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Nobody (that matters in psychology) considers "social intelligence" as an official metric. Most (minus maybe the genetic researchers) agree that various childh

Nobody (that matters in psychology) considers "social intelligence" as an official metric. Most (minus maybe the genetic researchers) agree that various childhood traumas usually explain strange behavior. What if Kim had a traumatic childhood, and had common issues with this like abandonment anxiety and poor boundaries? She could not see how her group could make decisions without her and her negative childhood experiences are projected onto the situation causing anxiety. What if Kim was a healthy adult? She would maybe not have negative experiences projected onto the scenario and perhaps could easily switch to making plans by herself without her group with healthy boundaries. What if the group was traumatized as well? The group would probably treat Kim like they were forced to treat their parents: giving Kim their full focus and emotional libido in order to avoid a fallout. This group would certainly project their insecurity onto Kim and assume her devastation. What if the group was healthy and had healthy boundaries? The group would, perhaps, know they could not assume how the other individual would react and video call her to see if she was OK and negotiate on-call. (Any assumption of Kim's response is just projection - and studies show that the older and more experienced with social situations a person becomes the more they know they can't accurately assume how a person reacts) Positive feelings are projected onto the situation and no one projects negative experiences. "Low social intelligence" isn't considered by most people, but childhood trauma is - and childhood trauma would clearly affect what happens. Childhood trauma causes negative affective emotions in social situations, good-enough parents cause positive affect in social situations - *NOT* social intelligence pseudoscience.

nafix 5y ago
I think your response kind of shows that you aren’t grasping the pretty standard social construct that she likely got dissed by her friends by most socialized peoples metrics (within the confined context of the original papers scenario). The person you replied to laid it out as clearly as possible. Also, by referring to emotional intelligence as pseudoscience, do you mean to dismiss it as a valid concept? Surely you realize some people are better in social situations than others.
- skim_milk 5y ago
  >Surely you realize some people are better in social situations than others Absolutely, and the cause of poor social function is almost only childhood trauma. Being sensitive to others emotions (pop-culture empathy) is not equal to actually knowing another person's emotions. There are many many such studies that prove this, here is a random one I found on page 1 of Google: https://escholarship.org/uc/item/6c5968c1 https://escholarship.org/uc/item/6c5968c1 Many more actually negatively correlate being sensitive to others emotions with accurately gauging others' emotions. I also mentioned there's a study that correlates age (accumulated social experience?) with the knowledge of how little they themselves can infer from other people (can't remember the exact topic, but it goes something like that). Side note, emotional sensitivity is linked with childhood trauma. Therefore we can say being sensitive to, or thinking we know, other people's emotions has nothing to do with being good at social situations (at worst it actually impairs social function). At best being sensitive to others' perceived (not real: projected) emotions is poor boundaries. This counter-intuitive reality needs to be clear when the topic of emotional intelligence is brought up. Emotional Intelligence is not a virtue, but yes, we can agree it exists and people that are healed (unfortunately, not all) can posses it. To tie it all in, would a truly emotionally intelligent person (in the academic and psychotherapeutic sense) know how Kim would respond, or would the emotionally intelligent Kim respond negatively or positively? It is not clear, and thinking one knows the objective answer to this scenario is suspect. We can obviously say "if I was Kim, I would feel..." but I argue nothing more can be said.
  - tux3 5y ago
    I think you have interesting points to make, but the conclusion is a cop-out. There's various useful ways you can answer beyond "if I were Kim". In faithful observance of commenting praxis, I have not read TFA. But it seems TFA expects an answer instead of taking the opportunity to dig into the way different groups answer and their reasonning for doing so. If the finding were that .75 of trauma-free people agree it's reasonable for Kim to feel like she wasn't included in the decision (the perception that the choice was made by her friends), would that change your mind? I know I'd be interested to know why, if data showed the opposite interpretation is popular :)
joe_the_user 5y ago
What if Kim was a healthy adult? She would maybe not have negative experiences projected onto the scenario and perhaps could easily switch to making plans by herself without her group with healthy boundaries. - This is bizarrely reading things into the original question. The question is, essentially, "if a group of your friends announce they're doing something fun and give a fairly thin excuse for not including you and nothing else, should perceive your relationship with these people weakened". There's "emotional reaction", it's a judgement. Kim judges where Kim's friends priorities are. The thing about this is, the only place emotions come is that most people with social bonds see things like doing activities together as a "good in itself". Even if someone isn't concerned with whether they go to a show, the person can see this group isn't too concerned with maintaining that particular bond. How a person reacts afterward isn't part the question, isn't part of my comment and seems like throwing your particular psychological baggage at the whole question.

