Computational studies have been performed to elucidate the activation mechanism of the Michael addition reactions containing bifunctional tertiary amine–thioureas and isatylidene malononitriles by density functional theory (DFT) calculations at the B3LYP/6-311++G(d,p)//B3LYP/6-31G(d) level of theory. Results showed a difference of 6.47 kcal mol⁻¹ between M1-O and M1-N, which suggest that it is the carbonyl group, instead of the malononitrile moiety of isatylidene malononitriles, that plays a dominating role in the activation of the electrophile by the catalysts. The predicted mechanism also successfully explains the experimentally observed enantioselectivity.