Emotion

Emotions Whole-organism responses, involving: Physiological arousal Expressive behaviors Conscious experience

Basic Emotions Fear, surprise, anger, disgust, happiness, sadness Basic emotions are innate (inborn) and “hard-wired” Complex emotions are a blend of many aspects of emotions Classified along two dimensions Pleasant or unpleasant Level of activation or arousal associated with the emotion

Concept of Emotion A class of subjective feelings created by stimuli that have high significance to an individual stimuli that produce high arousal generally produce strong feelings are rapid and automatic emerged through natural selection to benefit survival and reproduction

Functions of Emotion Emotions can move us to act, triggering motivated behavior Emotions help us to set goals, but emotional states can also be goals in themselves. Emotions are important in many different areas, including rational decision making and purposeful behavior. Emotional intelligence is the capacity to understand and manage your own emotional experiences and to perceive, comprehend, and respond appropriately to the emotional responses of others.

Evolutionary Explanations of Emotion Darwin argued that emotions reflect evolutionary adaptations to the problems of survival and reproduction Today’s evolutionary psychologists believe that emotions are the product of evolution and that they help us solve adaptive problems posed by our environment

The Subjective Experience of Emotion People vary in their subjective experience of emotion in the following ways: People vary greatly in the intensity of their emotions The sexes differ little in their experience of emotions The sexes differ in the expression of emotion: women are more emotionally expressive

The Subjective Experience of Emotion There are a limited number of basic emotions that all humans, in every culture, experience. They are thought to be biologically determined, the products of evolution People often experience a blend of emotions or mixed emotions, rather than a pure emotion.

The Neuroscience of Emotion The Nervous System & Emotion

Divisions of the Nervous System

Autonomic Nervous System The division of the peripheral nervous system that controls the glands and muscles of the internal organs Monitors the autonomic functions Controls breathing, blood pressure, and digestive processes Divided into the sympathetic and parasympathetic nervous systems Cross-cultural studies have demonstrated that the basic emotions are associated with distinct patterns of autonomic nervous system activity

Divisions of the Nervous System

Sympathetic Nervous System The part of the autonomic nervous system that arouses the body to deal with perceived threats Fight or flight response

Divisions of the Nervous System

Parasympathetic Nervous System The part of the autonomic nervous system that calms the body Brings the body back down to a relaxed state

Autonomic Nervous System

Autonomic Nervous System

Autonomic Nervous System

Autonomic Nervous System

Autonomic Nervous System

Autonomic Nervous System

Autonomic Nervous System

Fear: A Closer Look The Role of Brain in Emotion

Physical Arousal and Emotions Sympathetic nervous system is aroused with emotions (fight-or-flight response) Different emotions stimulate different responses Fear—decrease in skin temperature (cold-feet) Anger—increase in skin temperature (hot under the collar) A recent study using PET scans found that each of four emotions (sadness, happiness, anger, and fear) produced a distinct pattern of brain activation and deactivation This indicates that each emotion involves distinct neural circuits in the brain

High Arousal Arousal response - pattern of physiological change that helps prepare the body for “fight or flight” muscles tense, heart rate and breathing increase, release of endorphins, focused attention can be helpful or harmful in general, high arousal is beneficial for instinctive, well-practiced or physical tasks harmful for novel (new), creative, or careful judgment tasks Keywords: arousal, arousal response

Arousal Theory Experiencing pleasant emotion after internal or external achievement motivates our behavior.

Yerkes-Dodson Law Some arousal is necessary High arousal is helpful on easy tasks As level of arousal increases, quality of performance decreases with task difficulty Too much arousal is harmful Degree of arousal Quality of performance Very difficult task Moderately difficult task Easy task Keywords: Yerkes-Dodson law

Brain-Based Theory of Emotions Amygdala evaluate the significance of stimuli and generate emotional responses generate hormonal secretions and autonomic reactions that accompany strong emotions damage causes “psychic blindness” and the inability to recognize fear in facial expressions and voice Keywords: brain-based theory of emotions, amygdala, psychic blindness

Brain-Based Theory of Emotions Frontal lobes influence people’s conscious emotional feelings and ability to act in planned ways based on feelings (e.g., effects of prefrontal lobotomy) Parietal Frontal Occipital Temporal left frontal lobe may be most involved in processing positive emotions right frontal lobe involved with negative emotions Keywords: brain-based theory of emotions, frontal lobes

How You Experience Fear When a person is faced with a potentially threatening stimulus, the visual stimulus is first routed to the thalamus. Information is then relayed simultaneously along two neural pathways: crude, archetypal information travels rapidly to the amygdala (in the limbic system), More detailed information travels to the visual cortex, where the stimulus is interpreted If the cortex determines that a threat exists, the information is relayed to the amygdala along the longer, slower pathway.

Amygdala then sends information along two pathways One pathway leads to an area of the hypothalamus, then on to the medulla; together, they trigger arousal of the sympathetic nervous system Another pathway leads to a different hypothalamus area that, in concert with the pituitary gland, triggers the release of stress hormones. Joseph LeDoux believes that the direct thalamus–amygdala connection represents an adaptive response that has been hard-wired by evolution in the human brain. The indirect route allows more complex stimuli to be evaluated in the cortex.