Psych Exam 2 - Emotion

James-Lange Theory of Emotion

Awareness of bodily reactions → Emotion

Canon-Bard Theory of Emotion

Awareness of body and emotions happen simultaneously

Zajonc and LeDoux Theory of Emotion

Stimuli → Emotional response → Cognitively label emotion

Lazarus’ Cognitive-Mediational Theory of Emotion

Stimuli → Cognitive appraisal (e.g., dangerous?) → Emotional response

What did Paul Ekman do?

identifieda a means of emotion detection → FACS

Facial action coding system

when is good ability of detecting emotion in others present

when emotion is transparent, especially when emotion is in line with social expectations

when do we encounter errors in emotion detection

When emotion is not transparent, because it tends to throw us off

what is crucial to emotion detection

context helps to avoid egocentrism, we often embed context cues to help

what are the 10 basic emotions

• Joy • Interest-Excitement • Surprise • Sadness • Anger • Disgust • Contempt • Fear • Shame • Guilt

do body language cues differ across cultures?

yes, but differences may be shrinking due to globalization

what are the dimensions of emotions

• Valence → Positive, Negative

• Arousal → High, Low

‘the happiness trap’

• “I just want to feel happy”

• Social comparison of emotion • Social media not helpful for this

• Most people are not happy all the time, we generally stay in a neutral emotional state