Chapter 12

Emotions,
Stress, and
Health
Chapter Overview
Stress and
Emotions Health
 How emotions are  Defining stress, and
related to cognition, and how it works
yet sometimes seem to
bypass cognition  How stress relates to
illness
 How emotions are
related to the body  How people can cope
with stress or reduce it
 Communicating
emotions: detecting,  Promoting health
verbal and nonverbal through pets,
expression, and the alternative medicine,
influence of culture and and stress reduction
gender
 Experiencing emotions
such as anger and
happiness
 Emotion: Arousal, Behavior, and
Cognition
Someone cuts you off on the road. You may feel the
emotion of anger. Emotions are a mix of:
How do these components
of emotion interact and
Expressive behavior: relate to each other?
yelling, accelerating  Do our thoughts trigger
our emotions, or are
they a product of our
emotions?
Bodily arousal:  How are the bodily signs
sweat, pounding heart triggered?
 How do we decide which
Conscious experience: emotion we’re feeling?
(thoughts, especially the labeling
of the emotion) An emotion is a full
What a bad driver! I am angry, body/mind/behavior
even scared; better calm down. response to a situation.
Theories of Emotion:
The Arousal and Cognition
“Chicken and Egg” Debates
 Which came first,
James-Lange the chicken
Theory:
or the egg? Or did they evolve
• body before thoughts
together?
 Which
Cannon-Bard
happensTheory:
first, the
• body
body changes
with that go with an
thoughts
emotion, or the thoughts
Singer-Schachter/Two-
(conscious awareness and
factor theory:
labeling of an emotion), or do
• body
they plustogether?
happen thoughts/label
Zajonc, LeDoux, Lazarus:
• body/brain without
conscious thoughts
 An Evolutionary Theory of the Origins
of Emotional Facial Expressions
 People blind from birth show the same
facial expressions as sighted people.
This suggests that the origin of facial
expressions must be largely genetic.
 Why would we have facial expressions
in our genetic code? Could facial
expressions improve the survival of our
ancestors?
 Perhaps sneering at someone might be
like a wolf’s snarl, warning competitors
to back off.
 The “surprised” facial expression allows
us to take in information.
 Shared smiles build protective social
bonds, which may explain why we
smile more when facing someone.
James-Lange Theory:
Body Before Thoughts
William James (1842-1910): “We feel afraid
because we tremble, sorry because we cry.”
The James-Lange theory
states that emotion is our
conscious awareness of
our physiological
responses to stimuli.
 Our body arousal
happens first, and then
the cognitive awareness
and label for the feeling:
“I’m angry.”
 According to this theory,
if something makes us
smile, we may then feel
happy.
Cannon-Bard Theory: Simultaneous Body
Response and Cognitive Experience
The Cannon-Bard theory Cannon-Bard Theory
asserts that we have a  Emotions are not just a
conscious/cognitive separate mental
experience of an experience. When our
emotion at the same body responses are
time as our body is blocked, emotions do not
responding, not feel as intense.
afterward.  Cannon and Bard’s theory
suggests that the physical
 Human body responses and psychological
run parallel to the experience of emotion
cognitive responses happen at the same time
rather than causing and that one does not
them. cause the other.
Schachter-Singer “Two-factor” Theory:
Emotion = Body Plus a Cognitive Label
The Schachter-Singer Like the James-Lange theory, the Schachter-
“two-factor” theory Singer theory proposes that people do infer
suggests that emotions emotions based on physiological responses.
do not exist until we add The critical factor is the situation and the
a label to whatever body cognitive interpretation that people use to label
sensations we are that emotion.
feeling. Like the Cannon-Bard theory, the Schachter-
Singer theory also suggests that similar
physiological responses can produce varying
 Schachter and Singer’s emotions. For example, if you experience a
theory draws on both the racing heart and sweating palms during an
James-Lange theory and important math exam, you will probably identify
the Cannon-Bard theory the emotion as anxiety. If you experience the
of emotion. same physical responses on a date with your
significant other, you might interpret those
responses as love, affection, or arousal.
 Richard Lazarus:
Cognition Appraisal Theory
The psychologist Richard Lazarus’s research has shown that
people’s experience of emotion depends on the way they
appraise or evaluate the events around them.

