introduction to emotion Flashcards
what is an emotion?
strong/instinctive feeling responding to one’s circumstances, mood or relationships with others
distinguished from reasoning or knowledge
what is Rottenberg’s description of mood?
slow moving feeling states that are weakly tied to specific objects or situations
what are the 4 stages of emotional processing according to Phillips neuro-anatomical model?
- stimulus/thought presentation
- appraisal process to work out value of stimulus
- affective state (short lived emotional response)
- automatic emotion regulation of affective state to behave in appropriate way (mood when goes on for a while)
what is Darwin’s theory of emotion?
emotions evolved for their adaptive value in dealing with fundamental life tasks
emotions indicate what you are likely to do next
cross-species similarities in basic emotional expression
what are the basic emotions which exist across cultures?
who proposed this?
anger disgust fear happiness sadness surprise
Ekman
what did ekman do to study universality of emotions?
asked tribesmen to pull different faces for different emotional situations
asked them to identify which facial expression corresponded to which situation of americans
examples of changing expression to take in certain info?
widening eyes in fear helps detect a threat
evidence suggesting facial expressions innate?
- born blind still show same facial expressions as others suggesting hard wired into genes
- blindsighted (cortically blind) people responded to emotion shown to blind hemisphere
- first 6 weeks can smile and cry and may be able to develop facial expressions in the womb
example of simple dual-system theory to classification of emotion?
Schneirla categorise emotions in terms of approach and withdrawal
what did Gray theorise?
behavioural approach (reward) and inhibition (punishment) systems have distinct brain circuits
what is Davidson’s valence-asymmetry hypothesis?
left prefrontal cortex more related to approach related goals
right prefrontal cortex related to goals requiring inhibition and withdrawal (negative)
example of a negative emotion being an ‘approach’ response?
trying to approach goal but becoming angry
what are the 2 axis in the circumplex model?
arousal and valence
what did Ekman do to study relationship between emotional expressions and emotional experience?
watch positive or negative movies and rate how feeling when watching them
see if expressions during correlated with subjective reported experience
ppts who showed smile movements (watching positive movie) reported more happiness and vice versa
what does emg measure?
muscle activity e.g in the face to measure expression
what does FACS stand for?
facial coding system
which muscle is used to smile?
zygomatic major muscle
which muscle is used to frown?
corrugator muscle
relationship between emg and emotion perception?
emg positively correlated with emotion perception ability
what are some of the social functions of emotions?
wide eyes in fear (lots of white) so threat can be detected by others by seeing whites of eyes and pupils pointing in direction of threat
sadness elicits caregiving
happy/angry act a reinforcers (esp. for babies)
are facial expressions shaped by social context?
yes, more exaggerated facial expressions in social context (in particular around friends over strangers)
what is James-Lange theory?
physiological response to environmental stimuli and interpretation of that response results in emotion
don’t run because afraid, afraid because realise running away form a threat
different patterns of bodily change code different emotions
support for James-Lange’s theory?
expressions of disgust mis-identified as sadness or anger evoked heart rate changes more typical of sadness and anger than disgust
what is the Cannon-Bard theory in disputing James-Lange’s theory?
emotions occured even if brain disconnnected from viscera (internal organs)
bodily changes not emotion specific and too slow
stimulation of bodily change doesn’t lead to emotions
