Introduction to emotion Flashcards
what is an emotion?
Oxford Eng Dictionary: ‘a strong feeling deriving from one’s circumstances, mood/r’ships with others, instinctive/intuitive feeling as distinguished from reasoning/knowledge’
– Occurs in response to an event
– Also, subject experience – physical changes
– Indv diffs
stages of emotional processing
regulation
affective state
appraisal
stimulus presentation
the expression of the emotions in man and animals (Darwin, 1972)
Suggested emotional expressions conserved across humans in diff cultures and of diff ages
Emotions evolved for adaptive value in dealing with fundamental life stats (aids survival)
Cross-species similarities in emotional expression (emotions evolved)
Emotions signify what the animal is likely to do next – if behavs beneficial they become effective means of communication and original function/associated action may be lost – opposing messages often signalled by opposing movements/postures
Animals convert emotion based on action about to take
basic emotions exist across cultures
(Anger, disgust, fear, happiness, sadness, surprise)
Basic emotions innate neural and bodily states that are elicited rapidly and automatically in response to certain stimuli/stations
Should be universal, automatic and have discrete neural and/ bodily state associated with them
basic emotions exist across cultures - Ekman and Friesen (1971/2)
Spontaneous expressions
Tribesmen from Papua New Guinea posed emotions - shown to American undergrads – could identify expressions – never met – can be generalised
indv functions of emotions
Expressions change info taken in, e.g.:
- Widening of eyes in fear helps to detect threat
- Wrinkling of eyes and nose in disgust helps us avoid ingesting contaminating stimuli
- Senses more alert
Emotions adapt behaviour to help achieve goals
indv functions of emotions - Oatley and Johnson-Laird (1987)
Cognitive Theory of Emotion
- Emotions evolved to help indvs chances of survival by managing behaviour to meet one’s goals
- Specific emotions occur to adapt behaviour when progress on specific types of goals interrupted
basic emotions exist across cultures but there are culture-specific ‘display rules’
Diffs in display of emotions that may be culturally bound
Gender diffs in emotion reg and expression believed to be rooted in bio and social/cultural factors
what sort of evidence would suggest that emotions are innate?
Blind people use same emotional expressions
- Expressions hard-wired into genes
- High degree of correlation
Babies expressions – crying and smiles
- Facial expressions develop in the womb
classification of emotions
Simple dual-system theories, e.g. Schneirla (1959) categorise emotions in terms of approach and withdrawal
Jeffrey Gray (1970/80s) - Behavioural approach (reward) and inhibition (punishment) systems (distinct brain circuits)
Davidson’s ‘valence-asymmetry hypothesis’
- Left-sided prefrontal cortex = approach-related (pos) goals and right-sided PFC = goals requiring inhibition and withdrawal (neg)
- Left and right hem involved in diff emotions
circumplex model
(James Russell, 1980)
some neg emotions can be associated with approach responses so more complex models have been proposed, with 2 axes/dimensions – arousal and valence
Widespread support
the role of facial expressions of emotion
Lack of replication of embodying emotion study
emotion expression - Ekman et al. (1980)
Do facial expressions reflect emotional experience?
Ps watched movies (pos and neg)
- Self-reported subjective experience
- Facial expressions while watching movies videoed
- Coded using FACS – Facial Action Coding System
Ps who showed particular smile movement (‘action unit 12’) reported more happiness
Ps who showed more ‘neg’ facial movements reported more neg emotion
emotion expressions - Fridlund (1991)
Are facial expressions shaped by social context?
- Ps viewed ‘pleasant’ video
- 4 conditions:
1. Alone
2. Alone but believing friend nearby doing another task
3. Alone but believing friend also watching same tape
4. Watching tape with friend - Smiling measured by EMG
- Smiling increased as settings became more social
- Not as function of self-reported emotion
Smiling affected by context (audience) more than by actual felt emotion?
- Argues facial expressions communicate motives, rather than emotion states
emotion expression - Hess et al. (1995)
Similar paradigm to Fridlund
But
- Also varied intensity of emotional stimuli
- Slightly funny v very funny
- And r’ship to other P
- Friend or stranger
Measured:
- EMG
- Skin conductance
- Self-reported emotions
Findings:
- Intensity of smiling affected by sociality of context
- But also (more strongly) by funniness of film
- Social context and internal emotion state play a role
- But effects only emerge with friends
- Emotion expression influenced by emotion state, social context, and r’ship with audience
measuring emotional expressions - Ekman and friesen (1978)
Developed FACS
Other tools also developed
EEG
- Facial EMG measures subtle activity in corrugator (frown) and zygomatic (smile) muscles
- EMG pos correlated with emotion perception ability and shows gender diffs (fem > male)
- Measures muscle activity by detecting and amplifying tiny electrical impulses that are generated by muscle fibres when they contract
measuring emotional expressions - Kunecke et al. (2014)
Pos correlation between activity in corrugator and average emotion classification accuracy in response to angry and sad faces
Not sig in response to happy faces
emotions also social
Emotional expressions key form of interpersonal communication, so it’s imp to consider social functions of emotions
social functions of emotions
Wide eyes in fear = threat signal, white of eye helps to quickly direct attention to gaze location
Happy/angry = reinforcers (distinguished from 3 months old) – changing an infant’s behav (operant conditioning)
Sadness = elicits caregiving – increase affiliative bonds when support needed
James-Lange theory (1885)
Emotions = sets of bodily responses that occur in response to emotive stimuli
Diff patterns of bodily change code diff emotions
‘The bodily changes follow directly the perception of the exciting fact, and our feeling of the changes as they occur is the emotion’
facial expressions can be differentiated on the basis of evoked HR response - Critchley et al. (2005)
HR for correctly identified sad and angry faces > happy or disgusted faces
Expressions of disgust mis-identified as sadness/anger evoked HR changes more typical of sadness and anger than disgust, as predicted by the James-Lange model
Cannon-Bard theory (1920s)
Cannon argued against James because:
- Emotions occurred even if brain disconnected from viscera (internal organs)
- Bodily changes not emotion-specific
- Bodily changes too slow
- Stimulation of bodily change doesn’t emotions
But
- Emotions occurred even if brain disconnected from viscera (less intense)
- Bodily changes not emotion-specific (they are partly)
- Bodily changes too slow
- Stimulation of bodily change doesn’t emotions (i.e. CCK panic)
Emotions depend on brain mechanisms
2-factor theory of emotion - Schachter and Singer (1962)
Gave (misinformed) Ps adrenaline injections; resulting arousal/emotions interpreted on basis of contextual cues (provided by stooges)
Emotion is function of both cog factors (appraisal) and phys arousal
‘People search immediate env for emotionally relevant cues to label and interpret unexplained phys arousal’
appraisal and emotion - Lazarus (1991)
Relational meaning
- Emotions not caused by events in env
- /by intra-psychic factors (i.e. within indv)
- But by person-env r’ships that can change over time and circumstances
- Emotion rooted in appraisal