Emotional intelligence and chaplaincy: An analysis of elements of emotional intelligence in chaplains’ clinical training and encounters

Abstract

Life crises elicit emotions and people’s process of adaptation varies. Medical crises are no exception. Chaplains are part of the healthcare interdisciplinary team that provides holistic care. They are trained to address spiritual and emotional needs. Patients and their families undergo emotional sometimes spiritual distress when faced with news of devastating diagnosis or death. They need someone to come alongside them as they process and adjust to new situations. In order for chaplains to function effectively in these situations, they need to understand that people will react emotionally first before they can reason, and even when they begin to reason, it does not override emotions. Chaplains must then identify their emotions before they can identify and address other people’s emotions. A chaplain who can successfully execute this skill is said to possess emotional intelligence. Emotional intelligence is crucial in the functioning of a healthcare chaplain and deserves intentional inclusion in chaplain’s clinical pastoral education. Emotional intelligence focuses of self-awareness and self-management, social awareness and relationship management, these are areas that sum up a chaplains scope of interactions. It is imperative to sensitize chaplains in training to equip them to identify elements of emotional intelligence and apply these in their spiritual interventions. These elements of emotional intelligence include but are not limited to, compassion, cognitive empathy, active listening, realistic self-assessment, initiative, and insight. This research addresses the need to develop emotional intelligent amongst healthcare chaplains. The findings yielded significant themes that include emotional intelligence, chaplaincy skills, self-awareness as a chaplain, and social awareness in chaplaincy. The analysis of verbatim reports and data from interviews revealed that there is evidence of elements of emotional intelligence in interventions performed by the chaplains while in training and post-clinical pastoral education. The data revealed that intense emotional clinical encounters characterized diversity, sudden death, and intense grief acted as catalysts for demonstration of emotional intelligence. However, the data also revealed while chaplains excelled in social awareness and relationship management, the element of realistic self-assessment was generally lacking, although self-awareness seemed to be a topic of emphasis during CPE training. Respondents’ perception of selfawareness seemed to matter only in areas of caring for others. However, self-awareness without self-care is an incomplete concept. Possessing emotional intelligence includes self-management. The research project offers recommendations that include: redesigning clinical pastoral curriculum to include emotional intelligence, adaptation of appreciative inquiry as an non-antagonistic assessment approach, a rubric that describes elements of emotional intelligence, and self-evaluation that is a long term, user friendly for both CPE students and practicing chaplains.