L2 emotions Flashcards Preview

›Interconnectedness of (i) consciousness, (ii) sense of self & (iii) emotional experience ›The interplay of these three dimensions of human being is rarely so alive and intrusive as it is throughout serious illness trajectories ›High risk during illness of experiencing very challenging emotions and (often existential) threats to one’s sense of self

›Physical response (in extreme cases): ›Rapid heart beat; palid skin; cold sweat; bristled hair; muscular tremors; rapid breathing; dryness of the mouth; trembling lips; husky voice ›Increased blood supply to heart & muscles ›Increased adrenalin levels ›Intense concentration ›Can become pathological

›Consider the ‘fight or flight response’ factor

›Liminality: living in a state of uncertainty somewhere between sickness and health; living in a ‘liminal’ space – unable to flee & limited ‘fighting’ potential ›

Underlying state of anxiety related to uncertainty with fear surfacing from time to time in response to particular stimuli – eg a new symptom; a painful association; anticipation of test results

›Cancer screening research suggests that emotions relevant to attending for screening include embarrassment and fear (Consedine et al., 2007)

Originated as a form of food rejection

Contamination

›Basic forms of disgust are elaborated through social processes

›Susceptible to process of moralisation

›Moral emotions - eg guilt, shame, disgust

›Disgust in relation to foods based on their nature and origin

›Disgust in relation to reminders of our animal nature – death, inappropriate sex, violations of the body boundaries

›Disgust in the moral domain

› The process through which an activity that was previously outside the moral domain enters into it.

›Common in both individual development and cultural evolution.

›Moralisation of particular illnesses
›Moral judgements - contamination - disgust ›Close association between disgust and shame

›Use of metaphors in meaning making in illness experiences – eg battle/fight metaphors commonly used in cancer; ‘miracles’ in end of life care

›Can be challenging for people living in a liminal state

Current social metaphors tend to imply that cancer patients are weak or ineffectual people who have in some way participated in their disease--the so-called "Type C" personality, defined as passive, emotionally inexpressive, conforming and unassertive. "The cancer personality is regarded...with condescension, as one of life's losers," Sontag observes. It's hard for anyone in today's pop-psych, self-help American culture not to feel at least some sense of self- blame or shame over having a life-threatening illness.

›Shame arises from seeing one’s self negatively from the point of view of the other.

›Shame often precedes anger ›

Functions:

›1.Key component of conscience
›2.Alerts us to a threat to the social bond - signals trouble in a relationship
›3. Regulates the expression and awareness of all our other emotions

›A problem of public appearance

›In the beginning he used to hold his hand ... behind his back. Or he held one hand with the other (Wife)

›Sometimes I have to sign a cheque. Then I think ... these people must at least think I must have stolen the cheque ... it’s embarrassing

›When you are in a room full of visitors ... and you have to stand up, it’s embarrassing

›Intersubjective connectedness

›- Being connected to another person at the level of subjectivity (below level of surface communication)

›Emotions enable intersubjective connectedness

›Attunement - joint attention and feeling in interaction

›A sense of ‘attunement’ is the goal of most social interactions

›Maintaining social bonds - crucial human motive

›Communication system – through which individuals make known to each other their thoughts

›Deference-emotion system – through which each person evaluates the other’s status.

›Mutual understanding that is mental and emotional:

›- empathic intersubjectivity (mind reading) ›

- occur in conflict & in cooperative interactions.

›Successful face work leads to the state of attunement.

›Unsuccessful face work - feelings of shame (embarrassment or disgrace shame) in one participant at least

›Seeking attunement - the most basic component of all everyday interaction ›

Avoidance of shame - a high priority ›

Attunement and the nurse-patient relationship:

›- Potential for loss of patient status
›- Disgust -> shame - high risk
›- Shame avoidance - a very high priority ›

- Unsuccessful attunement makes n/p encounters difficult

›- Both nurse and patient working towards successful attunement

› Both always present in illness experiences where predicting the future precisely is usually impossible.

›You might be surprised by the particular things people who are very ill tell you they hope for – if you ask them

› Asking this question will make it possible for you to help them.

›Compassion: sympathetic consciousness of others distress together with a desire to alleviate it.

› Empathy: the act of understanding, being aware of, being sensitive to, and vicariously experiencing the feelings, thoughts and experiences of another without having the feelings, thoughts and experiences fully communicated in an objectively explicit manner

›Pity: sympathetic sorrow for one suffering, distressed or unhappy

› Sympathy: the act or capacity of entering into or sharing the feelings or interests of another.