Eastern Illinois University

The Keep

Undergraduate Honors Theses Honors College

5-2012

An Investigation into the Relationship between Help Seeking and

Emotional Intelligence in College Students
Brooke S. Aldridge

Follow this and additional works at: https://thekeep.eiu.edu/honors_theses

Part of the Social Psychology Commons

 An investigation into Help Seeking 1

Running Head: Help Seeking and Emotional Intelligence

An Investigation into the Relationship between Help Seeking and Emotional

Intelligence in College Students

An Honors Thesis submitted to the

Department of Psychology
College of Sciences
Eastern Illinois University

In partial fulfillment of the requirements

Of the Departmental Honors Program
For the degree of

BACHELOR OF ARTS

In the Department of Psychology

May, 2012

By

Brooke S. Aldridge

Successfully defended this \�'f M_..:_:A_Vj+------ __,Z=-"o...." l ..... 2.

day of __ __

Thesis Advisor:

Committee Members:
 An investigation into Help Seeking 2

Help seeking attitudes have been of significant interest to psychologists over the years.

The reason for this interest is the overall tendency for individuals with mental health problems to

not seek professional help. According to the 1999 Surgeon General's Report (U.S. Department of

Health and Human Services, 1999) approximately 28% of the adult population experienced

mental health problems in a year. Among those with mental health problems, however, only 15%

sought professional help (Kessler et al., 1996; Regier, Narrow, Rae, Manderscheid, Locke &

Goodwin, 1993). In the pursuit to understand this phenomenon, gender and culture have been

identified as reliable predictors of attitudes towards seeking help. Another possible factor is an

individual's emotional intelligence, though it has received little recognition. It remains unclear

how emotional intelligence, gender, and culture may combine together to affect help seeking

behavior.

While emotional intelligence (EI) has been a heavily researched topic in the last decade,

very little research has been conducted in which help seeking and emotional intelligence are

examined together. Dean and Ciarrochi (2002) have examined these two variables and found that

adolescents who were low in emotional awareness, and who were poor at identifying, describing,

and managing their emotions, were the least likely to seek help from nonprofessional sources and

had the highest intention of refusing help from everyone. An explanation for this could be that

skill at managing and describing emotions leads to better social support, and better social

support, in turn, leads to greater intention to seek help ( Dean & Ciarrochi, 2002).

Gender has also been identified as reliable predictors of attitudes towards seeking help.

For example, in a classic study by Fischer and Turner (1970), it was found that there are strong

gender differences in help-seeking, with females being more open to seeking professional help.
 An investigation into Help Seeking 3

Other research has shown that men who exhibit stereotypically masculine attitudes are restricted

emotionality and who express limited affection towards other men, are less likely to seek

professional help (Good & Wood, 1995).

Ethnicity has also been shown to play an important role in the attitudes of individuals

towards help seeking behavior. Part of this is explained by the differences between ethnicities in

defining what constitutes a psychological problem. Cauce et al. (2002, pg. 4 7) posit that

"contextual and cultural factors likely underlie, at least to some extent, the differences between

epidemiologically assessed need and perceived need across ethnic groups". Of course, this all

depends on how the individual interprets their own cultural values when it comes to seeking

help. On this matter, Sue (1999) asserts that cultural factors within individuals are important in

determining service use.

Help seeking has been a heavily researched topic over the years; however, there have

been very few studies on the relationship between EI and help seeking behavior. This study was

conducted to further understand the relationship between EI and help seeking while also

considering the effects of gender and cultural differences. It is hypothesized that EI may serve to

help explain the relationship between gender, culture, and help seeking attitudes. When

considering the present variables, it is important to review the literature to ascertain how these

concepts have developed and how they have and will be studied.

