emotional intelligence key to children's success

JAKARTA (JP): "Emotional intelligence", rather than the
previously much-touted intellectual quotient (IQ), determines 80
percent of a person's success in life, an expert has said.

Fawzia Aswin Hadis, a professor at the University of
Indonesia's School of Psychology, told a seminar on emotional
intelligence here Saturday that students with high academic
performance were not necessarily the most successful in life.

Rather, students who were less bright but with high emotional
quotient (EQ) fared better in life, she said. But she conceded
the debate between the link of the emotional quotient and the
intellectual quotient were continuing.

"Intelligence is not enough," Fawzia said, quoting American
psychologists including Daniel Goleman's best-selling book
Emotional Intelligence. Why It Can Matter More than IQ.

Society can help determine someone's success but most
importantly it is the ability to apply intellectual capacity and
emotional intelligence in school activities and face life's
challenges in the future, she said.

The factors of multiple intelligence include verbal,
mathematical, spatial, analysis, musical abilities and physical
agility, while emotional intelligence comprises self-awareness,
emotional control, self-motivation, knowing other's emotions and
maintaining relationships, she said.

Another speaker at the seminar, Karlina Leksono, said that
once a person knows his or her position in the world, they will
have a sense of appropriate moral attitude and act accordingly.

The philosophy lecturer said that moral attitude and
appropriate action would also form the basis of emotional control
in children.

"The child's ability to control their emotions is key to
their success to integrate in their environments while they
maintain the ability to choose, formulate, contemplate and change
reality," she said. "The child would then become a person able to
handle life's pressures and forge their own experiences as well.

"Firstly, they are increasingly exposed to television programs
filled with violence, anger and strong language for the sake of
emotional satisfaction. The underlying messages of material
success rather than people with character dominates the minds of
today's youth," she said.

Karlina said the onslaught of buzzwords like human resources,
global competition, mastery of science and technology could be
misunderstood and misused for the wrong end results.

"A person's feelings and role, his or her way of handling
certain feelings are what make him or her unique, not their
intellectual capacity," she said, adding that this was a process
for families to start early with their children.

Another speaker, educator J. Drost, stressed the importance
of quality primary education which can help a child succeed at
higher levels of education.

Drost said that bright students in junior high school remain
bright, average students remain the same. Such realities are
accepted worldwide that only 30 percent of primary school
graduates are capable of pursuing a university education, he
said.

He said that high school graduates are able to pass their
final year exams because they are not demanding and the criteria
are lax.

"This makes their level of knowledge very low not because they
are stupid but because their average intellect are subjected to a
heavy and complicated curriculum," he said.

He cited as examples the 85 percent dropout rate of state
university students, and 90 percent of private university
students. (01)