Emotional Intelligence: Implications for Counseling and Psychotherapy

In the last few decades, researchers have reiterated the importance of emotional intelligence as an imperative predictor of success at the academic, interpersonal, professional, and organizational levels. The scrutiny of this relationship has also been extended to the outcomes in domains of counseling and psychotherapy. However, further research must be conducted to accumulate evidence for such a relationship and decipher the mechanisms underlying it. Like self-awareness, emotional intelligence of a counselor or a psychotherapist has been regarded as an important dimension for a successful counseling process. Numerous empirical studies conducted in the West have examined the role of emotional intelligence in predicting the outcomes of counseling and psychotherapy in different settings. It has been found, for example, that emotional intelligence factors successfully predict counseling self-efficacy of both counseling students and practicing counselors. The objective of the present paper is to provide a review of the theoretical perspectives and empirical studies, which have been carried out worldwide, outlaying the importance of emotional intelligence in the fields of counseling and psychotherapy. In addition, the need for carrying out such studies in the Indian context along with their implications has also been discussed.