Help-Seeking

First, there must be a differentiation between help seeking attitudes and behaviors. The

Collins English Dictionary (2012) describes attitudes as "the way a person views something or

tends to behave towards it, often in an evaluative way". In terms of help seeking attitudes, it

would be the way a person views or feels about seeking mental health care. The Collins English
 An investigation into Help Seeking 4

Dictionary (2012) describes behaviors as "the manner of behaving or conducting oneself'. In

reference to help seeking, behavior would be the act of seeking mental health care.

There are several factors that may either impede or facilitate help seeking attitudes and

behavior. For instance, an individual who seeks professional help must not fear being

stigmatized. There is evidence that the degree of stigma can vary on the basis of person,

problem, and cultural influences, and that individuals seek less help for problems that are

associated with greater negative judgment by others (Kushner & Sher, 1991, pg.198-199).

Though fear of stigma has been cited as a prominent variable in help seeking studies, there are

many other factors that may impede help seeking that are equally as important. A study by

Kushner & Sher (1989) examined approach (e.g., mental distress, pressure from others) and

avoidance (e.g., treatment fears, cost) tendencies and how these tendencies influenced decisions

to seek help. Kushner & Sher found that as people became more fearful of treatment, they also

became more psychologically distressed, which led to the increased likelihood of seeking

services.

Another aspect of help seeking attitudes may be the lingering psychological effects of

previous encounters with professional mental help. If an individual has had a bad experience

with help seeking in the past, then that individual is more likely to have a negative association

with help seeking and therefore will be less likely to seek help in the future. For example, Asian

Americans with previous counseling experience expressed greater willingness to see a counselor

for both personal and academic problems than did those with no prior counseling experience.

This was attributed to those individuals finding counseling to be a worthwhile experience, and

thus, being more willing to seek counseling in the future (Atkinson, Lowe, & Matthews, 1995).
 An investigation into Help Seeking 5

Past studies by Fischer and Turner (1970, 1972) have suggested that social class,

education level, religion, and even college major may have some amount of influence on help

seeking behaviors and attitudes. In 1972, Fischer and Cohen conducted a study examining help

seeking attitudes among 989 high school and college students. Their results showed that the

higher the education level of the individual (i.e., junior/senior vs freshman/sophomore), the more

positive the attitudes toward seeking professional mental help. The same study found that

students in the social sciences and more specifically psychology were more in favor of seeking

professional help than other majors.

Lastly, one must consider the relationship between the therapist and client that may

influence help seeking attitudes. Studies have shown that individuals report a more positive

association with help seeking when the therapist demonstrated competency in the client's culture

based values (Cauce et. al., 2002). This may then lead to continued use of mental health services.

For example, clients who perceived their own etiology beliefs (i.e., the origin of their

psychological problem) as similar to those of their counselors regarded their counselors as more

credible and trustworthy, rated the counseling services as more effective, and desired future

counseling more than did those who perceived dissimilarity (Atkinson, Worthington, Dana, &

Good, 1991; Islein & Addis, 2003; Worthington & Atkinson, 1996).

Emotional Intelligence

In order to define emotional intelligence, one must start at the first emergence of the

concept. Thorndike first introduced his idea of social intelligence in the 1930s (Thorndike &

Stein, 1937). His idea of social intelligence was essentially an assessment of one's ability to

understand and manage people. This first idea has evolved into what we now refer to as

emotional intelligence. Unfortunately, understanding emotional intelligence is not as easy as it

 An investigation into Help Seeking 6

may seem. Multiple models of emotional intelligence have appeared since the 1930's. One of

those models is the mixed construct model. Introduced by Daniel Goleman (Chemis et. al, 2006),

the mixed construct model basically portrays emotional intelligence as a variety of different

competencies and skills. The main ideas for this model are self-awareness, self-regulation, social

awareness, and relationship management. Another prominent model is the trait model (Brannick

et.al, 2009). This model suggests that emotional intelligence isn't really a form of intelligence at

all but is really a personality trait.

