Emotion and Affect

Question 1

What is emotion?

Answer 1

• A conscious state that includes an evaluative reaction to some event

Question 2

What is the common sense theory for emotion?

Answer 2

• Pathway: stimulus leads to conscious experience which leads to physiological arousal
  e. g. scary stimulus causes the conscious experience of fear which leads to the ANS stimulation creating a physiological response (e.g. increase in HR)

Question 3

What is the James-Lange Theory for emotion?

Answer 3

• Stimulus leads to physiological arousal which leads to conscious experience of emotion
  e. g. scary stimulus causes a physiological response (increase in HR etc) which in turn leads to a conscious emotion (e.g. fear)
• Not supported by research but gave rise to facial feedback hypothesis which states that facial expressions modify the intensity of emotions

Question 4

What is the Cannon-Bard Theory?

Answer 4

• Stimulus leads to a simultanous physiological arousal and conscious experience of fear
  e. g. scary stimulus causes you to simultaneously become physiologically aroused as well have the conscious experience of fear

Question 5

What is the Schachter-Singer Theory?

Answer 5

• Also called the two factor theory
• When you are exposed to a stimulus you experience physiological arousal and you put a cognitive label on that stimulus which leads to the conscious experience of emotion
  e. g. a scary stimulus leads you to become physiologically aroused as well as cognitively label the stimulus as scary which causes you to experience the conscious experience of fear

Question 6

What is misattribution of arousal?

Answer 6

• There is an excitation transfer
  e. g. suspension bridge study showed that men interviewed on high suspension bridges reported greater attraction than those on lower bridges as they were experiencing more physiological arousal which is labelled as love

Question 7

Can you change negative arousal into positive emotions?

Answer 7

• The bridge study is the only study that suggests this is the case
• It is much more likely that there is the transfer of positive to positive and negative to negative

Question 8

What are affective drives?

Answer 8

• They originate in the lower brain (shared between humans and other mammals)
• They are not mutually exclusive
• Includes:

1. Seeking:
   - curiosity, approach behaviours
   - with positive emotions = a sense of purpose
   - with negative emotions = impetus to change a situation
2. Rage:
   - Anger, frustration
   - Propels an animal toward offending stimulus
3. Fear:
   - A negative affective state
   - Promotes escape
4. Lust
   - Sexual desire
   - One of the sources of love
5. Care:
   - Nurturing
   - Positive affective state (relaxed)
   - Another source of love
6. Panic/grief:
   - Caused by seperation from others
   - Facilitates social bonding
   - Another source of love
   - Reunion replaces panic/grief with care
7. Play:
   - Positive affective state
   - Can resemble aggression but all players are enjoying themselves
   - A main source of friendship

Question 9

What are the 7 basic human emotions?

Answer 9

1. Joy/Happiness
2. Contempt
3. Surprise
4. Sadness
5. Anger:
   - Driven by affective drive of rage
   - often considered maladaptive today but it is part of the pathway to social change
6. Disgust:
   - strong negative feelings of repugance and revulsion
   - not associated with emotional affective drives (it is a sensory affect)
7. Fear