CH 12 Review Q's & Summary

Question 1

For which of these purposes are physiological measurements more helpful?

Answer 1

Measuring the strength of someone’s anger or fear

Question 2

According to the James-Lange theory, which of the following is true?

Answer 2

Your feeling of fear is your perception of what your body is doing.

Question 3

What happens when people adopt postures and breathing patterns characteristic of a particular emotion? How do these results relate to the James-Lange theory?

Answer 3

They show an enhanced tendency to feel that emotion. This result is consistent with the James-Lange theory.

Question 4

According to Schachter and Singer’s theory, the intensity of an emotion depends on your ___ and your identification of which emotion you feel depends on your _____.

Answer 4

physiological arousal … appraisal of the situation

Question 5

To what extent do facial expressions of emotion differ among human cultures?

Answer 5

People anywhere can recognize facial expressions with greater than chance accuracy, but they are more accurate with faces from their own culture.

Question 6

Why is the ability to recognize the facial expressions of emotions not good evidence for the idea of basic emotions?

Answer 6

We also recognize facial expressions of other states that we don’t regard as emotions.

Question 7

What is one apparent advantage of feeling sad?

Answer 7

In some ways sad people are more realistic.

Question 8

A moral dilemma such as the trolley dilemma or the footbridge dilemma pits two considerations against each other. What are they?

Answer 8

The desire to help more people versus the guilt you would feel from hurting one person

Question 9

Tests of emotional intelligence ask questions about how someone would feel in various situations. Which of the following is a significant difficulty with such tests?

Answer 9

It is hard to be sure what is the correct answer.

Question 10

Measuring emotions.

Emotions are inferred, not observed directly. Researchers rely on self-reports, observations of behavior, and

Answer 10

measurements of physiological changes.

Question 11

Emotions and autonomic arousal.

Many emotional states are associated with increased arousal of the sympathetic nervous system

Answer 11

which readies the body for emergency action.

Question 12

James-Lange theory.

According to the James-Lange theory of emotions, the feeling aspect of an emotion is

Answer 12

the perception of a change in the body’s physiological state.

Question 13

Evidence supporting the James-Lange theory.

People who lose control of their autonomic responses generally report weakened emotional feelings.

Answer 13

Molding someone’s posture and breathing pattern into the pattern typical for some emotion facilitates that emotion.

Question 14

Schachter and Singer’s theory.
According to Schachter and Singer’s theory, autonomic arousal determines the intensity of an emotion but does not determine which emotion occurs.

Answer 14

We identify an emotion on the basis of how we perceive the situation.

Question 15

Do we have basic emotions?
Certain psychologists propose that we have a few basic emotions. The main evidence is that people throughout the world can recognize certain emotional expressions. However, we seldom recognize an emotion from facial expression alone; we also consider posture, context, tone of voice, and other information. Using such information, we can identify a wider range of emotional states than just a few.

Answer 15

The fact that we recognize expressions of disgust and surprise is not decisive for calling them emotions, because we also recognize expressions of sleepiness and confusion, which most people do not regard as emotions.

Question 16

Alternative views.

Instead of speaking of a list of basic emotions, an alternative is to consider emotions as

Answer 16

varying along continuous dimensions.

Question 17

Usefulness of emotions.

Emotions call our attention to important information and

Answer 17

adjust our priorities to our situation in life.

Question 18

Emotions and moral decisions.

When we face a moral decision, we often react emotionally.

Answer 18

Those quick emotional feelings may be an evolved mechanism to steer our behavior toward what is usually the right choice.

Question 19

Effects of brain damage.

People with brain damage that impairs their emotions have trouble making good decisions

Answer 19

especially in situations related to moral treatment of others.

Question 20

Emotional intelligence.
People need skills to judge other people’s emotions and the probable emotional outcomes of their own actions. The ability to handle such issues may constitute “emotional intelligence.”

Answer 20

However, it is not clear that current measurements of emotional intelligence predict much that we could not already predict based on academic intelligence and certain aspects of personality.