The last model of emotional intelligence is based on an individual's ability to engage in

sophisticated information processing about one's own and others' emotions and the ability to use

this information as a guide to thinking and behavior (Mayer, Salovey, & Caruso, 2008). Mayer,

Salovey, & Caruso (2008) go on to describe emotional intelligence as a form of higher

intellectual functioning that enriches human interactions and that it is a group of related mental

abilities.

Emotional intelligence has also been shown to be a factor in help seeking attitudes.

Although there are few studies that examine the relationship between emotional intelligence and

help seeking attitudes. Dean and Ciarrochi (2001) conducted three studies specifically examining

this relationship, all using the ability model created by Salovey and Mayer. Their goal was to

ascertain whether level of emotional intelligence was related to help seeking behavior. They

originally hypothesized that those with less emotional intelligence would be more likely to seek

help because of their low ability to manage and communicate their emotions. What they found

was that the opposite was true. Dean and Ciarrochi (2001) found that, for seniors in high school,

those higher in emotional intelligence tended to have more favorable attitudes toward seeking

professional mental health services. This may be due to the fact that those who are better able to
 An investigation into Help Seeking 7

identify their emotions also know when they need assistance to regulate those emotions. Through

further study, the authors found that the relationship was reversed when examining individuals

thirteen years of age and younger, i.e., those with more difficulty identifying and describing their

emotions were more likely to seek professional mental health (Dean & Ciarrochi, 2001).

Culture

Culture has been found to be a significant predictor of help seeking attitudes. Though

culture, as it refers to those from other countries, will not be a variable in the present study, it

will be included in the second phase of the study and therefore it is important to review culture

and help seeking attitudes. Generally, those from Western cultures have more positive attitudes

towards help seeking than those from Eastern cultures. For example, in a study examining

acculturation effects, it was observed that in Chinese populations, cultural values may be in

conflict with the expectations in counseling (Chen & Mak, 2008). This may be due to Chinese

culture placing more value on self restraint as opposed to emotional expression (Chen & Mak,

2008). This conclusion was reached after having 747 undergraduates from the United State of

America, Hong Kong, and mainland China complete questionnaires regarding lay beliefs about

mental illness and help seeking history.

Along with general cultural effects, one must also consider how stigma may have a

significant effect on help seeking attitudes in different cultures. As mentioned earlier, stigma has

repeatedly been recognized as a significant barrier to help seeking. This has been show to be true

in Asian cultures as well. In a study by Shea and Yeh (2008), 219 Asian American undergraduate

and graduate students completed multiple questionnaires including an Asian Value Scale, a scale

assessing stigma associated with receiving psychological help, and the Attitudes toward Seeking

Professional Psychological Help (ATSPPH). Their biggest finding was that Asian American
 An investigation into Help Seeking 8

students may find seeking professional psychological help contradictory to their belief system

due to significant differences between the Asian and Western perspectives of self, general,

human experiences, and conceptions of psychological problems (Shea & Yeh, 2008). They also

found that those students who reported a higher level of perceived stigma often had more

negative help seeking attitudes. They attributed this stigma to the discrepancy between Western

counseling practices and traditional Asian cultural values that encourage individuals to save face

and to maintain the family's reputation in society.

Gender

Gender has also been shown to be related to emotional intelligence and help seeking

attitudes. With regards to help seeking, women generally have more positive attitudes toward

seeking mental health services. A study by Leong & Zachar (1999) showed that women had

greater recognition of the need for help, greater confidence in mental health practitioners, and

more interpersonal openness when measuring help seeking attitudes with the ATSPPH. In

another study, psychological openness (i.e., acknowledging psychological problems and being

willing to seek professional help) was identified as a component of help seeking attitudes

(Mackenzie et al., 2006). Specifically the study stated that women exhibited more intentions to

seek help from mental health professionals than men despite previous experience with help

seeking. This finding was attributed to women having more positive attitudes concerning

psychological openness (Mackenzie et al., 2006).

