What is Emotion?

Question 1

How has the importance of emotion changed throughout history in western society?

Answer 1

18th century was the ‘age of reason’, but also The Enlightenment. Early 19th century was the ‘romantic era’. Late 19th and 20th century was when science and technology started to apply to almost all aspects of life

Question 2

How has psychology changed within the last century?

Answer 2

In the first half of the last century, psychology emphasised reason, thinking and problem solving, eg Skinner who saw no role for hypothetical psychological events like feelings

Question 3

How did James define emotions in 1884?

Answer 3

External or internal event that leads to physiological change, which leads to feelings (or emotions)

Question 4

What is the behaviourist view of emotions?

Answer 4

Watson 1924, emotions are hereditary (nature over nurture), pattern-reactions that involves mechanistic changes in the body

Question 5

What is the evolutionary psychology view of emotions?

Answer 5

Cosmides and Tooby 2000, mind has many subprograms that need to be orchestrated so their joint product is functionally coordinated, which happens by a set of superordinate programs (the emotions)

Question 6

What is the philosophical perspective on emotions?

Answer 6

Emotions commonly viewed as distorters of reason. People may become more rational by freeing themselves of emotion. Hume 1739, emotions are key and direct us or tell us what to do. Evans 2002, emotions allow humans to solve the search hypothesis

Question 7

What is the ‘nature’ side of the debate for emotions?

Answer 7

Emotions as pre-determined adaptive solutions. Subject to evolutionary selection in similar manner to physical aspect of an organism. Specific neural substrates. Distinctive psychology. Discrete, universal emotions

Question 8

What is the cultural, or ‘nurture, side of the debate for emotions?

Answer 8

Emotions as a social construct. Learned. Relatively dissociable from underlying substrate. Emotions as local, difficult to define constructs

Question 9

Wat is the sociological/anthropological view of emotions?

Answer 9

Socially constructed narratives that give shape and meaning to our world. They are formed and shaped by cultures and there is an expectation of differences in emotion between cultures

Question 10

What was Kitayama et al’s study 2006?

Answer 10

Cross cultural study. Eastern cultures are more group focused so expect more socially engaged emotions (Japan studied in this study). Western cultures are more individually focused so expected to show socially disengaged emotion (America studied in this study)

Question 11

What are different ways of measuring emotion?

Answer 11

Self report of emotional state. Observation of behaviour. Physiological measures

Question 12

What are issues with self-report?

Answer 12

Question of whether people can report own emotions (censorship, lack of self-knowledge, memory). Selection for adjective checklists (what to ask, inclusion of all necessary measures). Duration of emotions

Question 13

What is the ACL?

Answer 13

The adjective check list with 300 items and 37 scales (Gough 1960)

Question 14

What is the two factor model of affect?

Answer 14

Watson et al 1988. Positive affect is the extent to which a person feels enthusiastic, active and alert. Negative affect reflects feelings of distress, anger, contempt, disgust, guilt and fear

Question 15

What is the problem with the duration of emotions?

Answer 15

Can make it harder to study. Emotions have a short duration of minutes/seconds (moods are hours or days)

Question 16

How do emotions and moods differ?

Answer 16

Emotion biases behaviour buy mood biases cognition. Emotions have specific causes by moods do not, Moods relate to long lasting neurochemical changes

Question 17

In what cases is the observation of behaviour particularly necessary in the study of emotions?

Answer 17

Psychiatric patients, developmentally delayed individuals, infants and other animals

Question 18

Why is observation necessary for psychiatric patients?

Answer 18

Self description are often not accepted. Inventories used for screening purposes. Assessment based on interview. Use of standard measures

Question 19

Why is observation necessary for developmentally delayed individuals?

Answer 19

Often overlooked by scales (primarily focus on cognitive and functional skill). Commonly have high levels of mood disorder

Question 20

Why is observation necessary for infants?

Answer 20

Test of temperament (simplification of ‘adult-like’ emotionality). Behaviour judged by mother or other individuals. Early studies suggest 9 dimensions: approach-withdrawal, adaptability, quality of mood, intensity of reaction, distractibility, persistence or attention span, rhythmicity, threshold of responsiveness, and activity level (Thomas et al 1963)

Question 21

Why is observation necessary for other animals?

Answer 21

Need more background information first. Identification of emotions requires observation, knowledge of individuals history, observation of behavioural consequences and how others react to the individual. Van Hoof’s use of cluster analyses

Question 22

What is the basis for physiological measures of emotion?

Answer 22

The belief that emotions have physiological underpinnings is ancient. Greek factors from Hippocrates believed emotional tendencies depend on 4 humours

Question 23

What are the 4 humours of the body?

Answer 23

Choleric (angry) = yellow bile. Phlegmatic (slow/lethargic) = phlegm. Melancholic (sad) = black bile. Sanguine (joyful/good-nature) = blood

Question 24

What are more modern physiological measures of emotion?

Answer 24

Focus on generalised stress and arousal levels, such as in the lie detection (polygraph) tests

Question 25

What physiological changes can be measured?

Answer 25

Skin resistance and potentials/blood pressure/ECG and hear rate/ temperature/pupillary response/salivary secretion/blood, saliva, urine analysis/gastrointestinal motility/metabolic rate/muscle tension/tremor/eye blink or movement

Question 26

Does physiology cause emotion?

Answer 26

Schachter and Singer 1962 questioned whether physiological state = emotional arousal. Harris and Katkin 1975, emotions = primarily cognitive states, not dependent on automatic arousal. However, autonomic systems effect cortical activity, attention, depression and memory (Bernston et al 2003/Nicotra et al 2006)