General Psychology
Emotions

(1)     Introduction

• Brief psychological responses (often to the action of others) that involve physiological arousal, expressive behavior, automatic appraisal, and conscious experience

• Distinct but associated with moods (less intense and longer lasting) and temperament (innate response style).

• Basic emotions include: anger, fear, disgust, sadness, guilt/shame, surprise, joy

• Function: "physiological changes are recruited to support behavior and influence our motivations that has been adaptive over the course of evolution" Specifically, (1) to facilitate and organize behavioral and cognitive response (emotions influence cognitions more than cognitions influence emotions), (2) feedback for behavior (reward/punishment), (3) signal to others of intentions and motives

• Dysfunction: Usually related to intensity and frequency of negative emotions.

(2)    Physiological arousal

• May be based on limbic system, amygdala affects cortex 

• Hemispheres express different emotions with left + and right -.

• Hormones may induce emotions such as fear, anxiety, depression.

• Psychoactive drugs can elicit pleasure, fear, anxiety

• Polygraph used to assess changes in sympathetic nervous system

(3)    Expressed emotion

• Verbal and nonverbal (more authentic)

• Universal expression (faces)

• Introverts and women better at reading emotional expressions

• Culture influences display rules

(4)    Appraisal

• Some simple cognition probably required for emotion

• Conscious appraisal unnecessary as cortico-cognitive processes are independent 

(5)    Experienced emotion

• Pleasant/unpleasant, intense/sleepy, long/brief

• Happiness: optimistic, close friendships, sleep and exercise, meaningful religious faith and unrelated to race, age, wealth, education parenthood, physical attractiveness.

• Depression and anxiety: more common among women

• Adaptation level phenomenon: tendency to adapt to new stimuli (what once gave pleasure such as a raise in salary, loses its effect)

• Relative deprivation: perception that one is worse off relative to those with whom one compares oneself.

(5)    Theories of emotion

• James-Lange theory: experience of emotion is a consequence of physiological arousal to a stimulus (we are afraid because our heart pounds). ANS driven!

• Cannon-Bard theory: both physiological response and subjective experience of emotion occur simultaneously suggesting dual processes

• Cognitive theories: appraisal event of arousal determines subjective emotion. CNS driven!