On being nice and effective: Work‐related emotional intelligence and its role in conflict resolution and interpersonal problem‐solving

• Author: Michael D. Robinson,Buddhika Perera,Kay Hopkins,Sukumarakurup Krishnakumar
• DOI: http://doi.org/10.1002/crq.21268
• Published date: 01 December 2019
• Date: 01 December 2019

RESEARCH ARTICLE

On being nice and effective: Work-related emotional

intelligence and its role in conflict resolution and

interpersonal problem-solving

Sukumarakurup Krishnakumar

1

| Buddhika Perera

2

|

Kay Hopkins

3

| Michael D. Robinson

3

1

Keck Graduate Institute (Claremont

Colleges), Claremont, California

2

The Asia Foundation, Colombo, Sri Lanka

3

North Dakota State University, Fargo,

North Dakota

Correspondence

Sukumarakurup Krishnakumar, Keck

Graduate Institute (Claremont Colleges),

Keck Graduate Institute, 535 Watson Drive,

Claremont, CA 91711.

Email: kurup.mgmt@gmail.com

Abstract

People are thought to differ in their abilities to perceive,

understand, and manage emotions, a construct termed emo-

tional intelligence (EI). North Dakota emotional abilities test

(NEAT), a test of EI based on the situation judgment test

method, assesses EI applied to work settings. Three survey-

based studies examined and found that NEAT scores corre-

lated positively with constructive motivations and behavioral

intentions (Study 1; n= 94), conflict handling strategies

favoring mutual interests (Study 2; n= 92), and helpful

workplace behaviors, particularly under stressful conditions

(Study 3; n= 90). These findings could possess particular

value in domains such as conflict resolution and mediation.

1|INTRODUCTION

Emotions can sometimes occur in the absence of social stimulation, such as when encountering a

snake in the woods. However, the vast majority of our emotions seem to occur in social situations

(Hareli & Parkinson, 2008). Our fears are typically social fears, our joys are typically social joys,

and many emotions—such as anger, guilt, embarrassment, and love—either require a social object or

an appraisal of the self as a social object (Hareli & Parkinson, 2008). In fact, interacting with others

often means subjecting oneself to a nearly constant stream of feelings, some of which can be subtle

or change fairly quickly (Russell, 2003). Meanwhile, our interaction partners, too, have emotional

states and these need to be considered if we want to be interpersonally successful, whether within or

outside the workplace (Jordan & Troth, 2002).

Given this overlap of social and emotional processes, individuals who are more attuned to the

emotions of self and others may tend to interact with others in more effective ways (Halberstadt,

Received: 3 June 2019 Revised: 8 August 2019 Accepted: 26 August 2019

DOI: 10.1002/crq.21268

Conflict Resolution Quarterly. 2019;37:147–167. wileyonlinelibrary.com/journal/crq © 2019 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. 147

Denham, & Dunsmore, 2001). Ideas of this type are prominent in multiple literatures. For example,

children who make incorrect inferences about the emotions of others seem prone to socially problem-

atic behaviors like aggression or withdrawal (Crick & Dodge, 1994). Adults who lack clarity con-

cerning their emotions also engage in problematic social behaviors, and processes of this type have

been implicated in a number of disorders (Gratz & Tull, 2010). Conversely, people who are intelli-

gent about emotions should be more capable of generating behaviors that are appropriate to the social

context, in part because they are able to down-regulate emotional reactions that are inappropriate

(Halberstadt et al., 2001).

In concert with these ideas, Salovey and Mayer (1990) proposed a dimension of emotional intelli-

gence (EI) that distinguishes people who are insightful concerning emotions from those who are not.

Emotionally intelligent individuals are thought to be more attuned to the emotions of self and others

while possessing a more sophisticated, nuanced understanding of the manner in which emotions

work (Mayer & Salovey, 1997). Moreover, emotionally intelligent individuals should be better able

to manage their emotions, which will often result in behaviors that are more skilled and tactful

(MacCann & Roberts, 2008). Individuals who lack EI, by contrast, would be slow to recognize emo-

tional processes, would not understand them well, and would be prone to emotional outbursts that

could exacerbate interpersonal problems rather than resolving them (Halberstadt et al., 2001; Lopes

et al., 2011).

Despite this relatively solid theoretical foundation, the EI field has been marked by a considerable

degree of controversy and confusion (Zeidner, Roberts, & Matthews, 2008). A major reason for this

state of affairs is that researchers have created self-report measures of what is essentially an ability-

related construct. This has resulted in a somewhat confusing mix of findings as well as questions

about whether EI simply remolds existing personality traits into new forms (Zeidner et al., 2008).

Fortunately, these problems can be solved by reserving the term EI for tests that adopt ability-related

procedures (Ashkanasy & Daus, 2005). Unfortunately, there are not a lot of tests of this type, some

must be purchased if one wants to use them, and there are limitations to the tests that currently exist

(Roberts, MacCann, Matthews, & Zeidner, 2010). For example, the Mayer-Salovey-Caruso EI Test

(the MSCEIT) is copyrighted in a way that limits its use, and there are also questions about this test's

reliability and validity (Maul, 2012; Palmer, Gignac, Manocha, & Stough, 2005).

Such considerations led to the development of a new ability EI measure with some promising

attributes. Rather than using tasks with unknown social significance (e.g., judging the emotions con-

veyed by abstract paintings), Krishnakumar, Hopkins, Szmerekovsky, and Robinson (2016) embed-

ded all of their North Dakota emotional abilities test (NEAT) items within a situational judgment test

(SJT) format. That is, the NEAT assesses perception, understanding, and management abilities in

relation to human characters encountering largely interpersonal (Lievens & Chan, 2010) challenges

and opportunities. Furthermore, consistent with the SJT literature (Whetzel & McDaniel, 2009), the

NEAT's scenarios focus on workplace events and outcomes rather than those that might occur out-

side of the workplace (e.g., conversations with one's neighbor). The contextual nature of this framing

should be advantageous in predicting workplace functioning (Shaffer & Postlethwaite, 2012). In

addition, though, workplace situations are useful, because they encourage test-takers to consider both

pragmatic/agentic and communal sources of concern when responding.

The NEAT correlates with other ability EI tests such as the STEU and the STEM (MacCann &

Roberts, 2008) and seems to predict workplace outcomes fairly well. Employees with higher NEAT

scores report lesser job stress, greater job satisfaction, and better job performance (Krishnakumar

et al., 2016). Also, interpersonal processes have been implicated in some of these findings. For exam-

ple, individuals with higher levels of work-related EI (W-EI) report being particularly satisfied with

148 KRISHNAKUMAR ET AL.