Emotion:

 Emotions are feelings that generally have both physiological and cognitive elements and that
influence behavior.
 Emotion is characterized by physiological arousal, and changes in facial expressions,
gestures, posture, and subjective feelings.
 First of all, your body is physically aroused during emotion. Second, we are often motivated,
or moved to take action, by emotions such as fear, anger, or joy. Eg: We feel happy when we
succeed and sad when we fAil.
 Emotions are linked to many basic adaptive behaviors, such as attacking, fleeing, seeking
comfort, helping others, and reproducing. Such behaviors help us survive and adjust to
changing conditions.
 A mood is the mildest form of emotion.
 Moods are low intensity emotional states that can last for many hours, or even days.
 Moods often affect day-to-day behavior by preparing us to act in certain ways.
 Happy, positive moods tend to make us more adaptable in several ways. For example, when
you are in a good mood, you are likely to make better decisions and you will be more
helpful, efficient, creative, and peaceful.
 Like our motives, our moods are closely tied to circadian rhythms. When your body
temperature is at its daily low point, you are more likely to feel “down” emotionally. When
body temperature is at its peak, your mood is likely to be positive — even if you missed a
night of sleep.

 The elements of emotional experience:

1. The cognitive component:

 The cognitive component of emotion refers to both the evaluative thoughts
people have about their emotional experiences (such as “I feel bad”) and the
appraisal of the events that are producing the emotions.
 Our interpretation of an event not only helps bring about an emotional reaction
but also influences how intensely we will experience that emotion.
 This interpretation is called cognitive appraisal, a person’s assessment of the
personal meaning of his or her current circumstances.
 Consider the event of coming face to face with a grizzly bear. If the grizzly bear is
just a cub and is safely behind a protective barrier at the National Zoo, you will
probably appraise the situation as pleasant and experience an emotion such as
happiness. If, however, a full-grown grizzly bear were to appear in front of you
on a hiking trail in the Canadian Rockies, you would likely appraise the situation
as life-threatening and experience, among other emotions, very intense fear.
 In addition to appraising the situation that gives rise to a particular emotion,
peope also interpret and evaluate the emotion itself, further shaping how they
experience that emotion.
  If you love to roller coasters or amusement park horror rides, you will most
likely interpret the bodily arousal you feel while going into a big drop as
excitement and thrill. If, in contrast, you dread roller coasters but are talked into
riding one by friends, you will likely label that same bodily arousal as fear.

2. The physiological component:

 The physiological component of emotion refers to the bodily arousal we
feel when experiencing a particular emotion, whether it is positive or
negative.
 These physical manifestations of emotions are produced by your
autonomic nervous system (ANS).
 The ANS is responsible for regulating various bodily functions and the
activity of specific organs, glands, and muscles.
 Other physiological changes that might occur as we experience an
emotion include increased blood pressure, increased blood sugar, pupil
dilation, and the inhibition of intestinal action.
 Because emotions vary in intensity, some emotions may be
accompanied by several physiological changes, while others may involve
only a few.
 If, for example, you are anxious about presenting a seminar in class, you
will likely experience less intense and fewer physiological reactions than
if you are trying to escape from a fire in a crowded concert hall.
 The reason for these differences has to do with the sympathetic nervous
system, the subdivision of the ANS that mobilizes internal resources and
primes the organism to take swift action for survival—the fight-or-flight
response.
 Like fear and anxiety, emotions such as happiness, excitement, and
surprise also involve activation of the sympathetic nervous system.
Here, too, the intensity of the physiological arousal and the number of
bodily changes depend on the nature of the situation.
 Following an intense physiological reaction, the other component of the
ANS, the parasympathetic nervous system, works to calm the body
down and attempts to conserve energy by returning the organism to a
normal state.