According to this theory, the sequence of events first involves a stimulus, followed
by thought which then leads to the simultaneous experience of a physiological
response and the emotion.
For example, if you encounter a bear in the woods, you might immediately begin to
think that you are in great danger. This then leads to the emotional experience of
fear and the physical reactions associated with the fight-or-flight response.
If Tracy is driving on a winding road by the edge of a high cliff, she may be
concerned about the danger of the road. Her passenger, on the other hand, thinks
about the beauty of the view. Tracy will probably feel frightened, while her
passenger may feel exhilarated.
 Facial Feedback Theory of Emotion
The Facial Feedback Facial expressions are not only the results of our emotions
Theory holds that but are also capable of influencing our emotions. In other
facial movement and words, the act of smiling can itself actually make you feel
expressions can happier.
influence attitude and Research investigating the facial feedback hypothesis has
emotional experience. found that suppressing facial expressions of emotion may
decrease how intensely those emotions are experienced.
 For instance, when Emotion is displayed not only through facial expression
a person attends a but also through tone of voice, behavior, and body
function and is language.
required to smile for
the duration of the Children who have autism spectrum disorder have
function, they will difficulty recognizing the emotional states of others.
actually have a Research has shown that this may stem from an inability
better experience of to identify facial expressions and other nonverbal
the function. expressions of emotion.
Theories  Emotion can include the
of appraisal of the stimulus such
as, is it a threat or not?
Emotion

Avoiding the highway today

without identifying or
explaining any fear is an
example of the “low road”
of emotion.
 Embodied Emotion:
The role of the autonomic nervous system
 The physiological arousal felt during various emotions is
orchestrated by the sympathetic nervous system, which triggers
activity and changes in various organs.
 Later, the parasympathetic division calms down the body.
Embodied Emotion:
How Do Emotions Differ in Body Signs?
 It is difficult to see
differences in emotions A general brain pattern:
from tracking heart hemispheric differences
rate, breathing, and
perspiration. Positive Negative
 There is also a large “approach” “withdrawal”
overlap in the patterns emotions (joy, emotions
of brain activity across love, goal- (disgust, fear,
emotions. seeking) anger,
correlate with depression)
 There are some small left frontal correlate with
differences; for lobe activity. right
example, fear triggers hemisphere
more amygdala activity activity.
than anger.
 Emotional
Expression
 Are there universal forms of emotional expression seen on
human faces across all cultures?
 Are there differences by individual, culture, or gender in
how emotions are expressed?
 What is the relationship between emotional expression and
the inner experience of emotion?
 What emotion do we see in these faces and body
positions?
 If these emotions are hard to read, is it because it’s a
different culture from your own, or because it’s a
performance?
 Detecting Emotion in Others
 People read a great deal of  We are primed to quickly
emotional content in the detect negative emotions,
eyes (“the window to the and even negative emotion
soul”) and the faces. words.
 Introverts are better at  Those who have been
detecting emotions; abused are biased toward
extroverts have emotions seeing fearful faces as
that are easier to read. angry, as in the test below.

These faces morph from fear to anger.

Raise your hand when you first see anger under the red box.
Detecting Lies and Fakes
Brain signs of lying:
 Polygraphs (detecting
physiological arousal) fail
sometimes at correctly identifying
when people are lying.
 Visible signs of lying: eye blinks
decrease, and other facial
movements change.

In which image is Paul

Ekman “lying” with a
fake smile?
 A real smile uses
involuntary muscles
around the eyes.
 Gender and
Emotional Expression and Detection
 Women seem to have We also see some emotions as
greater and more being more “male,” changing our
complex emotional perception of a gender-neutral face
expression. based on the emotion (below):
 Women are also more
skilled at detecting
emotions in others.
 However, this is an
overgeneralization.
People tend to
attribute women’s
emotionality to their
dispositions, and
attribute men’s
emotions to their Male or female? How about now?
circumstances.
Culture and Emotional Expression:
Are There Universally Recognized Emotions?

 There seem to be some

universally understood
facial expressions.
 People of various cultures
agree on the emotional
labels for the expressions
on the faces on the right.
 People in other studies
did have more accuracy
judging emotions from
their own culture.
 Is Experienced Emotion as
Universal as Expressed Emotion?
Carroll Izzard
suggested that
there are ten
basic emotions:
those evident at
birth (seen here)
plus contempt,
shame, and
guilt.
 Two Dimensions of Emotion

We experience this
image in dimensions
of up/down and
left/right.

