Emotional intelligence describes how an individual
deals with intrapersonal or interpersonal aspects of
emotions. The concept appeared in the 1990s
(Goleman, 1995), and was the center of much debate.
The debate focused on two main opposing perspectives:
whether emotional intelligence should be considered as
an ability or a trait. The ability perspective regarded
emotional intelligence as something that people could
learn, which would be best assessed through
performance-based tests. The trait perspective considered
emotional intelligence as a stable disposition
linked to personality traits, assessed through self-report
measures.
In sport, researchers first favored the ability approach
under the assumption that emotional intelligence could
be trained and improved. However, growing evidence
within the framework of the trait perspective revealed
many connections between emotional intelligence and
predictors of sport performance. Those predictors are,
e.g., physiological stress responses, successful psychological
skill use, better athletic performances, and more
positive attitudes toward physical exercise (Laborde,
Dosseville, & Allen, 2016). Given the plausible arguments
and evidence underlying both perspectives, the
ability and trait perspectives will be later reconciled
within the tripartite model of emotional intelligence
(Mikolajczak, 2010). This model has an additional third
dimension, resulting in three levels of emotional intelligence:
knowledge, ability, and trait. The knowledge
level describes one’s knowledge about emotional concepts.
The ability level corresponds to what the person
can do if asked to do so. The trait level shows what one
habitually does to deal with emotions, without the need
to be reminded. Emotional intelligence as an ability
appears more visibly in short-term situations, while
emotional intelligence as a trait has the greater longterm
impact.
With the notion that emotional intelligence can be
trained and improved, the term ‘emotional competences’
has surfaced as a more fitting description of the
concept. Today, there is a consensus to describe the
five main competences related to emotional intelligence
as identification, expression, understanding, regulation,
and use of one’s or others’ emotions (Brasseur,
Gre´goire, Bourdu, & Mikolajczak, 2013).