3. Behavioral component:
 When you experience an emotion, you not only have particular thoughts and
bodily sensations, but also express and reveal that emotion.
 You do so through body language, such as facial expressions, gestures, and body
posture, as well as through verbal expression.
 For example, happiness is almost universally expressed with a smile. Conversely,
someone who is frustrated may cross his arms and shrug his shoulders, etc.
 Research suggests that there are several facial expressions that most people are
able to identify accurately.
  Ekman and his colleagues found six fundamental emotions that typically can be
identified by research participants: anger, sadness, happiness, surprise, fear, and
disgust.
 In fact, some research suggests that the ability to identify the facial expressions
for these emotions is genetically programmed.
 Although less fundamental to emotional expression than nonverbal emotional
behaviors, verbal expression of emotion is also important.

 PRIMARY EMOTIONS:
o According to Robert Plutchik’s theory, the most basic emotions are fear
surprise, sadness, disgust, anger, anticipation, joy, and acceptance.
o Each pair of adjacent primary emotions can be mixed to yield a third,
more complex.
o Each primary emotion produces a unique set of muscular movements.

 Positive emotions:
o Positive emotions are emotions that we typically find pleasurable to experience.
o Some common positive emotions include love, joy, satisfaction, contentment,
interest, happiness, amusement, serenity and awe.
o Positive emotions are necessary to function effectively, grow, and thrive.
o They help increase our performance on cognitive tasks, the help lower stress
hormones, boosts the functioning of our immune system, and improves our well-
being.
o positive psychology is the study and enhancement of positive feelings, including
happiness and optimism; positive traits, such as perseverance and wisdom; positive
abilities, such as interpersonal skills; and virtues that enhance the well-being of
society, including altruism and tolerance.
o By momentarily broadening our thinking and actions, positive emotions promote
discovery of novel and creative ideas, actions, and social bonds.
o The broaden-and-build theory states that positive emotions broaden our typical
ways of thinking and acting which, in turn, builds our lasting personal resources,
making us more complex and resilient people than we would be otherwise.
o

 Emotion and the brain:

o The brain structures involved in emotion are located in several different regions of
the brain, rather than in a unified “emotion center.”
o Happiness was related to a decrease in activity in certain areas of the cerebral
cortex, whereas sadness was associated with increases in activity in particular
portions of the cortex.
o In the brain, positive emotions are processed mainly in the left hemisphere. In
contrast, negative emotions are processed in the right hemisphere.
 o In Addition, the amygdala , in the brain’s temporal lobe, is important in the
experience of emotions for it provides a link between the perception of an emotion
producing stimulus and the recall of that stimulus.
o Emotional stimuli travel to the amygdala by both a fast, crude “low road”
(subcortical) and a slower but more involved cortical “high road.
o The direct route allows for quick responses to stimuli that are possibly dangerous,
sometimes before we actually know what the stimuli are, but with the awareness
provided by the indirect cortical route we can override the direct route and take
control of our emotional responses.
o This primitive fear response is not under the control of higher brain centers.
o The ability to interpret the facial expressions of others as a particular emotion also
seems to be a function of one side of the brain more than the other. Researchers
have found that when people are asked to identify the emotion on another person’s
face, the right hemisphere is more active than the left.
o +Canon-Bard theory.

 Physiology and emotion:

