Week 10 Flashcards
what is an emotion?
- multidimensional: exist as subjective, biological, purposive, and social phenomena
Feeling component of emotion
- subjective experience
- in both intensity and quality, emotion is felt and experienced at the phenomenological level (awareness)
- is rooted in cognitive or mental processes
bodily arousal component of emotion
- physiological activation
- bodily preparation for action
- motor responses
Purposive component of emotion
- goal-directed motivational state
- functional aspect
Social-expressive component of emotion
- social communication
- facial and vocal expression
relationship between emotion and motivation
- emotions are one type of motive: the energize and direct behaviour; it is the primary motivational system
- they serve as an ongoing readout system
- they indicate how well or poorly personal adaptation is going
- positive emotions: all is well
- negative emotions: all is not well
- they differ from needs and cognition, since thy reflect the satisfied versus frustrated status of other motives
what causes an emotion
- there is a biological perspective and a cognitive perspective
biological perspective of emotion
(According to Panksepp)
- because emotional states are often difficult to verbalize, they must therefore have origins that are noncognitive (not language based)
- emotional experience can be induced be noncognitive [rpcedures, such as electrical stimulation of the brain or activity of the facial musculature
- emotions occur in infants and nonhuman animals
cognitive perspective of emotion
- cognitive activity is a necessary prerequisite to emotion
- it is the cognitive appraisal of the meaning of an event (rather than the event itself) that sets the stage for emotional experience
- attributions, not an event or an outcome, give life to emotions
Two-systems view of emotion
- human beings have two synchronous systems that activate and regulate emotion (Buck)
- Biological system: innate, spontaneous, physiological system that reacts involuntarily to emotional stimuli; sensory information is processed rapidly, automatically, and unconsciously by subcortical structures and pathways
- cognitive system: an experience-based system that reacts interpretatively and socially; sensory information is processed evaluatively, interpretatively, and consciously by cortical pathways
- both systems are complementary: they work together to provide a highly adaptive, two-system emotion mechanism
basic emotions
- innate rather than acquired or learned through experience or socialization
- arise from the same circumstances for all people
- expressed uniquely and distinctively (i.e. through a universal facial expression)
- evoke a distinctive and highly predictable physiological patterned response
negative basic emotions
organized around the themes of threat and harm
- fear: motivates defense
- anger: motivates a fight-response and provides a sense of control
- disgust: motivates rejection
- sadness: motivates the alleviation of distress-provoking events
positive basic emotions
organized around the themes of motive involvement and satisfaction
- joy: motivates engagement and has a soothing function
- interest: motivates exploration
coping functions of emotions
- emotion during life tasks energizes and directs behaviour in adaptive ways
- emotions are considered to serve eight different purposes
- protection (fear); destruction (anger); reproduction (joy); reunion (sadness); affiliation (acceptance); rejection (disgust); exploration (anticipation/interest); orientation (surprise)
social functions of emotion
- emotions communicate our feelings to others
- they influence how others interact with us
- they invite and facilitate social interaction
- they create, maintain and dissolve relationships
5 strategies to control emotions
- flow a typical emotion episode and five opportunities to regulate that emotion
1. situation selection
2. situation modification (significant life event)
3. attentional focus (attention
4. reappraisal (cognitive appraisal)
5. suppression (bodily response) - emotional activation and ongoing flow of that emotional episode
difference between emotion and mood
- different antecedents
- emotions emerge from significant life situations and from appraisals of their significance
- moods emerge from processes that are ill-defined and oftentimes unknown - different action-specificity
- emotions mostly influence behaviour and direct specific courses of action
- moods mostly influence cognition and direct what the person thinks about - different time course
- emotions emanate from short-lived events that last for seconds or minutes
- moods emanate from mental events that last for hours or days
Arnold’s appraisal theory of emotion
- perception of an object or event produces a good or bad appraisal
- this appraisal generates emotion
- this emotion expresses itself in action
Complex appraisal model
- expends the general good/bad appraisal into a more complex conceptualization of the appraisal process
- evaluation of the situation relevance for one’s well-being
- evaluation of the situation as congruent with one’s goals
- evaluation of the situation as potentially affecting one’s self-esteem
- distinction between primary appraisal and secondary appraisal
emotion as a process
life event elicits primary appraisal:
- event relevant to well being? is there anything at stake during life event? potential benefit, harm, threat?
- If no coping required, no emotional episode
- if yes, ANS hyperactivity occurs to generate an impulse to action: approach potential benefit, avoid potential harm/threat
- secondary appraisal: can I cope successfully?
- if coping successful, ANS hyperactivity decreases and emotional episode ends
- if unsuccessful, AND hyperactivity remains and causes stress/anxiety
appraisal theory of emotion
- other appraisal dimensions have been considered throughout the years by different cognitive theorists
- expectancy appraisal - did I expect the event to happen?
- responsibility appraisal - who caused the event?
- legitimacy appraisal - is what happened fair? is it deserved?
- standard compatibility appraisal - is it okay on a moral level?
criticisms of appraisal theory of emotion
- processes other than appraisal contribute to emotion
- appraisals often function to intensify, rather than cause, the emotion
- while each specific emotion has a unique pattern of appraisals associated with it, the patterns of appraisals of many emotions overlap and create some confusion
- developmental differences exist among people such that children generally experience basic, general emotions, whereas socialized adult generally experience a richer variety of appraisal-specific emotions
- emotion knowledge and attributions represent additional cognitive factors beyond appraisal that affect emotion
other cognitive aspects of emotion
Emotion knowledge:
- the number of different emotions any one person can distinguish
- diversity of emotion experience comes from learning fine distinctions among emotions and the specific situations that cause them
Attributions
- the causal explanation as to why an event occurs
- outcome-dependent emotional reaction: primary appraisal of the outcome
- reason why the outcome occurred: secondary appraisal of the outcome
If outcome is positive
primary appraisal of the outcome: happiness
secondary appraisal of the outcome: pride (if attributed to an internal cause), gratitude (attributed to an external cause), hope (attributed to a stable cause)
if outcome is negative
primary appraisal of the outcome: sadness or frustration
secondary appraisal of the outcome: anger (attributed to an external, controllable cause), pity (external, uncontrollable cause), guilt (internal, controllable cause), shame (internal, uncontrollable cause)
social and cultural aspects of emotions
- social interaction contributes to a social understanding of emotion: other people are our most frequent source of day-to-day emotion; other people also affect us indirectly through emotional contagion (emotions of others create emotions in us through mimicry, feedback and contagion)
- the sociocultural context one lives in contributes to a cultural understanding of emotion (if you change the culture you live in, your emotional repertoire would also change
