EMOTIONS
What is Emotion?
In psychology, emotion is often defined as a
complex state of feeling that results in physical
and psychological changes that influence thought
and behavior.
Emotionality is associated with a range of
psychological phenomena including
temperament, personality, mood and motivation.
According to author David G. Meyers, human
emotion involves "...physiological arousal,
expressive behaviors, and conscious
experience."
The Functions of Emotions
Safety of individual. Virtually all emotions are
fundamentally about physical safety and well-
being or social safety and well-being.
Emotions almost always arise in response to
things that happen—or might happen—in our
physical environment or our social environment.
Can motivate us. When faced with a nerve-
wracking task, you might feel a lot of anxiety
about whether you will perform well and how the
task will impact your final evaluation/appraisal.
Because of these emotional responses, you might
be more likely to perform at your best. Since you
experienced a particular emotion, you had the
motivation to take action and do something
The Functions of Emotions
Reduce negativity and enhance positivity.
We take certain actions in order to experience
positive emotions and minimize the probability of
feeling negative emotions e.g., you might seek
out social activities or hobbies that provide you
with a sense of happiness, contentment, and
excitement. On the other hand, you would
probably avoid situations that might potentially
lead to boredom, sadness, or anxiety.
Preparing us for action. Emotions act as a link
between events in our environment and our
responses e.g., if you saw an angry dog charging
toward you, your emotional reaction (fear) would
be associated with physiological arousal of the
The Functions of Emotions
Shaping our future behavior. Emotions
promote learning that will help us make
appropriate responses in the future. For instance,
your emotional response to unpleasant events
teaches you to avoid similar circumstances in the
future.
Helping us interact more effectively with
others. We often communicate the emotions we
experience through our verbal and nonverbal
behaviors, making our emotions obvious to
observers. These behaviors can act as a signal to
observers, allowing them to understand better
what we are experiencing and to help them
predict our future behavior.
Range of Emotions
(Labelling our feelings)
How many emotions we feel, can you
name some?
to list the words in the English language
that have been used to describe
emotions, we would end up with at least
500 examples
list of basic emotions would include, at a
minimum, happiness, anger, fear,
sadness, and disgust.
Other lists are broader, including
emotions such as surprise, contempt,
Range of Emotions
(Labelling our feelings)
One difficulty in defining a basic set of emotions is that
substantial differences exist in descriptions of emotions
among various cultures.
For instance, Germans report experiencing
schadenfreude, a feeling of pleasure over another
person’s difficulties,
Japanese experience hagaii, a mood of vulnerable
heartache colored by frustration.
Do these schadenfreude and hagaii,
exist in our culture?
fitting a particular emotion into a linguistic category to
describe that emotion may make it easier to discuss,
anticipate, and perhaps experience
The Evolutionary Theory
in the 1870s, Charles Darwin proposed that emotions
evolved because they had adaptive value.
For example, fear evolved because it helped people to
act in ways that enhanced their chances of survival.
Darwin believed that facial expressions of emotion are
innate, that allow people to quickly judge someone’s
hostility or friendliness and to communicate intentions
to others.
All human cultures share several primary emotions,
including happiness, surprise, disgust, anger, fear, and
sadness.
All other emotions result from blends and different
intensities of these primary emotions. For example,
terror is a more intense form of the primary emotion of
fear.
The James-Lange Theory
1880s, two theorists, psychologist William James
and physiologist Carl Lange
Emotional experience is a reaction to bodily events
occurring as a result of an external situation
“I feel sad because I am crying”
Emotional experience is very simple, a reaction to
instinctive bodily events that occur as a response
to some situation or event in the environment.
This view is summarized in James’s statement,
“We feel sorry because we cry, angry because we
strike, afraid because we tremble” .
The James-Lange Theory
People experience emotion because they perceive their
bodies’ physiological responses to external events.
According to this theory, people don’t cry because
they feel sad. Rather, people feel sad because they
cry, and, likewise, they feel happy because they
smile. This theory suggests that different physiological
states correspond to different experiences of emotion
Visceral Response
Instinctive response of crying at a loss leads us to feel sorrow,
that striking out at someone who frustrates us results in
our feeling anger, that trembling at an alarming threat
causes us to feel fear. They suggested that for every major
emotion there is an accompanying physiological or
“gut” reaction of internal organs, called a visceral
The James-Lange Theory
Limitations
For the theory to be valid, visceral changes would have to
occur relatively quickly because we experience some emotions
—such as fear upon hearing a stranger rapidly approaching on
a dark night—almost instantaneously. Yet emotional
experiences frequently occur even before there is time for
certain physiological changes to be set into motion. Because
of the slowness with which some visceral changes take place,
it is hard to see how they could be the source of immediate
emotional experience.