o When you experience a strong emotion, your heart races, your respiration goes up,
your mouth dries, your muscles tense, etc.
o In addition to these noticeable changes, many others occur beneath the surface.
o All these responses are designed to mobilize your body for action to deal with the
source of the emotion.
o These reactions are nearly universal because they are innate. Specifically, they are
caused by the autonomic nervous system (ANS).
o The ANS has two divisions, the sympathetic branch, and the parasympathetic
branch. The two branches are active at all times.
o With mild, unpleasant stimulation, the sympathetic division is more active; with
mild, pleasant stimulation, the parasympathetic division is more active.
o Sympathetic nervous system:
-When we experience certain emotions intensely, such as fear or anger, we may be
aware of several bodily changes. In general, the sympathetic branch activates the
body for emergency action — for “fight or flight.”
-Hence, many of the physiological changes that take place during emotional arousal
result from activation of the sympathetic division of the autonomic nervous system.
-The sympathetic nervous system prepares the body for emergency action and is
responsible for the following changes (which need not all occur at once):
1. Blood pressure and heart rate increase.
2. Respiration becomes more rapid.
3. The pupils dilate.
4. Perspiration increases while secretion of saliva and mucus decreases.
5. Blood-sugar level increases to provide more energy.
6. The blood clots more quickly in case of wounds.
7. Blood is diverted from the stomach and intestines to the brain and skeletal muscles.
8. The hairs on the skin become erect, causing goose pimples.
 The sympathetic nervous system thus gears up the organism for energy output.

o Parasympathetic nervous system:

-As the emotion subsides, the parasympathetic nervous system – the energy-conserving
system – takes over and returns the organism to its normal state.
-This branch reverses emotional arousal. It calms and relaxes the body.
-After a period of high emotion, the heart is slowed, the pupils return to normal size,
blood pressure drops, and so forth.
-In addition to restoring balance, the parasympathetic system helps build up and
conserve the body’s energy.

o The parasympathetic system responds much more slowly than the sympathetic system.
That’s why a pounding heart, muscle tension, and other signs of arousal don’t fade for
20 or 30 minutes after you feel an intense emotion, such as fear. Moreover, after a
strong emotional shock, the parasympathetic system may overreact and lower blood
pressure too much. This can cause you to become dizzy or faint after seeing something
shocking, such as a horrifying accident.

o Physiologically, strong emotions such as fear or anger activate the body’s emergency
reaction system, which swiftly and silently prepares the body for potential danger.
o The sympathetic nervous system takes charge by directing the release of hormones
(epinephrine and norepinephrine) from the adrenal glands, which in turn leads the internal
organs to release blood sugar, raise blood pressure, and increase sweating and salivation.
o To calm you after the emergency has passed, the parasympathetic nervous system inhibits
the release of the activating hormones. You may remain aroused for a while after an
experience of strong emotional activation because some of the hormones continue to
circulate in your bloodstream.

o Sudden Death
-An overreaction to intense emotion is called a parasympathetic rebound. If the rebound is
severe, it can sometimes cause death. Eg: In times of war, for instance, combat can be so
savage that some soldiers die of fear (Moritz & Zamchech, 1946). Such deaths occur because
the parasympathetic nervous system slows the heart to a stop.

o Lie Detectors
-The most popular method for detecting falsehoods measures the bodily changes that
accompany the emotion. However, the accuracy of “lie detector” tests is doubtful, and they
can be a serious invasion of privacy (Lykken, 2001; National Academy of Sciences, 2002).
-The lie detector is more accurately called a polygraph, a word that means “many writings”.
The device only records general emotional arousal — it can’t tell the difference between
lying and fear, anxiety, or excitement (Lykken, 2001). A typical polygraph records changes in
heart rate, blood pressure, breathing, and the galvanic skin response (GSR).
-Psychologist David Lykken (1998, 2001) has documented many cases in which innocent
people were jailed after being convicted based on polygraph evidence. Proponents of lie
detection claim it is 95 percent accurate. But in one study, accuracy was dramatically
lowered when people thought about past emotional experiences as they answered
 irrelevant questions (Ben-Shakhar & Dolev, 1996). Similarly, the polygraph may be thrown
off by self-inflicted pain, tranquilizing drugs, or people who can lie without anxiety (Waid &
Orne, 1982).

 EXPRESSION OF EMOTIONS:
o There are facial expressions, body movements, and actions that indicate to others how a
person feels.

