The academic essay

EQ versus IQ
When an undergraduate gets an “A+” for each of his modules, he/she is praised to have high IQ. However, after someone has done an almost perfect presentation, he/she is said to have high EQ by his/her classmates. Sometimes it is confusing whether it is IQ or EQ that results in the performance of an undergraduate. Which one is more important for an undergraduate? Actually, both EQ and IQ are very important to an undergraduate, but they contribute in different aspects of a student. However, when they are combined together, their enhancement will be maximized to the overall development of the student.

From the side of EQ, it helps a student motivate himself/herself, keep optimistic to cope with stress and gain good relationships with others. According to Hang (1999), “emotional intelligence consists of five qualities: self-awareness, mood management, self-motivation, impulse control and interpersonal skills.” Firstly, a student probably would be bored with some mandatory modules because they have to pass them. According to Chan(2004),This kind of motivation is called negative motivation because the motivation comes from outside. It is only self-motivation that makes the student keep passion to get good academic results in the modules which he/she does not like. Moreover, self-motivation drives him/her to continue rather than give up when he/she meets some problems. Secondly, good mood management plays an important role in helping a student cope with stress which comes from exams, assignments, relationships with others and after-class activities. A student with good mood management will keep an optimistic attitude towards the stress and handle it properly so that stress can motivate him/her instead of ruining him/her. Last but not least, interpersonal skills help a student get along well with his/her classmates and teachers and make a lot of friends. Therefore, he/she can study collaboratively, which is more efficient than studying alone. In a word, EQ enhances the development of an undergraduate through motivating him/her, keeping good attitude to cope with stress and keeping good relationship with others.

In contrast, IQ helps a student think correctly, adapt effectively to the environment quickly and learn from experiences. According to the report “Intelligence: knowns and unkowns (Ulric et al.,1996), intellectual intelligence is defined as “the ability to understand complex ideas, to adapt effectively to the environment, to learn from experience, to engage in various forms of reasoning, to overcome obstacles by thinking”. From the definition, it is clear that the essence of IQ is the method of thinking. One main purpose of courses in universities is to teach the student to think logically and creatively. Hence, high IQ will help the student get success in academics. For example, a graduate may not use the advanced mathematics any more, but surely he/she still benefits from the way of thinking developed in math modules, which is mainly the contribution of IQ. In addition, that IQ helps the student adapt effectively to the environment (one part of IQ) will minimize the period of adaptation and maximize the efficiency of leaning. This competence is much more important to freshmen and exchange students because they face to a large change in environment. Furthermore, IQ keeps students to think after one task is done. He/she will draw lessons from failures and experience from success. These will make him/her do better next time, and that is the reason why the undergraduate makes progress. In a nutshell, IQ makes contributions to teach the student think in a right manner, adapt the environment and learn from experiences.

However, IQ and EQ are not exclusive. Their contributions are maximized when they are combined together. In other words, they complete each other to enhance the performance of an undergraduate. For instance, EQ provides the student the motivation to learn some courses and IQ supplies him/her the way of thinking to work out problems about the courses. Only when these two processes take place simultaneously will the student get good results. The absence of one side will deduct from the whole effort. A lot of students often say one sentence after examination, “The questions are simple, but I did badly.” The questions are simple means they can handle it, but they fail because their EQ is not high enough to answer the paper well under the circumstance of examination. This is an example that the absence of EQ decreases the overall performance. To summarize, for an undergraduate fully developed in all aspects, both high EQ and IQ are needed.

In conclusion, EQ and IQ both play an important role in the performance of the undergraduate, but in different aspects. However, when they are combined together, the talent of the student will be maximized. As a whole, an undergraduate fully developed in all aspects needs the contributions made from EQ as well as IQ.


References

Chan,E.(2004, March). Motivation for Mandatory Courses. CDTL Brief, 7(3), Retrieved
October18,2007, from http://www.cdtl.nus.edu.sg/brief/v7n3/default.htm.

Hang,C.C.(1999,March). Nurturing emotional in universities students. CDTL Brief, 2(1), 1-9.

Ulric,N.,Gwyneth,B.,Bouchard,J.,Thomas,J.,Boykin,A.W.,Brody,N.,et al. Knowns and
unknowns.(1996, February). American Psychologist, 51(2), 77-101.