Physiological arousal does not invariably produce emotional
experience. For example, a person who is jogging has an
increased heartbeat and respiration rate as well as many of
the other physiological changes associated with certain
emotions. Yet joggers typically do not think of such changes in
terms of emotion. Visceral changes by themselves may not be
sufficient to produce emotion.
The James-Lange Theory
Limitations
Our internal organs produce a relatively limited range of
sensations. Although some types of physiological changes
are associated with specific emotional experiences, it is
difficult to imagine how each of the numerous emotions that
people are capable of experiencing could be the result of a
unique visceral change. Many emotions actually are
associated with relatively similar sorts of visceral changes,
a fact that contradicts the James-Lange theory.
The Cannon Bard Theory
The physiologist Walter Cannon, posed three main arguments
against James-Lange theory
1. People can experience physiological arousal without
experiencing emotion, such as when they have been running.
(The racing heart in this case is not an indication of fear.)
2. Physiological reactions happen too slowly to cause
experiences of emotion, which occur very rapidly. For example,
when someone is in a dark alley alone, a sudden sound usually
provokes an immediate experience of fear, while the physical
"symptoms” of fear generally follow that feeling.
3. People can experience very different emotions even when
they have the same pattern of physiological arousal. For
example, a person may have a racing heart and rapid breathing
both when he is angry and when he is afraid
The Cannon-Bard Theory
Cannon proposed his own theory of emotion in the 1920s
He believed that both physiological arousal and
emotional experience are produced simultaneously,
Neither one causes the other.
The brain gets a message that causes the experience of
emotion at the same time that the autonomic nervous
system gets a message that causes physiological arousal
The theory states that after we perceive an emotion-
producing stimulus, the thalamus is the initial site of the
emotional response.
Next, the thalamus sends a signal to the autonomic
nervous system, thereby producing a visceral response.
At the same time, the thalamus also communicates a
message to the cerebral cortex regarding the nature of the
emotion being experienced.
The Schachter-Singer
Theory
In the 1960s, Stanley Schachter and Jerome Singer
Two factor theory
Emotions are determined jointly by a non-specific kind
of physiological arousal and its cognitive
interpretation, based on environmental cues
This approach to explaining emotions emphasizes that we
identify the emotion we are experiencing by observing our
environment and comparing ourselves with others.
When people perceive physiological symptoms of arousal,
they look for an environmental explanation of this arousal.
The label people give an emotion depends on what they
find in their environment
This theory suggests that the physiological arousal occurs
first, and then the individual must identify the reason
behind this arousal in order to experience and label it as an
emotion.
The Schachter-Singer
Theory
Schachter and Singer’s classic experiment found evidence
for this hypothesis.
The purpose of the experiment was to determine how the
participants would react emotionally to the confederate’s
behavior. When they were asked to describe their own
emotional state at the end of the experiment, the
participants exposed to the angry confederate reported
that they felt angry, while those exposed to the happy
confederate reported feeling happy.
Participants turned to the environment and the behavior of
others for an explanation of the physiological arousal they
were experiencing.
Schachter and Singer agree with the James-Lange theory
that people infer emotions when they experience
physiological arousal. But they also agree with the Cannon-
Bard theory that the same pattern of physiological arousal
Comparison of Three Models of
Emotions
Facial Feedback Theory
According to the facial feedback theory, emotion is the
experience of changes in our facial muscles. In other
words, when we smile, we then experience pleasure, or
happiness. When we frown, we then experience sadness.
It is the change in our facial muscles that cue our brains
and provide the basis of our emotions. Just as there are
an unlimited number of muscle configurations in our face,
so there are seemingly unlimited number of emotions.
EXAMPLE: You are walking down a dark alley late at night.
You hear footsteps behind you and your eyes widen, your
teeth clench and your brain interprets these facial
changes as the expression of fear. Therefore you
experience the emotion of fear
Emotional Intelligence (EI)
The ability to perceive, control and evaluate
emotions. Some researchers suggest that
emotional intelligence can be learned and
strengthened, while others claim it is an inborn
characteristic
Model of Emotional
Intelligence
EI
Self-Awareness: The ability to recognize and
understand your moods, emotions, and drives, as well
as their effects on others .
Self-Regulation: The ability to control or redirect
impulses and moods.
Motivation: A passion to work for reasons that go
beyond money or status. A tendency to pursue goals
with energy and persistence.
Empathy: The ability to understand the emotional
makeup of other people.
Social Skill: Proficiency in managing relationships
and building networks.