Need For Emotion

What it measures

A multiple-item likert scale designed to measure a person's tendency to enjoy emotional stimuli, seek emotional situations, and show a preference for using emotion in interacting with others.

Response format

7-point Likert scale

Scale items

• I try to anticipate and avoid situations where there is a likely chance of my getting emotionally involved.
• Experiencing strong emotions is not something I enjoy very much.
• I would rather be in a situation in which I experience little emotion than one which is sure to get me
• I don't look forward to being in situations that others have found to be emotional.
• I look forward to situations that I know are less emotionally involving.
• I like to be unemotional in emotional situations.
• I find little satisfaction in experiencing strong emotions.
• I prefer to keep my feelings under check.
• I feel relief rather than fulfilled after experiencing a situation that was very emotional.
• I prefer to ignore the emotional aspects of situations rather than getting involved in them.
• More often than not, making decisions based on emotions just leads to more errors.
• I don't like to have the responsibility of handling a situation that is emotional in nature.

Full scale items shown. Always cite the original source when using this scale in research.

Usage notes & scoring

Internal consistency (alpha = .92) was reported in the primary study. Convergent and discriminant validity evidence was provided by the original authors.

Citation

Kidwell, Blair, David M. Hardesty, and Terry L. Childers (2008), “Consumer Emotional Intelligence: Conceptualization, Measurement, and the Prediction of Consumer Decision Making,” Journal of Consumer Research, 35 (1), 154-166.

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