Is high EQ
innate
or forced by a lack of love in childhood?
You must have seen someone like this:
they walk into a room
and within seconds,
they know who's in a bad mood,
who's having tension with whom,
what can be said,
and what topics to strictly avoid.
It's as if they have an invisible antenna
that picks up unspoken signals in the air.
We call this social savviness,
or high EQ.
So, where does this antenna
actually come from?
Is it born in them,
or developed later?
The other day, a friend told me something that shook me.
He said,
high EQ
is often not cultivated through a privileged upbringing,
but rather born from deprivation and lack of love.
A child
who lacks stable love and protection from parents
will, for their own safety,
be forced to evolve a hypersensitivity to others' moods.
They must learn to read an adult's face
before the weather of that face shifts.
I didn't rush to argue after hearing this,
because it seemed to make too much sense.
So much sense that it's a bit heartbreaking.
But making sense
doesn't make it true.
So today,
we'll use the latest science
to investigate whether this claim
actually holds water.
Hello,
everyone.
I'm Wang Lijie.
First, a conclusion that might disappoint my friend:
EQ
does have an innate component,
and it's not a small one.
The favorite tool of scientists
is twin studies.
By comparing identical and fraternal twins,
they can estimate how much a trait
is influenced by genetics.
The result: for 'trait EQ,'
heritability is between 40% and 45%.
In other words,
your innate emotional hardware—how sensitive you are,
how easily you empathize,
and how well you stay calm—is nearly 50%
pre-installed by your genes at the factory.
You might think,
'Doesn't that prove EQ is mostly innate?'
Not so fast.
The truly interesting part
is the remaining half of environmental factors.
Scientists split the environment into two types.
One is the 'shared environment,'
the general atmosphere the whole family lives in.
Is the family wealthy?
What are the parents' beliefs?
Is the household strict or relaxed?
These are shared by all siblings.
The other is the 'non-shared environment,'
experiences unique to you that no one else can replace.
The result is very surprising.
The environmental factors that determine your EQ
come almost entirely from the non-shared environment,
not the general family atmosphere.
What does this mean?
It means
what truly sculpts your EQ into what it is today
often isn't how warm your home was overall,
but your individual experiences.
at specific moments...
...the things you experienced alone.
This is actually quite counterintuitive.
Same parents,
same roof,
yet two children raised together
can have vastly different EQs.
We tend to chalk it up to innate personality,
but science reminds us
there is another layer: even in the same home,
what the firstborn and the second-born experience
are two completely different worlds.
When the first was born, parents were young, energetic, and hectic.
By the second one, they were much more relaxed.
The first might have witnessed their worst fights,
while the second missed them entirely.
These solo experiences, not shared with siblings,
are what truly, quietly shape one's perception.
Have you noticed?
This actually opens a door
for my friend’s theory.
Because moments of facing danger alone without protection
are the most private, unshared experiences.
But behind this door,
is there anything of substance?
Yes,
and it's heartbreakingly solid.
A scientist named Pollak
conducted a series of experiments that are now classics.
He studied children who had suffered physical abuse at home.
He showed these children images of faces
that shifted from expressionless
slowly, bit by bit, into a certain emotion.
Typical children wait until the expression is obvious
before recognizing it as anger.
But what about those abused children?
At the first faint glimmer of rage,
before most social cues even appeared,
they accurately identified that this person
was about to explode.
And it wasn't just speed of recognition.
These children's attention
would lock onto the angry face like a magnet,
making it hard to look away.
Think about that for a moment.
These children's brains
have literally and tangibly
rewritten the way they see the world.
The brain diverts precious processing power
from other areas
to prioritize one task: detecting danger
before it actually erupts.
Isn't this exactly what my friend said?
Evolving social intelligence just to feel safe.
Only, science tells us
this evolution
is precise down to the neural and perceptual level.
An unprotected child
reallocates brain resources
to the singular task of 'reading' people.
This reminds me of the 'mind-reading' we've discussed.
Back then, we said
so-called mind-reading
is largely
a trainable skill—
a hyper-sensitivity to micro-expressions and vibes.
You see,
Pollak's subjects
completed this training in the cruelest way possible
during their childhood.
And this connects to
the most significant paradigm shift
in developmental psychology over the last decade.
In the past,
scientists viewed childhood adversity
through a 'deficit model'—childhood suffering
was brain damage,
a scar that needed to be patched.
But two scientists,
Ellis and Frankenhuis...
proposed a brand new framework
called "Hidden Talents."
They argue that
the abilities developed by children
growing up in harsh environments
aren't just damage;
they are a form of specialization.
Like a computer
built to run in extreme conditions,
certain functions are specifically optimized.
Evidence is mounting: those with unpredictable childhoods
often perform better
at rapid task-switching as adults.
A volatile environment forces them to be flexible.
Studies on children deprived of parental care found
their working memory capacity
actually exceeded that of their peers.
Those exposed to violent environments
remember dominance hierarchies—who is strong,
and who not to mess with—exceptionally well.
A systematic review of the field also found
that those raised in adversity
often develop sharper emotional awareness, better intuition,
and even stronger empathy.
These aren't defects;
they are skills custom-tailored
to survive in an unstable environment.
Why is the brain designed this way?
It goes back to a topic we discuss often on this channel:
Your brain
is essentially a prediction machine.
