Early Competing Theories of Emotion_default

Nature of Emotions

• Four major features of emotional states:

  • Triggered by external/internal stimuli

  • Result from our appraisals of stimuli

  • Physiological responses to appraisals

  • Include behavior tendencies

Example of Emotional Response

Scenario: Cuts Off While Driving

• Emotion experienced: Anger

  • Expressive Behavior: Yelling or accelerating

  • Physiological Arousal: Sweating, increased heart rate

  • Conscious Experience: Labeling thoughts such as "that person's a bad driver" or feeling scared and needing to calm down

Components of Emotion

• Cognitive appraisal: interpretation of the situation

• Physiological responses: bodily reactions like heart rate

• Expressive behaviors: actions in response to emotions

• Instrumental behaviors: secondary actions related to coping with the emotion

Debate: Arousal vs. Cognition

• Question: Which occurs first?

  • Physiological arousal or emotional experience?

  • Possible simultaneous occurrence

Early Theories of Emotion

James-Lange Theory

• Proposal: Physiological arousal occurs before thoughts

  • Example: Feel afraid because of trembling

  • Conscious experience results from perception of autonomic arousal

    • Stimulus (oncoming car) → Physiological response (pounding heart) → Emotion (fear)

Cannon-Bard Theory

• Proposal: Physiological arousal and emotion occur simultaneously

  • Example: Physiological arousal during exercise (heart racing) does not always result in emotion (e.g., fear)

  • Argument: Physiological states for different emotions are too similar to differentiate

  • Body’s response and emotional labeling happen at the same time:

    • Stimulus (oncoming car) → Physiological response (pounding heart) + Emotion (fear)

Summary of Theories

• James-Lange Theory: Linear sequence from stimulus to autonomic arousal to conscious emotion

• Cannon-Bard Theory: Simultaneous occurrence of thalamic activity leading to both arousal and conscious emotion