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Emotional intelligence has been defined as an array of emotional and social abilities, competencies and skills that enable individuals to cope with daily demands and be more effective in their personal and social life. It has been theorized that deficits in emotional signalling (somatic states) lead to poor judgment in decision-making, especially in the personal and social realms. This is known as the the somatic marker hypothesis developed by Demasio which argues that affective reactions ordinarily guide and simplify decision making. Although originally intended to explain decision-making deficits in people with specific frontal lobe damage, the hypothesis also applies to decision-making problems in populations without brain injury.
Somatic markers do not always function in such a way that improves our probability of survival. Damasio uses the example of someone who is trying to decide whether to drive or fly to a destination. Many people are afraid to fly, or at least has some sort of negative emotion, such as anxiety, and choose to drive to wherever they're going- but the probability is much greater that they are more likely to die on the road!
In a study in Brain, patients with lesions in the ventromedial prefrontal cortex have been found to have defective somatic markers and tend to exercise poor judgment in decision-making, which is especially manifested in the disadvantageous choices they typically make in their personal lives and in the ways in which they relate with others. Other lesions (in the right amygdala or insular cortices) also compromise somatic state activation and decision-making. The authors suggest that these brain regions are part of a neural system involved in somatic state activation and decision-making and they hypothesized that the severe impairment of these patients in real-life decision-making and an inability to cope effectively with environmental and social demands would be reflected in an abnormal level of emotional and social intelligence.
They studied 12 patients with focal, stable bilateral lesions of the VM cortex or with right unilateral lesions of the amygdala or the right insular cortices using standardized psychometric measure of various aspects of emotional and social intelligence. (EQ-i) and other psychometrics to assess their cognitive intelligence, executive functioning, perception and memory.
Results showed that "only patients with lesions in the somatic marker circuitry revealed significantly low emotional intelligence and poor judgment in decision-making as well as disturbances in social functioning, in spite of normal levels of cognitive intelligence (IQ) and the absence of psychopathology based on DSM-IV criteria." According to the authors, these findings provide preliminary evidence suggesting that emotional and social intelligence is different from cognitive intelligence and that "the neural systems supporting somatic state activation and personal judgment in decision-making may overlap with critical components of a neural circuitry subserving emotional and social intelligence."
Other articles discussing the somatic marker hypothesis and contributions of the amygdala and ventromedial prefrontal cortex to decision-making can be found in the Journal of Neuroscience and a historical overview of The Frontal Lobes & Executive Deficits
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