It is constantly guessing
what will happen next.
And what data does it use
to train its predictive models?
Precisely your early life experiences.
The brain treats childhood as a sample report for the future.
If the sample is full of danger and unpredictability,
the brain concludes: "The world I will live in
is unsafe."
So it calibrates itself in advance,
betting all resources on vigilance and reading people.
This isn't a glitch.
It is a precision instrument
making the most logical response
based on the data it has collected.
In other words,
that high-EQ child
doesn't have a broken brain.
Their brain is actually very clever—
clever enough to prepare for a hard battle in advance.
So,
my friend's intuition
wasn't just folk wisdom.
It aligns with the cutting edge of science: adversity
doesn't just destroy a person;
in specific ways,
it sharpens them into an exceptionally keen blade.
At this point,
you might think lack of love is a good thing,
a blessing in disguise.
Stop right there.
The following two "buts"
are what I really want to tell you today.
The first "but"
is the cost.
Pollak's research also found
that this hyper-sensitive vigilance system
comes with a bill.
This excessive focus on threats
leads directly to anxiety.
Simply put,
children who are experts at reading faces
are often those who are more tense and can't relax.
Their antennae scan the room non-stop,
meaning they almost never have a second
where they can let their guard down and just be at peace.
We must never romanticize the lack of love.
The sharp blade is real,
but the sharpening process is bloody.
And the edge can turn back and cut the person holding it.
The second 'but'
is context.
These skills forced out by adversity
have a key trait: they shine brightest
primarily in stressful situations.
In other words,
a child who learns 'mind-reading' in a volatile family environment
and then moves to a safe, relaxed setting,
will find their hyper-vigilance system
actually overreacting—reading layers of non-existent hostility
into someone's casual, harmless remark.
These skills are designed for the battlefield.
When brought into times of peace,
they sometimes fail to adapt.
Alright,
after all that setup,
we can finally answer that trickier question,
the second one that friend asked me:
If someone isn't naturally very intelligent
but is thrown into a complex environment,
can they still evolve high EQ?
To answer this,
we must first make a key distinction.
Understanding others
might sound instinctive,
but it's not free.
It consumes cognitive machinery.
Scientists have found
that the aspect of EQ involving emotional understanding—
not just sensing someone is unhappy,
but figuring out why,
and how they might act next—this ability
is closely linked to our Theory of Mind and crystallized intelligence,
which is built through accumulation.
That is to say,
high-level EQ
is mentally taxing.
So the answer becomes clear,
split into two halves.
The intuitive, reactive layer of EQ—for example,
hyper-sensitive detection of anger or danger—
can be roughly forged by one's environment,
even if their intelligence isn't very high.
Because it's perceptual and almost automatic,
the children in Pollak's study possessed this
without needing a high IQ.
But the strategic, calculating layer of high-level EQ—
understanding complex social unwritten rules,
picking the optimal response calmly after empathizing,
anticipating several steps ahead—this layer
requires cognitive bandwidth to sustain.
Environmental pressure alone won't force it out.
Let me paint two pictures
and you'll understand.
A child,
the moment their mother slams the door,
can tell from the weight of her footsteps
exactly whether to speak or not. This is radar.
It's a perceptual, lightning-fast reaction.
It doesn't require a high IQ;
enough environmental pressure can install it.
But here is the other picture: at a complex dinner party,
you need to read the motives of three or four people at once,
gauging who can't lose face or who's being sarcastic,
and what chain reaction your next sentence will trigger.
Then, based on all these calculations,
you pick a response that gets things done
without offending anyone. This is a chess player.
This step-by-step reasoning
is genuinely mentally demanding.
So, I want to use one sentence
to answer my friend: context
can force someone to become a precise emotional radar,
but context
won't necessarily force them to be a brilliant emotional chess player.
Radar
is for scanning and warnings,
while the chess player
must see the whole board before acting.
to make their moves calmly.
Someone who lacks the necessary cognitive depth
might develop a sensitive radar due to adversity;
that is entirely possible.
But to become a true chess player,
pressure alone isn't enough.
You also need the intellect to calculate the game.
Speaking of which,
this connects to the talent and character we discussed before.
The person someone eventually becomes
is never determined by genes alone,
nor by environment alone.
It is the hand of cards nature dealt you,
rubbed and folded repeatedly
throughout a unique life,
that creates the final shape.
So you see,
my friend's theory
was mostly correct.
Children lacking love and security
may indeed develop a skill for reading people.
There is solid science behind this.
But this skill
is like a callus formed over a wound.
It has its sharpness,
but also its pain and limitations.
Thinking about this,
a more haunting question comes to mind.
I can't answer it today,
so I'll leave it to you.
If someone's high EQ
is truly a callus grown from childhood trauma,
then as they heal and find security,
will they gradually
lose that hard-won ability?
Or perhaps,
true maturity is taking that radar
that once scanned others for survival
and slowly
replacing it with the internal capacity
to truly and calmly see others.
From scanning for threats
to actually seeing the person—
the distance between the two
might be a lifelong journey.
What about you?
Among the skills people admire in you,
are there any that,
looking back,
were actually forced out of you
during a moment of survival?
In the comments below,
I would love to hear your story.
I am Wang Lijie.
See you next time.