Emotion

Outline

1. Emotions and decision making

2. Emotional expression

3. Health benefits of emotional expression

Characterizing Emotion

Definitional issues

Emotions - multi-component, brief, specific responses to challenges or opportunities that are important to the individual’s goals

Emotions are nature’s way to trigger in us a useful behavioural response accompanied with an internal embodied experience to a given situation

Construal/appraisal

Ex: bear fear escape

Circumplex Model of Emotion

POSITIVENEGATIVE

LOW AROUSAL

HIGH AROUSAL

Serene

Excited

Sad

Furious

Happy

Elated

Irritated

Embarrassment

Emotions as Adaptive Response Patterns

Emotions can malfunction when: What was functional response in ancestral

environment is no longer functional

Emotions as Adaptive Response Patterns

Emotions can malfunction when: Hair-triggering of emotions. Negative

emotions sometimes loose their specificity

Mental Disorders: The Big Picture

According to the World Health Org (UN): 15% of the world’s burden of illness is mental illness If we include the mental illness component of

physical illness, % is even higher—up to 50% More than half of world’s mentally ill are not treated Stigma attached to mental illness Most mental illnesses are treatable

Mental Disorders: The Big Picture

According to the World Health Org (UN), the breakdown of mental illnesses are: Unipolar major depression 45% Suicide 15% Schizophrenia 13% Bipolar disorder 11% Obsessive compulsive dis. 10% Panic disorder 5% Other mental disorders 1% Total 100%

Are emotions rational?

o Gut feelings--The “somatic marker” hypothesis

o Bechara et al Iowa card game studyo People have feelings that precede their

conscious awareness or reasoningo Damage to ventromedial prefrontal cortex

impairs ability to produce this gut feelingo Descartes’ error (Damasio)—that thinking

(mind) is independent of feeling (body)

Emotions as Adaptive Response Patterns

Amygdala:

Ventromedial Prefrontal Cortex:

Embodied Cognition

Studies show that our bodily experiences affect our thinking (Barsalou)

Nodding vs. shaking head while listening to a persuasive message

Arm flexion (approach) vs arm extension (avoidance) – liking of unrelated novel stimuli

Emotions and Moral Judgments

Emotions affect our moral judgments

Inconsistent with rationalist theories: deontology or consequentialism

Emotions and Moral Judgments

Schnall, Haidt, & Jordan, 2008 Disgust as a moral emotion

Moral Judgment: Sex between cousins, releasing morally controversial film, etc.

Emotions and Moral Judgments

Schnall, Haidt, & Jordan, 2008 Disgust as a moral emotion

Clean, neat desk

OR

Expression and Recognition of Emotions

Basic emotions:

Cross cultural research:

Exist in all languages Recognized across cultures Facial expressions of blind and normally

sighted children

Expression and Recognition of Emotions

Important cultural variation in:The cultural importance of an emotion

(frequency, intensity, number of words)Construal of emotional situations (meaning)

• Ex: funny vs. insultingDisplay rules of when/how to express emotions

• Ex: Matsumoto & Ekman (1989) study

Expression and Recognition of Emotions

Important cultural variation in (cont’d)Attentiveness to emotional cues

• Ishii and colleagues emotional stroop task

Complex emotions culturally created• Ex: Humiliation (shame + anger)• Culture-specific emotions: mamihlapinatapei,

amae, honor

    

                                                                                                                                                                                                       

 

Health Benefits of Emotional Expression

Is expressing emotions good for you? Studies by Jamie Pennebaker and others:

randomly assign ppts to two conditions: 1) “In the next 5 days, write about your deepest

thoughts and feelings about an extremely emotional issue that has affected you and your life...”People write about lost loves, deaths of loved

ones, tragic failures, sexual and physical abuse

Health Benefits of Emotional Expression

2) Writing about superficial topics (their plans for the day) (Control condition)

Studies with college students, the unemployed, new mothers, prisoners, spouses of victims

Health Benefits of Emotional Expression

Immediately after: more distress Long term benefits:

Writing over longer periods, stronger results Comparable effect across gender, age group,

educational level, writing vs. talking

Health Benefits of Emotional Expression

Possible explanations:Expression removes the need for suppressionConfiding is cathartic, no need to hideMeaning making: most health benefits when

Health Benefits of Emotional Expression

Explains some of the positive benefits of

Summary

Def. and classification of emotions Emotions as adaptive responses When emotions become dysfunctional Universality and cultural variability of emotions Health benefits of emotional expression