Interlanguage pragmatics concerns the inspection of interactions among people in society while they are aware of the effects that interaction imposes on them regarding culture, social values and individuals' peculiar interpretations. Of high value in social interaction, politeness is an essential constituent of interlanguage pragmatics. If considered as a skill required to cope with social environmental demands, Emotional Intelligence (EI) may play a part in modifying the interlanguage pragmatics and hence individuals' politeness in response to social interaction. This study investigates how emotional intelligence of L1-Persian EFL learners relates to politeness strategies utilized in requests. To this end, 150 male and female undergraduate, graduate, and postgraduate students majored in Teaching English as a Foreign Language (TEFL) were randomly selected. Instruments of the study included Emotional Intelligence Appraisal Test, Multiple-choice Discourse Completion Task (MDCT), and a politeness questionnaire based on Brown and Levinson's theory of politeness. The results of correlational and regression analyses indicated that EI cannot predict politeness, whereas educational level and pragmatic competence can predict the EFL learners' politeness appreciated in requests in different scenarios. Of interest, the higher the level of education, the more pragmatic ability and politeness thereof.