Managing emotions to cope with emergencies Covid-19
14 May 2020
EMOTION MANAGEMENT: ANGER
8 June 2020
Interview by Laura Papetti (Pearson) with Diego Ingrassia
Interview with a great professional expert on emotions, Diego Ingrassia
Emotions are a subject that always fascinates, particularly when it comes to understanding, welcoming and managing children’s emotions. How can we bring them into the classroom, making them an added value in teaching?
Laura Papetti meets Diego Ingrassia, an expert in communication and emotions, and they tell us how best to use emotions at school.
by Laura Papetti
Diego Ingrassia is the CEO of I&G Management, the only company in Italy accredited by the American psychologist Paul Ekman, at the forefront of the most current studies on emotional intelligence and non-verbal communication. Diego, an expert in communication and emotions, has been involved in management training and assessment, acting as a consultant for the largest multinationals since 2003.
Diego, your experience on emotions is very broad. I bring you then to an environment that I frequent on a daily basis and perhaps you less so, the school, precisely because the outside view of a professional, consultant and coach for large multinationals can also be particularly valuable for those who spend their professionalism in the school context.
School has always been considered first and foremost the place of learning, of reason, of knowledge, of the construction of knowledge. However, it is also an environment of growth where children measure themselves against the varied world of their inner stories and the many relationships they are called upon to experience in this particular collective context.
The emotional dimension – often taken into account by school professionals mostly when working on motivation or on how to make learning paths more effective – is instead the protagonist of children’s being at school. Sometimes we realise this when emotions enter the classroom in a ‘disruptive’ way, and become an obstacle to learning.
How do you see, Diego, the role of the teacher when emotions ‘burst’, shouted or sometimes even violent, into the classroom?
I think there is a flaw in thinking that one can act when emotional situations become so intense and dysfunctional. Explosive’ situations that are now out of control. There is a period, called refractory, during which it is not possible to intervene. In this phase the child who shouts, or who engages in violent behaviour, is impervious to other stimuli, incapable of listening and paying attention, completely immersed in his emotion. At school, as in many other environments, we generally limit ourselves to trying to contain the consequences, but this belated behaviour is always ineffective. In this way, one does not work on the dysfunctionality of behaviour. The flaw in form is therefore the claim of wanting to work on emotions when the person involved is in a situation of ’emotional sequestration’, whereas emotions must be intercepted and understood first.
Proceeding in order, we can learn to grasp the process as it occurs along a timeline, as a response to a ‘spark’ that generates it, be it a stimulus from the external environment or generated by an internal condition.
How, on the other hand, can we work on emotions on a daily basis at school? .
The important work is that of observation, which allows us to recognise non-verbal and verbal communication channels and work strategically on emotions. This kind of awareness allows us to catch the onset of an emotion from small premonitory signals. A good relationship professional then recognises the emotion and works accordingly, first of all trying to ‘dilate the time’ within which it feeds and implement the appropriate strategies to work in the direction of positive relationship management.
However, an important step is also to correctly read the emotions that are manifesting. We commonly observe our interlocutors in their various communicative forms, from facial expression, to voice, body posture, verbal language, verbal style, but we do not always have the correct elements to understand what we are observing.
Once we have observed the emotions circulating in the people we relate to, in order to manage them – especially if we have an educational role – where do we start? .
We are all always looking for strategies to manage the emotions of others, and indeed there are studied strategies that prove more or less effective with different emotions. But to work effectively with the emotions of others, we must first recognise, know and work with our own emotions. Often we are not aware of some of our emotions or do not understand them. First we need to work on awareness of our own emotions and learn how to interact with them in a helpful way. Only then will we be able to help other people in managing emotions that manifest themselves dysfunctionally.
It is not enough, however, to have good observation skills for emotions. In fact, I could be a good observer but then commit the typical ‘Othello mistake’, i.e. to proceed on the basis of personal assumptions and misread the communication of others’ emotions. Othello is the emblem of this misreading: he in fact well recognises Desdemona’s fear, but since in his view of reality he fears betrayal, he interprets that fear as the fear of someone who does not want to be discovered, whereas Desdemona is only afraid of not being believed.
It is then necessaryto know how to ask the right questions, entering into a relationship with the pupils, asking them the meaning of certain behaviours. It is only within this process – in dialogue – that generative strategies are activated and a relationship is built that really activates processes of change.
What advice would you give to a new teacher venturing into the complex world of school life for the first time?”
It sounds like a joke, but I would advise them to study, because people often come to work in schools after degrees that meticulously prepare them for the specific discipline, but little for understanding our emotional grammar. And for everyone, teachers and pupils alike, it is crucial to develop empathy.
In Denmark, for example, there is a social education project,Klaessens tid, which provides a weekly hour of emotional education, a real path-workshop towards the ability to recognise emotions and develop empathy. Pupils aged 6 and over learn to tell their stories and share their experiences and struggles, while sharing simple practical activities with the group, such as making a chocolate cake (not by chance, chocolate is a natural antidepressant).
One last question, Diego. How much do emotions – if managed effectively – contribute to opening people up more to the learning and skills needed for the complex world we live in? .
The heart has reasons that reason does not know, is a famous aphorism by Blaise Pascal that admirably sums up the role and importance of emotional competence three centuries ahead of the knowledge we are talking about in this conversation. In the end, it is precisely in the synthesis of heart and reason that the deepest value of human intelligence lies. Schools must work on both aspects in a balanced way to promote learning paths that truly contribute to personal growth and maturation.