Additionally, gender has been identified as an important factor when studying emotional

intelligence. It has been shown that women typically score higher on indices of emotional

intelligence than men. More specifically, women score higher than men on general EI, and excel

especially in interpersonal skills and emotional self-awareness (Palmer et al., 2003). This may be
 An investigation into Help Seeking 9

due to the fact that women are more capable of perceiving emotions, regulating others' emotions,

and utilizing emotions for building relationships than men (Ciarrochi et al., 2001). Also, men,

when compared to women, are generally considered more restricted in emotionality and tend to

have less meaningful relationships with other men (Good & Wood, 1995). This may be an

explanation for why male participants typically score lower scores on indices of emotional

intelligence.

Present Study

In summary, other studies have found that generally women are more likely to seek help

and tend to score higher on indices of emotional intelligence (Deane & Ciarrochi, 2001). Also,

individuals from Western cultures tend to have more positive help seeking attitudes than those in

Eastern cultures (Shea & Yeh, 2008; Chen & Mak, 2008). Though these studies have given

psychologists a greater knowledge of help seeking attitudes and emotional intelligence, there are

still unanswered questions in this area. For instance, none of these studies have specifically

examined the differences between Indians and Americans when considering help seeking

attitudes or emotional intelligence. More importantly, no study has previously looked at how

emotional intelligence might mediate the relationship between cultural differences and help

seeking attitudes. Now that the literature has been reviewed, the main goals of this study may be

presented.

In the second phase of this study we will be aiming to understand the relationship

between gender, culture, and help seeking attitudes and whether those relationships can be

explained by emotional intelligence. Data will be collected in Indian and compared with data

obtained from American college students. In the present study, we aim to examine the same

variables and possible relationships in American college students. I hypothesize that females
 An investigation into Help Seeking 10

(Leong & Zachar, 1999) will have more favorable attitudes toward seeking help because they

have been found to have higher emotional intelligence which enables them to be more aware of

when they need help with their psychological problems. Also, we wish to examine the

relationship between help seeking and emotional intelligence. Consistent with Dean and

Ciarrochi' s (2001) findings, I hypothesize that those individuals with higher emotional

intelligence will have more favorable attitudes towards seeking help. The final goal of this

project will be to investigate the differences between cultures in emotional intelligence by

looking at American college students, and Indian college students in the second phase of this

study.

Methods

Particip ants

The participants in phase A were 77 college students from Eastern Illinois University.

The participants from Eastern Illinois University were recruited from the Introduction to

Psychology pool of subjects. Out of 77 participants there were 29 male and 48 female. The

average age was 19. Most of the participants identified themselves as Caucasian (n=44), African

American (n=26), and Latino/a (n=6). Also, 26 individuals reported that they had personally

received prior counseling and 26 reported that a member of their family had received prior

counseling.

Materials

The questionnaires that were chosen for this study were the Inventory of Attitudes

Towards Seeking Mental Health Services and the Schutte Self Report Emotional Intelligence

Test. The IASMHS is an abbreviated version of the ATSPPH developed by Fischer and Turner

(1970). The Inventory of Attitudes toward Seeking Mental Health Services (IASMHS)
 An investigation into Help Seeking 11

(Mackenzie, 2004) will measure participants attitudes toward help seeking with 24 self-report

Likert scale items using a 1(agree) to 5 (disagree) scale for responses. Participants will also

complete the Schutte Self-Report Emotional Intelligence Test (SSEIT) (Schutte, 1998). The

SSEIT is a 33-item self-report measure using a 1 (strongly agree) to 5 (strongly disagree) scale

for responses. Each score is computed and then added together to give the total score for the

participant with higher scores on SSEIT and IASMHS denoting more emotionally intelligent

participants and more positive attitudes toward seeking help, respectively. The SSEIT measures

the participant's ability to recognize, manage, and utilize their emotions.

