Uses for Emosocial's EmoGrams

Assessment: An EmoGram is a tool to visualize someone’s emotional state and how they may be perceiving themselves and others around them. An EmoGram can be an easy way to do a Family Sculpture or Family constellation in a non threatening manner.

Crisis Intervention: Creating an EmoGram while upset and struggling allows a shift in attention and perspective from experiencing oneself in the midst of the chaos to objective observing and cognitive assessing the situation. This change of focus to the construction of an EmoGram can be calming, as it creates a time out and permits a shift to the visualization of situational dynamics.

Treatment: EmoGramming is a journaling process to assist with Therapy and Counseling Goals. As a Therapist or Counselor, an EmoGram Journal gives you an opportunity to notice and process patterns over time. These visualized dynamics developed in an EmoGram creates insight into relationships, both productive and dysfunctional.

EmoSocial.com is a web-based journal created by a team of educators and mental health professionals. The site offers a variety of activities to assist in the psychosocial development of Emotional Intelligence and interpersonal coping skills. In educational settings, these skill sets are often referred to as Social Emotional Learning or SEL. These are basically ‘'social skills:" the ability to get along with others to help a child navigate the complex world of people, relationships, and decision making.

EmoSocial will enable the user to create visual and text entries of experiences that can be shared with others. The site will become an important resource in helping children record events, visualize themselves and others, and gain new insights perspectives on their world. This experience creates a foundation on which to better understand personal and social interaction.

Sociograms and EmoGrams

A key feature of EmoSocial is the use of Sociograms, developed in the 1930s by Jacob Moreno, a Viennese Social Psychologist and Psychiatrist. "Moreno's focus was to investigate how psychological well-being is related to the structural features of what he termed 'social configurations'. These configurations are formed from the concrete patterns of interpersonal choice, attraction, repulsion, friendship and other relations in which people were involved." (See more on Sociometry and Sociograms).

We have evolved the Sociogram into the EmoGram. The EmoGram screen uses a palate and canvas environment with drag and drop functionality to allow the user to create EmoGrams. EmoGrams are unique diagrams that use Feeling Face Icons (EmoCons), Sign Icons (SiCons), Decision Icons (DeCons) and Line Segments to represent how users are feeling, how they see others, what signs they are seeing and what type of connections they have people around them. The Journal aspect of EmoSocial allows children to save EmoGram entries along with written explanations creating a historical journal.

EmoGram  Journaling or "EmoGraming" Instructions

  1. Feel It:The first Menu/Palate is of Feeling Faces or what are commonly referred to as EmoCons. You select the face or faces that you identify with to represent yourself then label or name the face by using a right click which opens up a text box. You can label it "Me", your name or write anything you want about the face. The next step is to drag and drop various faces representing the various people, pets, places or important things in your life and use the text box to describe or name the faces. You can also resize Feeling Faces as well as Signs by hovering over the Face or Sign which triggers the resizing box around the icon. Drag a corner of the box to resize. You can put important people closer to you and others farther away.

  2. See the Signs: The second Menu/Palate is of Signs or what we call SiCons that include traffic signs, weather icons (sunny to stormy), hands (a hand shake to a fist), among others. These Signs can be used to create a mood or accent and represent something of importance. You can also resize Signs as well by hovering over the icon and triggering the resizing box around the icon. Drag a corner of the box to resize.

  3. Get Connections: The third Menu/Palate is that of line segments that are used to connect Faces and Signs. There are a variety of lines that can be used to characterize or describe the nature or status of relationships between the various Faces. For example, a thick solid line connecting two faces in close proximity could be described as a warm and caring relationship where as a zigzag line between faces far away could be described as being stressed or conflicted and even "fighting". You can also color the lines to add depth and meaning, a blue line could indicate a cold relation and red line an angry of conflicted one (click the black box on the lower left side of the palate to open the color palate). Once you drag and drop a line you can move it around, make it longer or shorter by using the resizing boxes at either end of the line (arrow or beginning of the line) and rotate it by using the light green paddle or lollipop at end of the line.

  4. Good Decisions: is the 4th palate of Icons (DeCons) that can be used to articulate the question that needs a decision, identify strategies that can be used in the decision making process, and offers various responses or answers to the question. These Icons can help in clarifying the question, slowing down the decision making process to encourage a thorough understanding of the question and the range of responses in making the decision. By visualizing a situation and diagramming how people are feeling, labeling social signs regarding the situation and identifying connections one becomes more aware of how to make Good Decisions.

  5. What’s the Story: This is a Text box to write out what is going on in more detail.

GO TO EMOGRAM JOURNAL »

In summary, EmoGraming provides a valuable tool to help the user develop new ways of expression and awareness. Depending on the age and development of the user, the tool can be linked to parental involvement, educational experiences via school-based Social and Emotional Learning (SEL) programs, as well as with counseling and psychotherapy treatment.