Teaching of emotional intelligence can have great benefits

Research shows it’s a good idea to teach emotional intelligence to help nurture mental health and overall success in life.

It has been reported by the University of British Columbia that there is a lasting positive impact from being taught emotional intelligence. There is an improvement in mental health, social skills and learning outcomes in young people who have taken part in social and emotional learning programs. Researchers say these positive benefits continue to serve as a benefit for kids into their future.

Children learn skills from social-emotional learning programs which they need to go on and succeed and thrive in their lives

Eva Oberle, who is an assistant professor at UBC’s Human Early Learning Partnership in the school of population and public health, has said children learn skills from social-emotional learning programs which they need to go on and succeed and thrive in their lives. This means that social-emotional learning programs are a worthwhile investment of time and financial resources for schools to make.

Children are taught to recognize and to understand their own emotions with social-emotional learning. They are also taught to feel empathy and to make decisions while building and maintaining relationships. It has previously been shown that these programs help students improve learning outcomes and decrease anxiety and behavioral problems. The new study showed there was an association between social-emotional learning and longer-term outcomes of a positive nature.

Students who took part in social-emotional learning programs had 13.5 percent lower rates of diagnoses of mental health disorders

There was a six per cent higher rate of high school graduation and 11 percent higher rate of graduation from college among students who took part in social-emotional learning programs. Program participants also had a six percent lower rate of drug abuse and behavior problems. These students also had 19 percent lower arrest rates and 13.5 percent lower rates of diagnoses of mental health disorders.

The journal Child Development has published this study. School centered social and emotional learning has been observed to help nurture positive academic success, behavior, and development of young people. There are both short term and long term benefits from teaching emotional intelligence which makes this a worthwhile investment.

Oberle has highlighted the teaching of social-emotional learning in schools helps to support the success of children and to promote positive public health outcomes later on in life. Clearly there is a great deal of value to learning emotional intelligence.