Social cognition is a domain of cognitive function that includes the ability to understand and manage social interactions. Emotional intelligence (EI) has been identified as a component of social cognition and is defined as the ability to identify, use, understand, and manage emotions. Neurocognitive impairments are known to be associated with poorer social function in people with schizophrenia, but less is known about the relationships between EI, neurocognition, and social function. The current study assessed EI using the Mayer-Salovey-Caruso Emotional Intelligence Test (MSCEIT) in 20 people with schizophrenia and 20 controls. The schizophrenia group had significantly lower scores on all measures of EI and demonstrated poorer neurocognition and social functioning than controls. The difference between schizophrenia and control groups was greatest for the Understanding Emotions Branch of the MSCEIT. The neurocognition score and total EI score accounted for 18.3% of the variance in social function in the control group and 9.1% of the variance in social function in the schizophrenia group. Our results suggest that a total EI score is not a useful predictor of overall social function and it may be more clinically useful to develop an individual profile of social cognitive abilities, including EI, to form a remediation program. 1. Introduction Social cognition refers to aspects of cognition that are critical for social functioning and interpersonal relationships, such as accurate perception of the emotions of others, the ability to recognize important social cues, theory of mind (TOM), and the management of emotions in social situations [1]. Various components of social cognition have been found to be impaired in people with schizophrenia [2, 3]. Impaired social cognition may also be a risk factor for psychosis—Kim et al. [4] reported that poor performance on social cognition tasks was associated with higher rates of transition to psychosis in young people who were at ultra-high risk of psychosis. Emotional intelligence (EI) is an important component of social cognition [5, 6]. EI is defined as the ability to process, understand, and manage emotions. EI is most commonly assessed using the Mayer-Salovey-Caruso Emotional Intelligence Test, Version 2.0 (MSCEIT) [7, 8]. Mayer and Salovey [6] identified four components (termed Branches) of EI. The four Branches are Identifying Emotions (the perception of emotion in the self and others); Facilitating or Using Emotions (the capacity to use and generate emotions, and to use emotions in cognitive tasks such as
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