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Emotions

Emotions. Feeling , such as fear, joy, or surprise, that underlies behavior Essential Questions: What causes us to feel emotions, both physically and psychologically? Do emotions differ culturally? Does emotion (happiness, stress) have any correlates? How can we be happier?.

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Emotions

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  1. Emotions • Feeling, such as fear, joy, or surprise, that underlies behavior • Essential Questions: • What causes us to feel emotions, both physically and psychologically? • Do emotions differ culturally? • Does emotion (happiness, stress) have any correlates? • How can we be happier?

  2. Defining Emotion • Emotion includes the following: • A subjective conscious experience or cognitive component • Bodily or physiological arousal • Overt or behavioral expressions- like? • Emotional reactions are linked with the Autonomic Nervous System • Sympathetic/parasympathetic NS • Autonomic responses accompanying emotion are controlled by the brain

  3. Measuring Emotional Responses • Galvanic Skin Response (GSR) • GSR measures increased electrical conductivity of skin that occurs when sweat glands increase activity • GSR used to measure autonomic arousal and therefore emotional reactions • Polygraph/Lie Detector • Assumes there is a link between lying and emotions • Measures respiration, heart rate, blood pressure, and GSR • Does not detect lies, but rather nervousness • Only accurate about 2/3 of the time – some people do not become nervous when they lie!

  4. Basic Emotions • Plutchik proposed that there are eight basic emotions • Fear • Surprise • Sadness • Disgust • Anger • Anticipation • Joy • Acceptance • Other (secondary) emotions are the composites of primary emotions • Surprise + Sadness = Disappointment • Fear + Acceptance = Submission

  5. Plutchik’s Basic Emotions

  6. Plutchik

  7. Basic Emotions • Some have criticized Plutchik’s model as applying only to English-speakers • Other cultures have more socially “helpful” emotions, i.e. more that describe empathy • Revised model of basic emotions includes: • Happiness • Surprise • Sadness • Fear • Disgust • Anger • Which emotion is the most evolutionarily important? Physically important? Psychologically important?

  8. Opponent-Process Theory • Emotions have hedonic value- either negative or positive (pleasurable) • When one is aroused, the opposite will appear to allow us to remain even-keeled • when we are elated we may then feel down or depressed • fear is replaced with elation (or at least relief ) • pain with pleasure • anxiety with calm • Boredom with interest

  9. Solomon’s Opponent Process

  10. Theories of Emotion: How do we know when we are excited vs. stressed? • James-Lange theory • Environmental stimuli bring on physiological changes that we interpret as emotions • Your heart is beating fast and your breathing rate has increased. Your palms are sweaty and your hands are shaking. What emotion might this be? • Based on the contextual cues, the interpretation of this emotion may be: • Excitement before a competitive race • Fear of an intruder in the house • Nervousness before speech, first date, surgery

  11. Nonverbal Communication of Emotion • Voice quality • Facial expression and Ekman’s work • Lie to Me • Body language • Posture • The way we move communicates information • Personal space • Explicit acts • Slamming doors • Destroying stuff • Emblems • i.e. the bird

  12. Gender, Culture and Emotion • How do men and women differ in: • Their experience of emotion • Their display of emotion • Their reaction to others’ emotion?

  13. Gender and Emotion • Men and women feel emotions equally, but express them differently (role of language) • Men and women may experience different emotions in the same situation • Anger • Men tend to direct their anger outward • Women tend to direct their anger inward • Women are more skilled at understanding nonverbal components of emotion

  14. Culture and Emotion • Expression of emotion can be influenced by cultural norms • Some emotional displays are universal • Display rules • Culture-specific rules that govern how, when, and why expressions of emotion are appropriate • Etre et Avoir clip (1:11) • “Display rule” methods: • Intensification-emphasizing • deintensification – less intense display • masking- expressing one, feeling another • neutralizing- no display

  15. Stress and Health • Stress is the manner in which we respond to events perceived as threatening or challenging • Stress has an impact on our mood, our behavior and our health • Behavioral medicine integrates what we know of human behavior and medicine to better understand health and disease • Health psychology involves the contribution of psychology’s contribution to behaviorla medicine

  16. Arousal Theory • People are motivated to seek an optimal level of arousal for a given moment • Yerkes-Dodson law • States that there is an optimal level or arousal for best performance on any task • The more complex the task, the lower the level of arousal that can be tolerated without interfering with performance

  17. Yerkes-Dodson Law

  18. Stress Response • Stress Appraisal (Threat or Challenge) • Cannon’s fight-or-flight response • Epinephrine and norepinephrine released from adrenal glands • Sympathetic nervous system kicks in • Hypothalamus and pituitary control cortisols released from adrenal cortex • Withdrawal- pull back and become paralyzed • “Tend and befriend” (Shelley Taylor).. Oxytocin? • Gender and stress • Women more likely to nurture and band together • Men more likely to withdraw and turn to alcohol • Selye’sGeneral Adaptation Syndrome (GAS) • Phase 1: Alarm (prepare to cope) • Phase 2: Resistance (actual coping) • Phase 3: Exhaustion (resources depleted)

  19. Selye’s General Adaptation Syndrome Bottom Line: Long-term stress = Body “collapses”

  20. Sources of Stress: Stressors • Catastrophes and PTSD • Change and the SRRS • Pressure • Frustration • Conflict • Approach-approach • Approach-avoidance • Avoidance-avoidance

  21. Stress and Health • “Type A” vs. “Type B” (Friedman and Rosenman) • Type A: reactive, competitive, impatient, motivated, aggressive and easily angered – susceptible to Coronary Heart Disease • Type B: easy going, mellow – much less susceptible to CHD • Pessimism makes you twice as likely to develop CHD • Depression also increases CHD risk • Psychoneuroimmunology (PNI) • Studies relationship between nervous, endocrine and immune systems • Stress and AIDS • Stress and cancer

  22. Coping with Stress • Perceived feelings of control • Optimism • Social support • Exercise • Relaxation/Meditation • Biofeedback • Spirituality

  23. Positive Psychology • How do we move away from stress and focus on being happy? • How Full Is Your Bucket

  24. Stress (portrait of a killer) • Happiness (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eLKfTgG_9Ok synthetic happines) http://movies.netflix.com/WiSearch?v1=Happy&raw_query=happy&ac_category_type=movie&ac_abs_posn=1&ac_rel_posn=1&raw_query=happy happy documentary

  25. Journal Questions • Come up with a list of six universal emotions. • Are emotions physical (heart rate, blood pressure) or psychological (thought processes)? • On a scale of 1 to 10, how stressed are you? • What are your “stressors” on a daily basis? Overall?

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