Social Inteligence

Question 1

5 main constructs of Social Intelligence?

Answer 1

1. Self-awareness – the ability to know one’s emotions, strengths, weaknesses, drives, values and goals and recognize their impact on others while using gut feelings to guide decisions.
   
   2. Self-regulation – involves controlling or redirecting one’s disruptive emotions and impulses and adapting to changing circumstances.
   3. Social skill – managing relationships to move people in the desired direction
   4. Empathy – considering other people’s feelings especially when making decisions
   5. Motivation – being driven to achieve for the sake of achievement

Question 2

Part of the brain that is the base of emotional intelligence?

Answer 2

Basal Ganglia
Our life wisdom on any topic is stored in Basal Ganglia.
It’s the part of the brain that records the results of every decision that we make. (Can we train this?) It has no connectivity to the verbal cortex. It can’t tell us what it knows in words so it does so with the feelings. it has connection the emotional centres of the brain and the GUT.

Question 3

what does Anthony Domasio say about self mastery and flow?

Answer 3

says something like: Feeling and enjoyment during an actively is an indicator for optimal cognitive functioning. (FLOW*) And so the flow is an emotional state driven mainly by right amount of Cortisol in the brain, too less or too much and you are either bored or stressed.
He argues that therefore “self mastery” aspect of the emotional intelligence is catalytic for whatever cognitive abilities or talents that you may have. ( does porn and masturbation also plays a role int this?)
*Flow as I know already is the state that we want to be in ad much as possible with our productive lives ( work etc…)

Question 4

What parts of the brain help us to interact with others?

Answer 4

“mirror neurons”. these are an important part of our social brain that enables us to connect. When 2 people are in a good interaction ( click) their bodies synchronises. ( also interesting in the context of the digital social media )

Question 5

Which part of the brain is less sensitive to amygdala highjacking?

Answer 5

Left prefrontal cortex is much less sensitive t amygdala hijacking than the right. People who have tis have a better mood and enthusiasm

Question 6

How can meditation benefit the social intelligence?

Answer 6

good news is that the circuitry witch manages these emotional intelligence capacities is malleable through life, it’s called neuro plasticity witch appears to be benefited by meditation. The longer you have been meditating the stronger the circuitry in the left prefrontal cortex becomes for managing distressing emotions and so the better that you’ll feel. ( evidence of improving after just after 8 weeks).

He refers to a debate (which was a measured study)between a professor and the happy mediating doctor Ricard. In the beginning the professor is very agitated but Ricard is very calm throughout. After 15 minutes the professor is so calm that he want s to continue for more. The take away there is that if we have a very well groomed prefrontal cortex we can spread that goos feeling as a part of our every interaction.

Question 7

What interesting point does Antonio Damasio makes about the consciousness?

Answer 7

You can not have consciousness without connection of the parts of cerebral cortex and the interior of the body through brain stem. Witch is interesting since it demonstrates that there is more to the self than our brains content. He has a explanations for the sense of “self” and witch is worth of the further studies.