1. FACIAL EXPRESSIONS:
o The facial muscles evolved to communicate specific information to onlookers.
o For example, an angry face would signal to onlookers that they should act submissively
or expect a fight.
o The fact that facial expressions of emotions communicate important information is
demonstrated even more powerfully when the facial expression of one person by itself
changes the behavior of another person.
o Facial expressions can vary across different cultures, although some aspects oF facial
expression seem to be universal.
o Eg: Anger is common in western cultures because the western culture encourages
personal independence and a free expression of individual rights and needs. However, it
is not encouraged in Asian cultures and is regarded as less “natural” as it separates
people.
o During their research, Ekman and Friesen found that people of many different cultures
can consistently recognize at least seven facial expressions: anger, fear, disgust,
happiness, surprise, sadness, and contempt.
o Although the emotions and the related facial expressions appear to be universal, exactly
when, where, and how an emotion is expressed may be determined by the culture.
o Display rules that can vary from culture to culture (Ekman, 1973; Ekman & Friesen, 1969)
are learned ways of controlling displays of emotion in social settings.
o display rules are also different for males and females. Researchers looking at the display
rules of boys and girls found that boys are reluctant to talk about feelings in a social
setting, whereas girls are expected and encouraged to do so.

2. NON VERBAL CUES AND BODY LANGUAGE:

o Kinesics is the study of communication through body movement, posture, gestures, and
facial expressions (Harrigan, 2006). Informally, we call it body language.
o It is important to realize cultural learning also affects the meaning of gestures. What, for
instance, does it mean if you touch your thumb and first finger together to form a circle?
In North America it means “Everything is fine”. In France and Belgium it means “You’re
worth zero.”
 o The most general “messages” involve relaxation or tension, and liking or disliking.
Relaxation is expressed by casually positioning the arms and legs, leaning back (if sitting),
and spreading the arms and legs. Liking is expressed mainly by leaning toward a person
or object. Thus, body positioning can reveal feelings that would normally be concealed.
o Psychologists John Bargh and Tanya Chartrand have identified an aspect of body
language they call the “chameleon effect.” This refers to unconsciously imitating the
postures, mannerisms, and facial expressions of other people as we interact with them.
o Body language can also indicate whether a person is lying. Gestures, called illustrators,
tend to decrease when a person is lying.
o Other movements, called emblems, can also reveal lying. Emblems are gestures that
have widely understood meanings within a particular culture. Emblems tend to increase
when a person is lying.

 ASSESSMENT OF EMOTIONS:
Researchers typically use three kinds of information to measure an individual’s emotions: (1)
behavioral displays of emotion,
(2) self-reports of emotion, and
(3) physiological reactions.
o Behavioral displays of emotion are most often observed by objective raters. These
displays typically include obvious acts, such as fighting, fleeing, or making sexual
advances. Behavioral displays may also include facial expressions. Researchers often
observe behavioral displays in role-playing situations. The researchers evoke
particular emotional responses from participants by showing them a film, giving
them a small gift, or manipulating them in some other way (Isen, 2008, 2004, 1993),
and then measure how well the participants perform on tasks of various kinds.
o Self-ratings are the most widely used approach to measuring a person’s emotional
experience. The use of such measures is based on the premise that the best way to
evaluate emotional states is to simply ask individuals how they are feeling. Many
questionnaires and surveys have been published throughout the years that ask
people to provide ratings for how happy, afraid, content, anxious, or depressed they
are. However, self-reports may be inaccurate at times, as they provide only a limited
picture of a person’s total emotional experience and rely on a person’s ability to
properly identify and describe an emotional experience.
o In recent years, researchers have developed several techniques for measuring an
individual’s psychophysiological reactions to stimuli and have begun using such
measures to assess emotional experience. This is based on the premise that
emotions vary biologically from one another. Psychophysiological approaches
include facial electromyography and assessments of heart rate, skin conductance,
and the startle reflex.
1. Facial electromyography (EMG) A facial EMG measures muscle contractions in
specific areas of the face that occur when a person is exposed to an emotionally
charged stimulus, such as a pleasant or unpleasant picture.
2. Heart rate Reductions in heart rate have been observed when individuals are
presented with unpleasant stimuli, whereas pleasant stimuli are associated with
accelerations in heart rate.
 3. Skin conductance We tend to perspire when we are emotionally aroused.
Readings of skin conductance are a very useful indicator of emotional arousal
(either positive or negative) and of sympathetic nervous system activity.
4. An additional physiological indicator of emotional reactivity is the startle reflex,
an involuntary movement (an eye blink, for example) that is brought on by the
onset of a sudden stimulus, such as a loud burst of noise.

