In Emotional Intelligence, Goleman notes: "Perhaps the most telling data of all--a direct barometer of dropping levels of emotional competence--are from a national sample of American children, ages seven to sixteen, comparing their emotional conditions in the mid-1970s and at the end of the 1980s.
《EQ》書中寫道：「有一份資料可做為 EQ 普遍降低的直接指標，該研究取樣自全美八到十七歲的孩子，比較他們在七○年代中及八○年代末的情感狀態。