What is emotional intelligence? EQ refers to a person's ability to perceive, control, evaluate, and express emotions. It is centered on abilities such as identifying emotions, perceiving and evaluating how others feel, controlling one's own emotions, using emotions to facilitate social communication, and relating to others.

IQ, on the other hand, is evaluated through a standardized test through which a score is given in relation to a person’s mental age and actual age. Some of the abilities it tests for are: visual and spatial processing, knowledge of the world, fluid reasoning, working memory and short-term memory, and quantitative reasoning.

We can think of IQ as book smart and EQ as street smart. While IQ has been recognized as an important measure for success in life, some critics claim that it is perhaps too narrow a concept to fully encompass the wide range of human abilities and knowledge. Many experts believe that EQ can be equally important to IQ, if not more important. Due to the importance of human interaction in most aspects of life, knowing how to perceive, relate, and control emotional responses can often be a determining factor in reaching the desired outcome in most situations.

In conclusion, IQ and EQ both play important parts in our success in life, and we should aim to learn and improve our ability in both arenas.