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Lecture 1 – Emotion categories and dimensions
Why should we study emotions?
• Emotions have a huge impact (e.g. on memory, attention, feelings);
• Emotions are important for survival and social skills (they guide our actions and reactions);
• Some mental disorders are extremes of emotional states (e.g. fear → anxiety disorder);
• Our well-being depends on emotions.
The concept of emotions
What are emotions
Emotions have different factors: they consist of a phenomenal experience (information from your sensory
systems), physiological patterns, and verbal and nonverbal expression. There are some typical
expressions that are displayed early in life (babies/innate), thus ‘hard-coded’. These expressions represent
distinct states of the mind. Not every emotion has a typical expression (e.g. jealousy) and some emotions
develop during life. Also, some emotions are culture specific.
Paul Ekman
According to Paul Ekman, there are six basic emotional expressions: fear, anger, disgust, joy, sadness and
surprise. Ekman used Charles Darwin’s work to study emotions across humans. Those six basic emotions
have specific activities of different facial muscles. Emotions are relatively distinct, but mixed emotions are
possible. Furthermore, there are subtle differences across subjects.
Ekman argued that emotions are universal across cultures. He conducted a study in Papua New Guinea
(1971) in which participants had to match stories to emotions and the other way around.
Russell
Russell criticized Ekman. Russell argued that dimensions would be a better approach than categories.
Russell conducted a study with different groups: western vs non-western groups and literate vs illiterate
groups. There was less agreement between western literate and isolated illiterate groups.
Elfenbein & Ambady
Participants are better at recognizing emotions of people of their own ethnical group than of people of
another ethnical group (in-group bias). Elfenbein and Ambady stated that emotions are universal to a
limited degree. However, they found that the in-group bias could be decreased by cross-cultural exposure.
According to Elfenbein and Ambady, emotions can be different across cultures, because there are
differences in how an emotion is expressed. There are stages between an emotion experience and an
emotion expression. During these stages, noise can occur.
Friesen and Matsumoto argued that display rules shape emotion. Participants watched a movie. Japanese
participants tried to hide their negative emotions, whereas American participants were more expressive in
their negative emotions. Kitayama found that for Americans, the goal is to experience more positive and
less negative emotions. For Japanese, the amount of negative and positive emotions was correlated:
when a Japanese person had more positive emotions, he/she also had more negative. Also, in Japan social
context is more important.
There can also be noise at the level of decoding of an emotion.
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Emotion expressions in animals
Animals also express emotions. Some emotions are similar between humans and animals. However, some
human emotions are hard (or even impossible) to measure in animals (e.g. how would you measure
jealousy?).
Why do we have emotions
Adaptive functions
The idea that emotions are adaptive is an evolutionary (Darwinian) perspective. Darwin paid much
attention to emotional expression. He stated that emotions had a purpose during evolution and that
emotions became associated with certain situations. He argued that emotions are no longer necessary, but
that we still use them because we associate them with situations. An example of why facial emotional
expressions were adaptive: in disgust, you close your nose, mouth and eyes to protect your sensory systems:
Darwin also called on the principle of antithesis: according to him, most emotions have a counterpart. For
example: in anger you didn’t get what you expected, the counterpart: you get what you didn’t expect. So
according to Darwin, the counter-emotion of anger is surprise.
Furthermore, he argued that different emotions had distinct reactions in the brain.
Emotion and science
Eliciting emotions
In studies, many things are used to elicit emotions. For example: rewards/punishments, music, stories,
pictures and movies.
Measuring emotions
We want to know how emotions work. We also need to measure emotions for things like diagnoses of
mental disorders, to infer with well-being and for advertisements (to see if an advertisement has good vs
bad impact). A questionnaire is a method that is used often, but might not be the most valid (think of social
desirability bias).
A very interesting method is described in the paper by Nummenmaa et al. (2014). A paper that also needs
to be read for the exam.
Physiological measurements are also very handy. For example; heart rate, skin conductance, pupil dilation,
and more.
Theories and models of emotions
James-Lange theory
This theory suggest that first our autonomic nervous system reacts and result in an expression, and that
we then feel an emotion based on our physiological response. The traditional view at the time was the
opposite: that we first experience feelings and then act upon these feelings.
James and Lange described ‘emotion’ as a feeling of physiological changes due to a stimulus. James focused
on conscious emotions and the conscious experience of emotions. Lange made James’s theory more testable
and applicable to real life. They agreed that if physiological aspects were not present, there would be no
emotional experience. According to them, physiological arousal causes emotion.
Lanzetta (1976) conducted a study in which there were two groups that were administered shocks. The one
group was asked to express their emotions and the other group was asked to conceal their emotions. The
conceal-group showed less arousal and experienced less pain from the shocks.
Hennenlotter et al. (2009) found that people with Botox were not good at mimicking expressions and
preformed worse at recognizing others’ emotions.
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Cannon’s criticism
• Cannon stated that visceral changes (changes in the sympathetic systems) were too slow to be the
source of emotion. This is false; especially the hypothalamus and amygdala react very quickly (in
10-20 ms).
• He studied animals with body separated from their central nervous system (CNS) and he didn’t see
changes in their behavior. However, this is also false. People with spinal cord injuries show muted
emotional responses, show less fear-conditioning and are less accurate in predicting emotions in
others.
• Cannon experimented with the artificial induction of visceral changes and concluded that these
induced changes do not produce emotions. This is not true. Schachter and Singer (1962) injected
participants with adrenaline to heighten arousal. The one group was told about the effects of the
injections and the other group wasn’t told anything. The group that was not informed took over the
mood of a happy person much more than did the informed group. The expression of emotions is
not only influenced by events, but also by the interpretation of the bodily states. People that were
informed about the adrenaline injection attributed their arousal to the injection and not to the
happy person. Adrenaline injections induced appraisal-dependent emotions.
• Cannon also argued that the relation bodily states : emotional states is not 1 : 1. This is true.
Much of what Cannon stated turned out to be false, but his criticism led scientists to adapt the James-Lange
theory, because:
- Not all physiological changes showed the same pattern per emotion;
- Cognition is sometimes necessary to know which emotion is experienced;
- Adrenaline injection induced appraisal-dependent emotions.
The facial feedback theory
When we see an emotional expression on someone’s face, we often mimic that expression. This might help
us to feel what the other one is feeling. It might help us to recognize emotions in others.
Schachter’s two-factor theory
Schachter proposed that the cognitive and the physiological processes are parallel and interacting, and that
both processes are influencing the phenomenal experience of emotions.
This theory is quite different than the Cannon-Bard theory that stated that these processes are completely
separate.
The two-factor theory was tested by an experiment (Nisbett & Schachter, 1966). There were two groups.
Both groups received a placebo pill. The first group was told that the pill caused arousal symptoms. The
second group was told that the pill was a placebo. The participants received a shock. Participants in the first
group expected arousal and had a higher tolerance for the shocks. Participants in group 2 expected nothing
and showed a low tolerance for the shocks. This proves that context and expectations can alter emotions
and feelings.
It should be noted that bodily changes are not the only thing responsible for emotions. The arousal must be
interpreted, so a cognitive component is also responsible for emotions. There is interaction between
autonomic responses and cognition before emotional experience.
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