Knowing What to Want

Straight from the psychological powerhouse that is Yale and indeed from our very own Peter Salovey, today’s study explores the relationship between emotional intelligence and the accuracy with which we predict our responses (in moods and emotions) to future events. We call this ability “affective forecasting.”

Here is the link to the article, entitled “On Emotionally Intelligent Time Travel: Individual Differences in Affective Forecasting Ability"

http://psp.sagepub.com/cgi/reprint/33/1/85 (hit the download button if it does not pop up immediately).

Most people are miserable predictors of how happy or sad a future event will make them, overlooking the strength and versatility of what some call our “psychological immune system.” We end up overestimating the duration and intensity of our emotional reactions to events.

The idea of affective forecasting, and the fact that we are bad at it, is hardly news. I open the topic today to suggest the possibility that not all affective forecasters are equally impaired. This study compellingly presents a case for emotional intelligence as a significant predictor of how accurately an individual can forecast his or her future emotional state. The better we are at a certain facet of emotional intelligence -- emotional management -- the better forecasters we are.
Though I suppose any empirical research is never conclusive, it is approaching consensus that women exhibit, in more studies than not, higher emotional intelligence than men. If so, does that mean that women are better affective forecasters?

The authors investigate the role of gender here, and find that it is the increased emotional intelligence, not gender itself, that is playing the greatest role in the effect. Nevertheless, women score higher on emotional intelligence, so the link still holds.

Researchers Gilbert and Wilson in an earlier affective forecasting study subtitle their paper as “Knowing What to Want.” If we are dismal predictors of how happy we will be after attaining our goals, can we really trust ourselves to be the enablers of our future wellbeing? “Knowing oneself,” may be the key to acting today in the best interest of each or our future selves.