Procedures

In Phase A, this study examined sex and minority status (minority or non-minority

American college students) as the independent variables. In Phase B the study will be a 2X2

factorial design with sex and culture (American vs Indian college students) being the

independent variables. The dependent variables were emotional intelligence a.11d help seeking

attitudes. Participants completed the questionnaires via an online survey website. They first

viewed and read the informed consent form and then pressed the "I accept" button to affirm their

consent to participate. Then they completed the demographic survey which asked them their age,

gender, ethnic background, and other questions that were devised specifically for this study.

After the demographics, they completed the SSEIT that measured their emotional intelligence,

and the IASMHS, that measured help seeking attitudes. After these questionnaires were

completed, the participants received the debriefing form which explained the reasons for the

study. The average testing time was approximately 30 minutes.

Results
 An investigation into Help Seeking 12

Participants' scores were computed for each of the separate measures according to the

procedures outlined above. To assess if participants with higher scores on the emotional

intelligence measure would have more positive attitudes towards seeking professional mental

health services, a Pearson's r was conducted on emotional intelligence and help seeking attitude

scores. At an alpha level of .05, results show that the higher the scores on the SSEIT, the higher

the score on IASMHS, r(73)= .354, p=.002. This is consistent with my hypothesis that the more

emotionally intelligent an individual is, the more positive attitudes they will have towards

seeking professional mental health treatment.

To assess gender differences on measures of help seeking attitudes and emotional

intelligence, t-tests for independent means were conducted with the independent variable being

participant sex and the dependent variables being the SSEIT score and IASMHS score. The

hypothesis that women (M= 96.74, SD= 9.46) would score significantly higher on the IASMHS

than men (M= 93.41, SD = 8.04) was not supported, t(73) = 1.588, p = 1.24 . Also, the

hypothesis that women (M = 124. 79, SD= 13 .69) would score significantly higher on the SSEIT

than men (M= 127 .79, SD= 13.69) was not supported, t(71) = .803, p = .425.

To assess minority group differences on measures of help seeking attitudes and emotional

intelligence, t-tests for independent means were conducted with the independent variable being

minority status and the dependent variables being the SSEIT score and IASMHS score

respectively. Non-minority participants (M= 95.13, SD= 9.18) did not score significantly higher

on the IASMHS than minority participants (M = 95.70, SD= 8.98), t(72) = .265, p = .792.

Although the minority participants (M= 129.40, SD= 12.63) did not score significantly higher

on the SSEIT than non-minority participants (M= 123.32, SD = 14.94), the finding did approach

significance, t(70) = 1 .83, p = .066. To further understand differences in emotional intelligence

 An investigation into Help Seeking 13

between minority and non-minorities, t-tests for independent means were also conducted

separately for male and female participants who were minorities or non-minorities. For these

analyses, two separate t-tests were conducted for men and women separately with the

independent variable being minority status and the dependent variable being emotional

intelligence. It was found that female minority participants (M= 129.10, SD = 12.07) did rate

themselves as significantly more emotionally intelligent than non-minority females (M = 120.74,

SD= 15.99), t(42) = -1.958, p = .057 (see Figure 1).

To examine emotional intelligence, a two-way analysis of variance was conducted with

the independent variables being gender and minority status and the dependent variable being

emotional intelligence. At an alpha level of .05, results show that there was no significant

interaction between gender and minority status, F(l, 72) = .411, p = .523. There was also no

significant main effect of gender, F(l, 72) = .864, p = .356. Likewise, there was no significant

main effect of minority status, F(l, 72) = 2.96, p = .09. However, it is important to recognize that

the trend in the data shows that, based on the means of emotional intelligence scores, minority

men (M= 130.12, SD = 4.67) and minority women (M= 129.10, SD= 2.99) scored higher than

non-minority men (M= 126.32, SD= 3.22) or non-minority women (M= 120.74, SD= 2.99).

