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Pre-reading activities

Listen for the first time

Before listening to the tape, scan the following words quickly.

socks

socks

emotional quotient (EQ)

emotional quotient (EQ)

empathy

sympathize with

Listen for the second time

Listen to the tape again. They choose the best answer to each of the following questions.

1. The listening article says that Einstein was a genius in _ _ _ _ _ _.

A) emotional intelligence or "emotional intelligence"

B) intelligence or "IQ"

C) EQ and IQ

D) neither emotional intelligence nor IQ

2. Which of the following is not an example of emotional intelligence?

A) know how you feel.

B) understand the feelings of others.

C) can effectively handle emotions.

D) smarter than others in your class.

3. Which of the following statements best describes the relationship between EQ and IQ?

A) People tend to prefer one to the other.

B) People tend to have the same quantity of each.

C) They work together to make you successful.

D) They depend on social class and how lucky you are.

4. What is the main purpose of this article?

A) Introduce a new concept-EQ and explain its meaning.

B) Explain why EQ is more important than IQ in life.

C) Discuss different definitions of success.

D) Criticize the traditional concept of intelligence.

Emotional quotient factor

Nancy Gibbs

It turns out that scientists can predict the future by observing the interaction between four-year-old children and marshmallows. The researchers invited the children one by one to an ordinary room and began a gentle torture. He said, you can eat this marshmallow now. But if you wait for me to do something, you can eat two marshmallows when I come back. Then he left.

As soon as he went out, some children scrambled for candy. Some people persist for a few minutes and then give in. But others are determined to wait. They cover their eyes; They bowed their heads; They sing for themselves; They try to play games and even sleep. When the researcher came back, he gave the children their hard-earned marshmallows. Then, science waits for them to grow up.

Something unusual happened when the children went to high school. A survey of parents and teachers of these children found that those children who have enough self-control to reach out for the second marshmallow at the age of four usually grow up to be more adaptable, popular, adventurous, confident and reliable teenagers. Children who succumb to temptation at an early age are more likely to be lonely, depressed and stubborn. They can't stand the pressure and avoid the challenge. When some students in the two groups took the academic ability test, the average score of the children who persisted for a long time was 2 10 higher.

When we think of talent, we see Einstein, a thinking machine with deep eyes, furry hair, skin and socks that don't match. We imagine that successful people are born to be great. But you have to wonder why, with the passage of time, talent seems to ignite in some people and dim in others. This is where marshmallows come in. It seems that the ability to delay gratification is a superb skill and a victory of rational brain over impulsive brain. In short, this is a sign of emotional intelligence. It won't show up in the IQ test.

For most of this century, scientists worshipped the hardware of the brain and the software of thinking; The chaotic power of the mind is left to the poet. But cognitive theory can't explain what we want to know most: why some people seem to have the talent to live a good life; Why the cleverest child in the class may not become the richest person; Why do we love some people at first sight and don't trust others? Why do some people remain optimistic in the face of difficulties, which will sink a less elastic soul? In short, what kind of ideological or spiritual qualities determine who will succeed?

The word "EQ" was coined by psychologists Peter Salovey of Yale University and john mayer of the University of New Hampshire five years ago to describe the qualities of understanding one's own feelings, sympathizing with others' feelings and "adjusting emotions in a way to improve the quality of life". Due to Daniel Gorman's new book EQ, their ideas will soon enter the national discussion, which is called EQ for short. Gorman is a doctor of psychology at Harvard University and a science writer in The New York Times. He has a gift to make readers understand the most difficult scientific theories. He has collected ten years of behavioral research on how the brain handles emotions. He declared on the cover that his goal was to redefine the meaning of intelligence. His argument is that in predicting people's success, intelligence measured by IQ and standardized achievement tests may actually be less important than the quality of the brain, which was once considered as "character" before the word began to become obsolete.

At first glance, this seems nothing new to readers of fortune cookie. There may be no more creative idea than our heart dominating our brain. "I'm so angry," we said. "I can't think normally." It is not surprising that "interpersonal skills" are very useful, which is equivalent to saying that being kind to others is a good thing. Dr Paul mchugh, director of psychiatry at Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, said, "It's true and insignificant. But if things were really so simple, the book would not be so interesting and its meaning would not be so controversial.

This is not an abstract survey. Gorman is looking for an antidote to restore "the civilization of our streets and concern for our public life." He saw various practical applications, such as how companies should decide who to hire, how couples can increase the chances of marriage lasting, how parents should raise their children, and how schools should educate their children. When street gangs replace families, campus insults end in quarrels, when more than half of marriages end in divorce, and when most murdered children in this country are killed by their parents and stepparents, many of them say that they try to punish their children's behaviors, such as not watching TV or crying too much, which shows that remedial emotional education is needed.

Here, arguments will break out. Mchugh said that Gorman's highly popular conclusion "will make any senior scholar of psychotherapy and any neuroscientist worried about how his research will be applied." Although in this relatively new field, many researchers are happy to see that emotional problems are finally taken seriously, but they are worried that convenient concepts like emotional intelligence will be misused. Gorman admits that it is dangerous to suggest that you can give a numerical value to a person's personality and intelligence; Gorman never even used the word EQ in his book. However, he did reluctantly approve an "unscientific" EQ test by USA-Today, and chose "I can even realize the subtle feelings I have" and "I can feel the pulse of a group or relationship, and say the unspoken feelings".

Jerome Kagan, a pioneer in the field of child development research and a professor of psychology at Harvard, said: "You don't want your emotional skills to be at an average level." . "This is where intelligence is wrong with the concept of spiritual skills. Some people can handle anger well, but they can't handle fear. Some people can't take away happiness. So every emotion should be treated differently. " EQ is not the opposite of IQ. Some people have both, and some people have neither. What researchers have been trying to understand is how they complement each other; For example, how does a person's ability to deal with stress affect his ability to concentrate and use his intelligence? Among the elements of success, researchers now generally believe that IQ accounts for about 20%; The rest depends on everything, from class to luck, to the neural pathways formed in the brain after millions of years of human evolution.

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