Lecture 5 - Basic Emotion Theories Flashcards
Basic Emotion Theories (BET)
- Ekman, Izard, Levenson & Panksepp’s theories are all examples of ‘Basic Emotion
Theories’ - The assigned paper focuses on the central themes of these models and identifies points of
similarity and difference and considers which pieces of the model are most useful
What makes a
useful model?
All models are wrong, but some are useful. George E. P. Box
-A useful model makes
clear, testable predictions
-A useful model will guide
and influence research
-Determining which parts of
a model are right or wrong
is an empirical question
Three things a strong model of basic emotions should do
(Tracy & Randles)
1. Allow us to figure out if X (some
psychological entity)- is a basic emotion
2. If we already know that X is a basic
emotion, a strong model should help us to
learn more about X
3. Provide a set of instructions for how to go
about studying newly uncovered emotional
states
Basic emotion theories
- Basic emotion models propose a limited number of
biologically and psychologically ”basic” emotions
such as fear, anger, joy, sadness - These basic emotions are discrete and irreducible
but can be combined to form complex emotions - These emotions have innate neural substrates and
when elicited, lead to organized and recurring
patterns of behavior that are universal - These emotions evolved to respond to
fundamental life tasks - They have distinctive causes (eliciting
stimuli) and characteristic physiological
correlates - They are automatically elicited by these
causes
Basic emotion vs
dimensional models
- Basic emotion models can be generally
distinguished from dimensional models - Dimensional models define emotions based on their
position in two or more dimensions e.g. arousal and
valence - Dimensional models may suggest that the
underlying neural mechanisms of emotion are
shared - Basic emotion models identify categorically
different emotions with discrete neural substrates
See list of the basic emotions for each theorist
What is a basic emotion?
- All these theorists agree that basic emotions are
- discrete
- have a fixed set of neural and bodily components
- have a fixed feeling or motivational component that has been evolutionarily selected because it
is adaptive - ‘psychologically primitive’ (but this means different things to different theorists)
– are found in subcortical brain structures
– most strongly expressed early in development or in response to an immediate crisis - can interact with other basic emotions and higher cognitive processes to produce complex
emotional experience
What is evidence of a basic emotion?
- All theorists agree that the existence of a
basic emotion is supported by - generalization across species i.e. observing the
emotion in nonhuman animals - the existence of neurons that are dedicated to
producing that emotion - Panksepp alone adds the requirement
- basic emotions must be located in subcortical
structures
How do we observe the emotion in
another animal?
This assumes emotions are hardwired at
the level of individual neurons.
What about animals with very different
kinds of neural systems?
Is pride a basic emotion?
* Tracy & Randles suggest pride ‘passes the
test’ of having a distinct
feeling/motivational component
* Suggest it is spontaneously shown in
‘pride-eliciting’ situations across cultures
suggesting it is universal
* Suggest that dominance displays in nonhuman animals may be related to pride
By what objective criteria?
How do we define ‘pride-eliciting’
situations?
What criteria can be used to assess this?
What is the function of a basic emotion?
- Basic emotions must have direct causal
powers over motivation and behavior, at
least early in development: Automaticity - Based on evolutionary principles that
emotions evolved to facilitate adaptive
coping: Functional definitions - As higher cognitive functioning develops, so
to does emotion regulation, so effects of
emotion become more probabilistic than
deterministic : Volitional control
Does pride have a distinct function?
* ‘Pride likely promotes social status
through several causal pathways: the
reinforcement of achievement behaviors
which in turn boost status; the motivation
of perseverance at difficult tasks; and the
communication of an individual’s
deservedness of higher status
Basic emotion theories can prompt a
functional definition of pride
How can we distinguish among basic
emotions?
- How can we know that different emotions are discrete?
- All agree that a basic emotion should have discrete antecedents, neural networks,
physiology, and behavioral output - Challenging to find this evidence in humans because of the challenges of studying the
brain and in particular, establishing causality - Panksepp argues for the necessity of research in non-human animals
- Ekman suggests focusing on studying the discrete events that elicit emotions
- Levenson points out that observing emotions across cultures does not mean that there
must be a conserved neural network. This is because similar environments produce
similar culturally learned responses and emotion expression associations can be
transmitted across cultures. This argues against the idea that ’universality’ of emotions is
evidence for a ‘genetic’ underpinning
These are all different but potentially fruitful research directions
Can pride be distinguished from other
emotions?
* Pride does not feature in any basic emotion theories
* Tracy & Randles suggest that pride has discrete non-verbal behaviors but that the events
that elicit pride may be less specific to pride e.g. they might also elicit happiness, although
likely not vice versa
* Is happiness a basic emotion or a dimension?
* Tracy & Randles suggest that this focus on discreteness is useful because it pushes new
thinking about the nature of emotion
What are the cognitive prerequisites of basic
emotions?
- All agree that basic emotions are elicited by
some kind of core affect program which evolved
to elicit adaptive responses to fixed prototypes of
antecedent stimuli: Global co-ordination - Ekman says this must be so for emotions to
trigger cohesive responses similarly across
individuals and cultures. There must be a
hardwired program in the brain. : This emphasizes the stability of
emotional responses but fails to
account for the flexibility and variability
inherent to emotion - All agree that novel stimuli can be added to this
program, as can novel behavioural outputs: Generalization/learning
What are the cognitive pre-requisites for
pride
* Pride is a ‘self-conscious’ emotion that is
elicited by high-level cognitive appraisals
* Pride is a ‘cognitive-dependent’ emotion,
which contrasts with ‘cognitionindependent’ basic emotions
A hard distinction is drawn based on
the requirement of cognition at any
level, marking a qualitative difference
between different kinds of emotions.