Furthermore, to examine help seeking, another two-way analysis of variance was

conducted with the independent variables being gender and minority status and the dependent

variable being help seeking attitudes. At an alpha level of .05, results show that there was no

significant interaction between gender and minority status, F(l, 74) = .320, p = .574. There was

also no significant main effect of gender, F(l, 74) = 2.314, p = .133, and no significant main

effect of minority status, F(l, 74) = .017, p = .895.

 An investigation into Help Seeking 14

Finally, to assess the previous counseling differences on measures of help seeking

attitudes and emotional intelligence, t-tests for independent means were conducted with the

independent variable being if the participants had received previous counseling and the

dependent variables being the SSEIT score and IASMHS score. Those who had previous

experience with counseling (M = 101.34, SD = 7.36) did score significantly higher on the

IASMHS than those who did not have previous experience with counseling (M = 92.65, SD =

8.49), t(72) = 4.35,p <.001. However, those who did have previous experience with counseling

(M = 127.14, SD = 14.63) did not score significantly higher on the SSEIT than those who did not

have previous experience with counseling (M= 125.02, SD = 14.09), t(70) = .590,p = .557.

Discussion

The aim of this study was to understand the relationship between gender, minority status,

and help seeking attitudes and whether those relationships can be explained by emotional

intelligence. ,A�dditionally, we wished to examine possible relationships between gender and

minority status and emotional intelligence and help seeking attitudes. All of these variables have

been previously examined but never before have they been examined together.

The first question this study set out to answer was whether there was a relationship

between emotional intelligence and help seeking. I hypothesized that there would be a positive

correlation between the two. This hypothesis was supported. The correlation showed that the

more emotionally intelligent an individual is, the more likely they are to have positive help

seeking attitudes. This is firmly in keep with previous research that has found a relationship

between emotional intelligence and help seeking attitudes (Dean & Ciarrochi, 2001).

The second question in this study was whether men and women would differ with respect

to emotional intelligence and help seeking attitudes. I hypothesize that women would be more
 An investigation into Help Seeking 15

emotionally intelligent and have more favorable attitudes towards seeking professional mental

health treatment. Surpisingly, my hypothesis was not supported by the data. In fact, there was

very little difference between genders with respect to help seeking attitudes. This was unusual

because multiple studies that have researched help seeking attitudes have found that women have

more favorable help seeking attitudes (Fischer & Turner, 1970; Leong & Zachar, 1999). Also,

when examining the means, men had higher emotionally intelligence scores than females. This

of course may be due to the small sample size in this study and the small number of men who

participated. Another possible explanation is that it is becoming more socially acceptable for

men to act more feminine. In other words, men are becoming less emotionally restricted and are

becoming more psychologically open, both of which are areas at which women have excelled at

previously. It has become acceptable for men to exhibit feminine characteristics including

sensitivity, devotion and showing emotions (Hevrdejs, 2003), these men have, "embraced

customs and attitudes once deemed the province of women" (Hevrdejs, 2003 pp. 2).With this

shift in emotionality in men, they may be more aware of their emotions, more aware of when

they need to seek help, and have more positive attitudes towards seeking help. We also found

that minority women had significantly higher emotional intelligence scores as compared to non­

minority women. This is likely due to the aforementioned explanation of minorities having

higher emotional intelligence scores.

The third question was whether or not minority students would differ from non-minority

students with respect to emotional intelligence. Although the t-test was not significant (p=.06),

there was a trend in the data indicating a difference between minority and non-minority students.