Although psychophysiological measures of emotion are in some respects more valid and reliable
indicators of emotional states than behavioral displays and self-ratings, most investigators of
emotion agree that the complexity of emotion is best measured by using multiple approaches.

 THEORIES OF EMOTION:

1. James-lang theory:
 James-Lange theory of emotion refers to the belief that emotional experience is a
reaction to bodily events occurring as a result of an external situation (“I feel sad
because I am crying”).
 Eg: “I am embarrassed because my face is red,” “I am nervous because my stomach
is fluttering.”
 William James was the earliest and one of the most influential psychologists to study
emotion.
 James (1884, 1890) argued that emotions proceed differently. He suggested that an
emotion begins with (1) the perception of an environmental situation or event,
followed by (2) the elicitation of physiological and behavioral changes, which are
then (3) processed by the cortex and converted into felt emotion.
 In 1885, a Danish physiologist, Carl Lange (1834–1900), published a theory of
emotion that was very similar to James’s. Both theorists believed that there is no
emotion to experience without a physiological component.
 Their views are collectively referred to as the James-Lange theory of emotion.
 Although the two theories are very similar, they do have a few key differences.
 Whereas James believed there is a place for cognition in the context of an emotional
episode, Lange viewed mental activity as having little to do with emotion.
 Lange (1885) postulated instead that the vasomotor center, a collection of nerves
and muscles that cause the blood vessels to constrict or dilate, is the root cause of
all emotion.

2. Cannon-Bard theory:
 In response to the difficulties inherent in the James-Lange theory, Walter Cannon
and later Philip Bard suggested an alternative view.
 This theory rejects the view that physiological arousal alone leads to the perception
of emotion.
 Instead, the theory assumes that both physiological arousal and the emotional
experience are produced simultaneously by the same nerve stimulus, which Cannon
and Bard suggested emanates from the thalamus in the brain.
  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.
 Hence, it is not necessary for different emotions to have unique physiological
patterns associated with them—as long as the message sent to the cerebral cortex
differs according to the specific emotion.

3. Opponent process theory:

 Opponent-process theory (of emotions) States that strong emotions tend to be
followed by an opposite emotional state; also the strength of both emotional states
changes over time.
 Using this theory, psychologist Richard L. Solomon (1980) offers an intriguing
explanation for drug addiction and other learned motives.
 According to his opponent-process theory, if a stimulus causes a strong emotion,
such as fear or pleasure, an opposite emotion tends to occur when the stimulus
ends.
 For example, if you are in pain, and the pain ends, you will feel a pleasant sense of
relief. If a person feels pleasure, as in the case of drug use, and the pleasure ends, it
will be followed by craving or discomfort.
 Solomon assumes that when a stimulus is repeated, our response to it habituates, or
gets weaker.
 First-time skydivers, for instance, are almost always terrified. But with repeated
jumps, fear decreases, until finally the skydiver feels a “thrill” instead of terror.
 The opponent-process theory thus explains how skydiving, rock climbing, ski
jumping, and other hazardous pursuits become reinforcing.
 Hence, a primary or initial reaction to an emotional event (State A) will be
followed by an opposite secondary emotional state (State B).

4. Cognitive appraisal theories of emotion:

Cognitive theories talk about the mental interpretation of the components of emotion.