Is this useful or valid?
Basic emotion theories and Anderson &
Adolph’s framework for emotion
- Anderson & Adolph’s build on the the BET
tradition but also depart from it in
important ways - We can recognize many elements of
Anderson & Adolph’s framework in these
BET theories e.g. automaticity, global
coordination, use of evolutionarily derived
functional definitions - There are also key differences
- BET models focus on stability and don’t address
individual differences - A & A emphasize flexibility and easily account for
variability in emotion within and across individuals
(e.g. via effects of context & volitional control) - A & A formalize the importance of functional
definitions and locate all stimuli and outputs in
equivalent qualitative functions (e.g. vs BET theory
distinction between cognitive and non-cognitive) - A & A make explicit the properties of emotion
states while leaving room for variance so that
they may be broadly applicable to a range of
specific emotion states - A & A provide a framework that is separable from
physical instantiation vs. e.g. Panksepp’s
insistence on subcortical basis of emotion or the
broad consensus that basic emotions must have
a discrete neural mechanism
Panksepp’s Thesis
- ‘Many choose to ignore the likelihood that
raw affective experiences- primal
manifestations of ”mind”- are natural
functions of mammalian brains…’ - ‘…higher aspects of the human mind are
still strongly linked to the basic
neuropsychological processes of “lower
animal minds”
Panksepp’s Goal
* ‘… to encourage more open-minded discussions
about the variety of primary-process affective
processes in mammalian brains- emotional,
homeostatic and sensory feelings- and to motivate
young scholars to avoid the grand mistakes of the
the 20th century, which in a sense were similar to
those bequeathed to us by Rene Descartes.’ (i.e.
dualism)
* ‘… we can scientifically understand the foundations of
the human mind by studying the basic subcortical
emotion systems that can be well studied in animals’
Panksepp’s prescription
* We need more research using ‘dual-aspect approaches’ that follow the scientific method
(dual-aspect theory holds that the mental and the physical are different aspects of a
unitary reality)
* For example:
using conditioned place preference or conditioned place aversion to test the hedonic
properties of a stimulus
testing if ’emotional response circuits’ are rewarding or punishing
using emotional vocalizations as proxies for feeling states
Tickling rats
Panksepp’s Theory
* Primary emotional operating systems
correspond to specific neural circuits
* Circuits are defined by genetics,
refined by experience
* The circuits generate well-organized
behaviour sequences
* (Electrical) stimulation of the neural
circuit will evoke the behaviour
* Each system is assigned a specific
anatomical location (here, in
hypothalamus or thalamus)
* Systems overlap and interact
* These interactions can be excitatory or
inhibitory
* The theory equates these systems with
the ‘primary-process level’
‘The brain is evolutionarily layered’
* Panksepp references ideas about how brain complexity evolved and how
this then relates to how the brain functions
‘What came first remains low and medial in the brain; what came later was
added on the outside (more laterally)
This approach parcellates brain functions and assigns them to physical
locations in the brain
* Panksepp argues that any understanding of emotion must be based on first
understanding evolutionarily conserved ‘primal affective’ functions
‘The primal affective mechanisms exist in some of the most ancient regions
of the brain, where evolutionary homologies are striking.’
‘If we don’t understand the foundational level- the primary-process mechanisms of
BrainMind- then we will never have a clear image of how our emotional feelings
evolved and how higher brain mechanism work… the secondary and tertiary
functions of the brain rely critically on unconditional networks that evolved earlier’
- Panksepp argues strongly for the importance of ‘primal’ emotions in
generating emotional experience
‘ ..diverse primal affective feelings, homologous in all mammals, have
their origins in subcortical structures, and our working hypothesis is
that they are re-represented, in nested hierarchies in higher brain
regions, and that basic learning, like classical conditioning, is
dependent on such bottom-up hierarchical controls’
‘…in modern human emotion-affect studies, we must question the
excessive weight of explanatory power that has been placed on
poorly defined ”cognitions” in lieu of a full consideration of the primal
nature of our emotions and motivations”
Panksepp’s central claims
1) Brain networks that are located in evolutionarily old brain regions that are similar in all
mammals control basic emotional instinctual behaviours
2) The ‘lower’ (i.e. sub-cortical and brain-stem) regions of the brain are more important
for generating emotional feelings than ‘higher’ (i.e. cortical) regions of the brain
3) Brain regions or networks that generate emotional instinctual behaviours closely
correspond to the feelings associated with these states
4) The basic neurochemistry (i.e. neuromodulators and – e.g. opioids, oxytocin, dopamine)
of emotional feelings is the same across all mammals
- Panksepp proposes that studying the ‘primary-process systems’ will lead
to scientifically valid general definition of emotions - He outlines 7 basic emotional systems and assigns to each ‘key brain
areas’ and ‘key neuromodulators’
See list
Panksepp’s legacy
* The details of his theory are debatable and no longer widely accepted
* His work has inspired much research into the neural mechanisms of emotion. When he
started his career, this was not considered a serious topic of research.
* His work has been influential in psychiatry, providing a framework to understand neural
mechanisms of mental disorders such as depression and anxiety and to target treatments
to the underlying emotional disturbances
- He also used his research to advocate for
improving the treatment of animals
’If the experiences of affects resembling our own
anger and despair, desire and joy do exist in
other animals, then these issues must figure in
our treatment of experimental animals. To treat
animals as if they had no such feelings, if they
do, is an ethical mistake…I think the scientific
knowledge about our shared affective heritage
can justify the sacrifices that are required’
