ORIGINAL RESEARCH article
Front. Psychol.
Sec. Organizational Psychology
Volume 16 - 2025 | doi: 10.3389/fpsyg.2025.1701703
This article is part of the Research TopicResignation and Strategic Retention: Shaping the Future WorkforceView all 12 articles
The Emotional Recession: Global Declines in Emotional Intelligence and its Impact on Organizational Retention, Burnout, and Workforce Resilience
Provisionally accepted
- Six Seconds, Freedom, United States
Select one of your emails
You have multiple emails registered with Frontiers:
Notify me on publication
Please enter your email address:
If you already have an account, please login
You don't have a Frontiers account ? You can register here
The COVID-19 pandemic triggered widespread disruptions to workplace wellbeing and employee engagement, intensifying risks of employee burnout and reduced retention. Despite extensive research on organizational performance, few studies have examined longitudinal declines in emotional intelligence (EQ) during the pandemic and its aftermath, or considered their implications for organizational resilience. This study analyzes EQ trends from 2019 to 2024 using data from the Six Seconds Emotional Intelligence Assessment (SEI), a validated 77-item instrument measuring eight core competencies and four life outcome factors, with a stratified sample of 28,000 adults across 166 countries. Results show a 5.79% overall reduction in global EQ scores (Cohen's d = 0.22, 95% CI [0.17, 0.27]), with statistically significant decreases across all eight competencies (p < .001), most notably in Drive-related skills which include Engage Intrinsic Motivation (Cohen's d = 0.22, 95% CI [0.17, 0.27]), Exercise Optimism (Cohen's d = 0.23, 95% CI [0.18, 0.28]), and Pursue Noble Goals (Cohen's d = 0.19, 95% CI [0.14, 0.24]). Success Factors—including Effectiveness (Cohen's d = 0.20, 95% CI [0.15, 0.25]), Relationships (Cohen's d = 0.19, 95% CI [0.14, 0.24]), Quality of Life (Cohen's d = 0.17, 95% CI [0.12, 0.22]), and Wellbeing (Cohen's d = 0.13, 95% CI [0.08, 0.18])—declined by 4.39–6.45%. Individuals with higher EQ were 10.18 times more likely to report strong overall life outcomes (OR = 10.18, 95% CI [9.64, 10.76]). These findings suggest an "Emotional Recession," defined as a sustained decline in emotional and relational capacities with direct implications for work and life outcomes essential for wellbeing, engagement, and organizational resilience.
Keywords: Emotional Intelligence, Decline in emotional intelligence, Workplace wellbeing, employee burnout, Employee engagement, Organizational resilience, retention, Organizational performance
Received: 09 Sep 2025; Accepted: 20 Oct 2025.
Copyright: © 2025 Freedman, Freedman, Choi and Miller. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.
* Correspondence: Patricia E. Freedman, patty@6seconds.org
Disclaimer: All claims expressed in this article are solely those of the authors and do not necessarily represent those of their affiliated organizations, or those of the publisher, the editors and the reviewers. Any product that may be evaluated in this article or claim that may be made by its manufacturer is not guaranteed or endorsed by the publisher.