Salogey and Mayer first coined the term "emotional intelligence" in 1990 and have since carried on to conduct research on the implication of the concept. The pure theory of emotional intelligence mixes key thoughts from the fields of intelligence and emotion. From intelligence theory comes the principle that intelligence involves the capacity to accomplish abstract reasoning.

From emotion research comes the belief that emotions are signals that carry regular and discernable meanings about relationships and that at a number of common emotions are universal. They propose that people vary in their power to process data of an emotional nature and in their power to relate emotional processing to a wider knowledge. They then postulate that this power is seen to manifest itself in particular adaptive behaviors. This conception of emotional intelligence is based inside a model of intelligence, that is, it endeavors to define emotional intelligence inside the confines of the standard measures for a new intelligence. It proposes that emotional intelligence is constituted of 2 areas: experiential (power to perceive, react, and manipulate emotional data without necessarily understanding it) and strategic (power to comprehend and manage emotions without necessarily comprehending feelings well or fully experiencing them)