I. Schachter’s two-factor theory:

 According to Schachter and Singer (1962), earlier theories had neglected to
consider the influence of cognition, or thought processes, in our emotional
experience.
 Schachter and Singer (1962) proposed that two things have to happen
before emotion occurs: the physical arousal and a labeling of the arousal
based on cues from the surrounding environment.
 These two things happen at the same time, resulting in the labeling of the
emotion.
 For example, if a person comes across a snarling dog while taking a walk, the
physical arousal (heart racing, eyes opening wide) is accompanied by the
 thought (cognition) that this must be fear. Then and only then will the
person experience the fear emotion.
 We likely choose the appropriate label through a process of attribution. The
mental process of assigning causes to events. In emotion, the process of
attributing arousal to a particular source.
 Hence, this theory argues that people look to external rather than internal
cues to differentiate and label their specific emotions.

II. Lazarus’s theory of cognitive appraisal:

 Emotional appraisal refers to evaluating the personal meaning of a stimulus:
Is it good/bad, threatening/supportive, relevant/irrelevant, and so on.
 One of the more modern versions of cognitive emotion theories is Lazarus’s
cognitive-mediational theory of emotion (1991).
 In this theory, the most important aspect of any emotional experience is
how the person interprets, or appraises, the stimulus that causes the
emotional reaction.
 To mediate means to “come between,” and in this theory, the cognitive
appraisal mediates by coming between the stimulus and the emotional
response to that stimulus.
 According to Lazarus, the appraisal of the situation would come before both
the physical arousal and the experience of emotion.
 In other words, it’s the interpretation of the arousal that results in the
emotion of fear, not the labeling as in the Schachter-Singer model, and the
interpretation comes first.
 Some researchers believe that emotional reactions to situations are so fast
that they are almost instantaneous, which would leave little time for a
cognitive appraisal to occur first. Others have found that the human brain
can respond to a physical threat before conscious thought enters the
picture.

5. Facial feedback hypothesis:

 According to this hypothesis, facial expressions not only reflect emotional experience, but
they also help determine how people experience and label emotions.
 Basically put, “wearing” an emotional expression provides muscular feedback to the brain
that helps produce an emotion congruent with that expression.
 For instance, the muscles activated when we smile may send a message to the brain
indicating the experience of happiness—even if there is nothing in the environment that
would produce that particular emotion.
 Stated another way, it says that having facial expressions and becoming aware of them is
what influences our private emotional experience.
 In one study, for example, participants were directed to move their facial muscles into
certain positions, without directly being told which emotions they were expressing. The
facial changes produced significant changes in their autonomic nervous system arousal, as
indicated by increases in their heart rates, skin conductance, and finger temperatures.
6. Evolutionary theories of emotion:
 Over the past 50 years, a number of theorists have suggested that emotions are
innate, prewired responses that have evolved over millions of years, from lower
species to humans (Izard, 2007; Cosmides & Tooby, 2000; Plutchik, 1980).
 This perspective is based on the evolutionary theory of Charles Darwin.
 He argued that emotional expression in both people and animals serves a
communicative function that is essential to survival.
 Emotional expressions may, for example, warn others of danger, dissuade enemies
from attacking, or signal sexual receptiveness.
 Darwin believed that emotions developed because of their adaptive value.
 Fear, for instance, would help an organism avoid danger. This would then aid in
survival.
 Hence, Darwin viewed emotions as a product of evolution.
 Evolutionary theorists believe that emotion evolved before thought.
 They assert that thought plays a relatively small role in emotion.
 They admit, though, that learning and cognition may have some influence on human
emotions.
 Based on research on the universality of certain facial expressions and the evolution
of emotion, a number of theorists have suggested that some innate, basic emotions
are preprogrammed into all people, regardless of culture or country of origin.
Tomkins (1962) has proposed that there are eight basic emotions: surprise, interest,
joy, rage, fear, disgust, shame, and anguish.
 Finally, we repeatedly saw that biological and environmental factors jointly govern
behavior .