Bipolar or Independent? Relations Between Positive and Negative Affect Vary by Emotional Intelligence

Abstract

Individuals who are intelligent concerning their emotions should experience them differently. In particular, being conversant with the valence dimension that is key to emotions should reasonably result in emotional experiences that are more bipolar with respect to this dimension. Pursuant of these ideas, three studies (total N = 335) assessed emotional intelligence in ability-related terms (ability EI). The same participants also reported on their recent experiences of positive affect (PA) and negative affect (NA) at work (studies 1 and 2) and/or their day-to-day emotional experiences within a daily diary protocol (study 3). Within each of these studies, ability EI moderated the relationship between experiences of PA and NA, such that the PA-NA relationship was more bipolar at higher levels of EI. These findings are discussed with respect to their implications for debates about bipolarity as well as for their value in highlighting ways in which the ability EI dimension operates.