James Russell sees our

emotional experience
in two dimensions:
1. from pleasant to
unpleasant
2. from low to high
arousal.
Closer Look at a Particular Emotion: Anger
 A flash of anger gives us energy  The catharsis myth
and initiative to fight or otherwise refers to the idea that
take action when necessary. we can reduce anger by
 Persistent anger can cause more “releasing” it, and we
harm than whatever we’re angry do this by acting
about. aggressively (yelling,
punching a pillow).
 Some ways to keep anger from
persisting: distraction, constructive  In most cases,
action, problem-solving, exercise, expressing anger
verbal expression, and allowing worsens it, and any
others to be wrong. “release” reinforces the
aggression, making it a
conditioned habit.
 Sometimes, releasing
anger causes harm, and
results in guilt.
 Instead, try calming
down and moving on.
Closer Look at a Particular Emotion: Happiness

Happiness is:
 a mood.
 an attitude.
 a social phenomenon.
 a cognitive filter.
 a way to stay hopeful,
motivated, and connected to
others.
The feel-good, do-good
phenomenon: when in a good
mood, we do more for others.
The reverse is also true: doing
good feels good.
 Over the Course of a Week
Happiness
has its ups
and downs.
Levels of
happiness, as
well as other Over the Course of a Day
emotions, can
vary over the
course of a week
(we like the
weekend), and
even over the
course of a day
(don’t stay awake
too long!).
 “How far are you up a 10-step ladder toward
the best possible life?” The answers worldwide:

Brighter color
means feeling
higher up the
ladder.

People in Chad and Tanzania are not feeling successful.

 Can Money Buy Happiness?
Money seems to buy
happiness when it lifts
people out of extreme
poverty. Otherwise, money
doesn’t seem to help our
mood much.
1. The average level of
income (adjusted for
inflation) and
purchasing power has
increased in the United
States.
2. The percentage of
people feeling very
happy, though, has not
followed the same
trend of improvement.
 Correlates of Happiness
There are behaviors that seem to go with
happiness. Whether they are the cause or the
effect of happiness is not clear, but it can’t
hurt to try them.
Researchers have found that happy people However, happiness seems not much
tend to: related to other factors, such as:
 Have high self-esteem (in individualistic  Age (example: the woman at the
countries) laptop in the picture)
 Be optimistic, outgoing, and agreeable  Gender (women are more often
 Have close friendships or a satisfying depressed, but also more often
marriage joyful)
 Have work and leisure that engage their  Parenthood (having children or
skills not)
 Have an active religious faith  Physical attractiveness
 Sleep well and exercise

There also may be a genetic basis for a predisposition to happiness.

Whether because of genes, culture, or personal history, we each
seem to develop a mood “set point,” a level of happiness to which we
keep returning.
 Possible Ways to
Increase Your Chances
at Happiness

 Look beyond wealth for satisfaction.

 Bring your habits in line with your goals; take control
of your time.
 Smile and act happy.
 Find work and leisure that engages your skills.
 Exercise, or just move!
 Focus on the needs and wishes of others.
 Work, rest, …and SLEEP.
 Notice what goes well, and express gratitude.
 Nurture spirituality, meaning, and community.
 Make your close relationships a priority.
3 SKILLS UNDER EMOTIONAL LITERACY
1. INSIGHT ON THE
NATURE OF EMOTION-
ability to know what kind
of emotion is felt, how it 3. DETECTING EMOTIONS IN
came about, why it exist OTHERS-ability to determine
and how to use it the mood and feelings of
other people by reading their
facial expression, vocal
2. SELF AWARENESS- overtones, body language
ability to discriminate and correctly guessing its
and monitor one’s causes. The skill is referred to
feelings as they happen. as PRACTICAL INTUITION.
Awareness of one’s
moods, patterns of
emotional flow,
thoughts, reactions, etc.
EMOTIONAL DEPTH
Refers to the ability to
experience complex feelings
and the courage to
experience emotions
intensely. Emotional
intensity is what drives
people to discover their
potential, purpose,
commitment, conscience,
accountability and passion
to transform situations and
engage in personal growth.
EMOTIONAL
ALCHEMY
Refers to the ability to
use emotions to bring
forth something
beautiful. It may come
in the form of
transforming negative
emotions into
something positive
knowing that even in
the darkest and most
painful moments have
learning and healing.