It would be interesting to examine this further with a larger group of minority students and

subgroups.
 An investigation into Help Seeking 16

The fourth and final question was whether minority status and gender would interact with

respect to emotional intelligence and help seeking. It was found that there were no significant

interactions with respect to emotional intelligence or help seeking. However, the main effect of

minority status did approach significance when examining emotional intelligence. Given these

results, we decided to further assess the differences between minority and non-minority students

with respect to emotional intelligence. We found that participants in the minority group tended to

be more emotionally intelligent than those in the non-minority group. Because of the limited

research on minority status and emotional intelligence it is hard to form an explanation as to this

outcome. One possible explanation for this is that minorities may perceive having less "power"

in this society and because of this they must be more "emotionally intelligent" so they can

recognize the emotions of those higher in authority and use this knowledge to guide their

behaviors so as to engender greater success in the workplace, social interactions, etc. Social

psychologists have done research in this area and found that since Caucasian individuals are

generally accepted as having more institutional power, minority groups are forced to "develop

strategies that will confer efficacy on preferred patterns of behavior and developed abilities"

(Jones, 1986, p. 307). Increased emotional intelligence may be one of these strategies that helps

confer efficacy.

Though it was not one of the primary study questions, we also examined whether

previous mental health treatment would be related to help seeking attitudes and emotional

intelligence scores. It was found that previous experience with counseling was positively

correlated with help seeking attitudes. In other words, those who had had previous experience

with counseling for mental health problems had much more favorable attitudes towards seeking

professional mental health. This may be because their previous experiences were positive and
 An investigation into Help Seeking 17

therefore they view help seeking in a more positive light than those who have not previously had

experience with counseling services. Another explanation could be that those who originally

have more positive attitudes towards seeking professional mental health treatment are more

likely to seek help. It would be beneficial for future studies to also evaluate whether those who

have had previous counseling experience had positive experiences and how helpful they found

these mental health services.

Limitations/ Future Directions

The biggest limitation in this study was the small number of participants and the makeup

of the sample. A greater number of participants would have provided the power to do certain

analyses, e.g., test for mediation effects and analyze the subscales of the IASMHS. Furthermore,

most of the participants were Caucasian and most were around the ages of 18-20 which makes it

hard to generalize the results of this study. Also, the sample was composed of relatively few men

which reflects the nature of the introduction to psychology pool of participants that was used.

Also, it is important to recognize the limitations of using self report questionnaires. Some

participants may have been engaging in self enhancing behavior by filling out the questionnaires

in a biased way.

With these limitations being stated, there are some areas that would benefit from future

research. First, future research should endeavor to examine these variables and their relationships

with a larger and more generalizable participant pool. Second, it would be interesting to further

examine the differences between non-minority and minority individuals with respect to

emotional intelligence. This would be especially interesting to examine with specific emphasis

on the differences between females in both categories with respect to emotional intelligence.

Third, the possible relationship between prior help seeking behaviors should be examined with
 An investigation into Help Seeking 18

respect to help seeking attitudes as well as emotional intelligence. It would also be interesting to

see what relationship might exist between these variables and participant's or family' s prior help

seeking behaviors. Also, it would be intriguing to see if there exists an interaction between

previous history with counseling and ethnicity. Lastly, researchers should investigate these

relationships and whether they still hold true when studying other cultures. This will actually be

Phase B of this project. We will be gather data from India regarding emotional intelligence, help

seeking attitudes and religious affiliation and compare it to our American sample.

Implications

This study has many implications for psychologists. As I stated earlier, all barriers to help

seeking are interesting to psychologists and this study is unique in the fact that it examines

emotional intelligence as a type of barrier to seeking professional mental health treatment. The

less emotionally intelligent an individual is, the less favorable attitudes they will hold towards

seeking mental health treatment so psychology needs to take steps to encourage psychological

openness and less restricted emotionality so that those who need the help are more likely to

receive it.

Conclusion

In this study I found that there is a relationship between emotional intelligence and help

seeking attitudes. Also, it seems that individuals in a minority group, especially women, are more

adept at recognizing, managing, and utilizing their emotions. Hopefully with more participants,

further analyses can be conducted to further assess these relationships and better understand the

factors which facilitate or hinder obtaining professional help for psychological issues.
 An investigation into Help Seeking 19

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 An investigation into Help Seeking 24

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Figure 1. Mean emotional intelligence scores for participants by minority and gender.