nafix 5y ago

I think your response kind of shows that you aren’t grasping the pretty standard social construct that she likely got dissed by her friends by most socialized peoples metrics (within the confined context of the original papers scenario). The person you replied to laid it out as clearly as possible. Also, by referring to emotional intelligence as pseudoscience, do you mean to dismiss it as a valid concept? Surely you realize some people are better in social situations than others.

skim_milk 5y ago
>Surely you realize some people are better in social situations than others Absolutely, and the cause of poor social function is almost only childhood trauma. Being sensitive to others emotions (pop-culture empathy) is not equal to actually knowing another person's emotions. There are many many such studies that prove this, here is a random one I found on page 1 of Google: https://escholarship.org/uc/item/6c5968c1 https://escholarship.org/uc/item/6c5968c1 Many more actually negatively correlate being sensitive to others emotions with accurately gauging others' emotions. I also mentioned there's a study that correlates age (accumulated social experience?) with the knowledge of how little they themselves can infer from other people (can't remember the exact topic, but it goes something like that). Side note, emotional sensitivity is linked with childhood trauma. Therefore we can say being sensitive to, or thinking we know, other people's emotions has nothing to do with being good at social situations (at worst it actually impairs social function). At best being sensitive to others' perceived (not real: projected) emotions is poor boundaries. This counter-intuitive reality needs to be clear when the topic of emotional intelligence is brought up. Emotional Intelligence is not a virtue, but yes, we can agree it exists and people that are healed (unfortunately, not all) can posses it. To tie it all in, would a truly emotionally intelligent person (in the academic and psychotherapeutic sense) know how Kim would respond, or would the emotionally intelligent Kim respond negatively or positively? It is not clear, and thinking one knows the objective answer to this scenario is suspect. We can obviously say "if I was Kim, I would feel..." but I argue nothing more can be said.
- tux3 5y ago
  I think you have interesting points to make, but the conclusion is a cop-out. There's various useful ways you can answer beyond "if I were Kim". In faithful observance of commenting praxis, I have not read TFA. But it seems TFA expects an answer instead of taking the opportunity to dig into the way different groups answer and their reasonning for doing so. If the finding were that .75 of trauma-free people agree it's reasonable for Kim to feel like she wasn't included in the decision (the perception that the choice was made by her friends), would that change your mind? I know I'd be interested to know why, if data showed the opposite interpretation is popular :)

joe_the_user 5y ago

What if Kim was a healthy adult? She would maybe not have negative experiences projected onto the scenario and perhaps could easily switch to making plans by herself without her group with healthy boundaries. - This is bizarrely reading things into the original question. The question is, essentially, "if a group of your friends announce they're doing something fun and give a fairly thin excuse for not including you and nothing else, should perceive your relationship with these people weakened". There's "emotional reaction", it's a judgement. Kim judges where Kim's friends priorities are. The thing about this is, the only place emotions come is that most people with social bonds see things like doing activities together as a "good in itself". Even if someone isn't concerned with whether they go to a show, the person can see this group isn't too concerned with maintaining that particular bond. How a person reacts afterward isn't part the question, isn't part of my comment and seems like throwing your particular psychological baggage at the whole question.