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New Directions In Ability Emotional Intelligence: From Emotion-Information Processing To Emotional Hypersensitivity

In the past three decades, several issues related to the conceptualization, validity, and measurement of ability emotional intelligence (EI) have been settled.  Although EI is associated with (mostly) positive outcomes, it remains unclear what type of emotional and cognitive processes may account for such outcomes and how they operate in high as compared to low EI individuals. In this keynote presentation I will address this gap in the literature by introducing emotion-information processing as a new component of EI. Empirical evidence will be provided supporting the basic idea that EI can be conceptualized as having two interrelated but distinct components, each predicting different aspects of emotionally intelligent performance: 1) EIK or emotion Knowledge component, which is captured by current ability EI tests, and represents mostly acquired and culture-bound knowledge about emotions; 2) EIP or emotion information Processing component, measured with emotion information processing tasks, which represents how individuals process emotions and emotion information, it requires faster processing and is based on bottom-up attention-related responses to emotion information. This new look into how EI functions implies that individuals who are high in EI, in particular the EIP component, should be positioned on the highest extreme of the EI trait continuum and be characterized by a stronger sensitivity to emotion and emotion information as measured by more extreme scores on emotional tasks. I will provide empirical evidence of this way of functioning of EI, which is called the ‘hypersensitivity hypothesis’, wherein EI operates as a magnifier through which individuals attribute value and meaning to what is happening around them, modulating emotional experience and its effects on (social) perception. Implications of the proposed reconceptualization of ability EI will be discussed.