Emotion

1. Emotion Psychology 1107

2. Introduction • Emotions are a mix of: • Physiological arousal of some sort • Behaviour • Experience

3. Physiology of emotion • Extra sugar is made available for energy • Breathe faster • Slowed digestion • Pupils dilate • Sweat • Autonomic nervous system kicks in • epinephrine • norepinephrine

4. The Yerkes Dodson Law • Too much arousal is not good • Too little arousal is not good • Somewhere in the middle is what you want • True for most tasks • Overlearned tasks, the more arousal the better

5. Emotions are a riddle • It is hard to pick out who is angry, scared or sexually aroused by physiological reactions alone • They feel different though • Different brain regions light up • Polygraphs work only on this stuff so it is hard to tell if people are guilty, or just generally aroused

6. Noverbal communication and emotion • Kellerman, Lewis and Laird (1989) • Body language affects emotions • Women tend to be better than men at detecting emotion • Women express happiness more easily • Men express anger more easily

7. Body language • Liars make fewer pauses, more gestures • There are cultural differences of course • Personal space • Gestures • Nixon’s famous gaffe • Facial expressions though seem to be culturally independent

8. Facial expressions • Fear, anger happiness, disgust, surprise are the same everywhere • There is probably an evolutionary basis to this, indeed, chimps make expressions that are universal

9. Facial expressions and emotion • Oddly enough, our emotions can also feed off the expressions we are making (Duclas et al, 1989) • Forced people to ‘smile’ • Felt happier • Ekman’s work with actors

10. Experiencing emotion • Emotions seem to have a few dimensions to them • Pleasant vs. unpleasant • Arousal vs. sleepy • Long vs. short • Izzard (1977) said there are 10 emotions • Joy, excitement, surprise, sadness, guilt, anger, disgust, contempt, fear, shame • Said that other emotions are just combinations

11. Fear • Pretty adaptive, fight or flight • Learn to fear objects etc • Observation too • Nobody fears houses… • Amygdala may be key • Genetic effects too

12. Anger • Both other’s willful acts, and plain ol’ annoyances can make us angry • Seems maladaptive, but it often leads to a solution • Should you vent? • Catharsis • Usually does not work • Leads to more rage • Calm down! • Vent not through anger, but through exercise etc

13. Happiness • Happy people have better lives than non happy people • Wonder what the direction is though… • Even after bad stuff, happiness levels do not seem to change • It is all relative of course • We adapt to our lot in life

14. Theories of Emotion • James-Lange theory • Emotions come from physiological arousal • Happiness comes from smiling • Sadness comes from crying Perceived Event Physiological And Behavioural response Emotional Experience

15. Cannon-Baird Theory Physiological And Behavioural response • Emotion originates in the thalamus • Physiological and psychological systems activated simultaneously Perceived Event Emotional Experience

16. Schacter Two Factor • Physiological arousal and cognitive label happen • Both of which are required for an emotional experience Physiological Arousal Emotional Experience Cognitive Label