Social skills, emotional intelligence and self-esteem

Since we are born, the social component is integrated into our day to day.

The first interactions occur with the mother in the womb, and once the birth occurs these will occur through the skin, especially. The main attachment figures are the first context in which social skills will be developed and shaped, starting with the looks between parents and babies, the smiles, the vocalizations and the words. Later, school will become another of the main contexts for the development of these skills.

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The rise of social skills

It is important to highlight the importance of the cultural and social framework and temperamental characteristics. of the individual, which will determine that two people behave in a different way in the same situation.

Social skills could be described as the ability of one person to relate to another through effective communication. Among these we would find qualities such as: greeting when we arrive at a place, assertiveness, inference of the states of the others, the expression of feelings, thoughts, opinions and desires, and the orientation towards the resolution of conflicts.

Through social behaviors the individual is becoming aware of the limits, which will favor in the future their ability to self-regulate. The ability to regulate our behavior and our emotions is a fundamental part of what we know as emotional intelligence; For this reason, social competences are closely related to this, and this, in turn, to self-esteem. On the other hand, deficits in social skills are related to psychopathological disorders, such as anxiety disorders and mood disorders.

Emotional intelligence

Emotional intelligence is defined as the ability to perceive, identify and manage one's own emotional states and those of others.

Goleman (1995) divides emotional intelligence in two: intrapersonal and interpersonal emotional intelligence. In the intrapersonal, we find emotional self-awareness, and the ability to communicate with oneself to regulate one's own emotional states. This positively affects our security and confidence in ourselves. The interpersonal would include social skills and empathy, with the aim of recognizing and manage the emotions of others, which is related to charismatic people who have a desire to leadership.

As we can observe, in emotional intelligence, the expression and use of language are important, used in order to regulate internal and external states. Having good emotional intelligence encourages the ability to build healthy relationships with others, which greatly influences our self-esteem.

The self-esteem

The self-esteem It is a concept heard very frequently on a day-to-day basis, but what is it? Refers to the feelings of worth a person has towards themselves. These feelings are stable over time, and remain throughout different situations.

It is common to confuse high self-esteem with narcissism: an inflated image of yourself, characterized by feelings of superiority, that is not realistic, but unstable and fragile. Healthy self-esteem incorporates awareness of one's limits, authenticity, recognition of mistakes and virtues, and self-acceptance.

How do these psychological elements interact?

These three concepts are related to each other. Without the development of sufficient social skills, our emotional intelligence would be diminished; thus, also our self-esteem, since it is affected, in part, by interactions with other people, where we find a direct or indirect feedback on us, which is shaping our selfconcept.

Through interaction with our environment we increase our knowledge about ourselves, reflection on our behaviors and states, and the ability to manage, modify and adjust our emotions and attitudes, to the demands of the environment.

People with more empathy (quality of emotional intelligence) are better able to perceive the emotions of others (characteristic of social skills), which makes them, socially, more accepted, and evaluated in a positive.

Strengthening these qualities from childhood is essential so that children have optimal psychological, social, and even academic development, which will favor, in the future, adaptation to multiple situations, and coping with them, in a proactive and decisive.