Measuring emotional intelligence in young children and its application in the classroom

1. Measuring emotional intelligence in young children and its application in the classroom Katharine Bailey

2. Why is decoding facial expressions important? It is one of the abilities that makes up emotional intelligence (EI) EI is an ability to validly reason with emotions and to use emotions to enhance thought (Salovey and Mayer) QCA guidance for the Foundation Stage emphasises the importance of successful emotional development to provide pupils with the best opportunity for success in life, including academic attainment

3. Emotional intelligence The capacity to accurately perceive emotions The capacity to use emotions to facilitate thinking The capacity to understand emotional meanings The capacity to manage emotions (Salovey and Mayer, 1990)

4. An emotionally intelligent person … Can perceive emotions, use and understand them and manage their own emotions better than others Tends to be more open and agreeable Tends to be somewhat higher in verbal, social and other intelligences And interestingly … • Is less likely to engage in problem behaviour • Less like to smoke, drink or take drugs (Salovey and Mayer, 1990)

5. How can EI be measured? Self-judgment scales Cambridge Assessment used self-judgment scales recently to investigate lack of progress in students from KS2 to vocational GCSEs compared to other subjects Performance measurement Based on ability Has advantage of tapping into latent variables

6. Back to facial expressions The capacity to accurately perceive emotions in others

7. Can you do it?

10. Facial expressions • Humans are highly skilled at decoding facial expressions • Infants can differentiate between happy and sad expressions at 10-12 months • Evidence suggests ability is stable by age of 8

11. Facial expressions Evolutionary and comparative studies

12. Facial expressions Evolved ability to use the skill for complex social functioning Honest emotional states Social manipulation

13. Basic emotions model • Paul Ekman • 6 basic emotions • Fear • Happiness • Sadness • Anger • Disgust • Surprise • Evidence for basic emotions includes cross-cultural studies and work with blind children

14. Why test? • Is emotional intelligence related to wider success including performance in school? • Could a test identify latent difficulties at an early stage? • Can individual differences be identified with a view to remediating deficits?

16. Development of scale • Initial development • Computer-delivered, classic test design • 78 items • 61 children aged between 5 and 6 • Further development • Cartoons and faces redrawn • Visual Basic program developed • Item bank adjusted to incorporate equal number of items for each emotion – 36 in total • Initial trial with further refinements

18. 2007 Analysis - Sample • 170 children from 4 schools • 50 children in Year 1, 120 in Reception • Children were generally below average in Reception and above average in Year 1 • Children were rated by class teacher

19. 2007 Analysis - Results • Rasch analysis • Internal reliabilities of scale • Item reliability = 0.90 • Person reliability = 0.77 • Ability of pupils • Independent samples T test showed girls to score significantly higher than boys - (Effect size) 0.42 standard deviation units • T test showed Year 1 pupils to score significantly higher than Reception – (Effect size) 0.43

20. Results

21. Results • Differential item function analysis showed no bias for gender or year group • Correlations between PIPS-Faces and PIPS attainment scores statistically significant in all but one area • Teacher-rating produced groups 1 – 3 with 1 being most able. T test showed group 1 to score significantly higher on the PIPS-Faces test

23. Difficulties Test reliability Cognitive load Problems with tests of affect Tests that have good reliability rely on language …

24. Application • Initial trials have suggested that PIPS-Faces provides a reliable scale to identify children who have difficulty in decoding facial expressions • Interventions are offered • Transporters (www.transporters.tv) • Emotion Trainer (www.emotiontrainer.co.uk)

25. Further work • Extending to adults • Facial decoding impairments found in • Non-clinical social anxiety • Schizophrenia • Alcohol dependence • Pro-social behaviour • Extend scale to encompass complex emotions • People with Asperger Syndrome can generally decode the 6 basic emotions

26. Contact Kate.Bailey@cem.dur.ac.uk