Cognitive Theories Of Emotion Research Articles

Category EMOTIONS as a multimodal linguo-cognitive matrix of Homo Sentiens discourse ecology

The present article focuses on the issue of revealing the multimodal nature of the verbally objectivized category EMOTIONS as a linguo-cognitive matrix of Homo Sentiens discourse ecology. Drawing upon philosophy of emotion and cognitive theories of emotion to complement the linguo-cognitive and cognitive-discursive approaches, I elaborate a multimodal framework where interdiscursive representation of emotion is regarded as a specific architectonics of semiotic cognitive-perceptive choices derived from linguo-cognitive components of conceptualized emotions. In terms of our research interdiscursive representation of emotion is proved to be its matrix actualization in the major linguoculture semiotics, such as semiotics of human movement (dancing, acting, circus), semiotics of sound (music), semiotics of art expression (sculpture, painting, architecture, cinema), semiotics of literature and media through the corresponding discourses concerning the above that constitute our ecology. The paper provides insights into a comprehensive theoretical account of the ways various multichannel semiotics expressed by discursive means represent the category EMOTIONS, stemming from its multimodality.

Ambivalence for Cognitivists: A Lesson from Chrysippus?

Ambivalence—where we experience two conflicting emotional responses to the same object, person or state of affairs—is sometimes thought to pose a problem for cognitive theories of emotion. Drawing on the ideas of the Stoic Chrysippus, I argue that a cognitivist can account for ambivalence without retreating from the view that emotions involve fully-fledged evaluative judgments. It is central to the account I offer that emotions involve two kinds of judgment: one about the object of emotion, and one about the subject’s response.

Breaking the World to Make It Whole Again: Attribution in the Construction of Emotion

In their cognitive theory of emotion, Schachter and Singer proposed that feelings are separable from what they are about. As a test, they induced feelings of arousal by injecting epinephrine and then molded them into different emotions. They illuminated how feelings in one moment lead into the next to form a stream of conscious experience. We examine the construction of emotion in a similar spirit. We use the sensory integration process to understand how the brain combines disparate sources of information to construct both perceptual and emotional models of the world even as the world continues to change. We emphasize two processes: affect segmentation (isolating the felt component of an emotion) and affect integration (recombining this feeling with its object).

Deconstructing the “Two Factors”: The Historical Origins of the Schachter–Singer Theory of Emotions

In this contribution, I interrogate the historical-intellectual narrative that dominates the history of the Schachter–Singer two-factor theory of emotion. In the first part, I propose that a social influence model became generalized to a cognitive view. I argue that Schachter and Singer presented a cognitive theory of emotions in enacting inside the laboratory Schachter’s preceding “social influence” model of emotions and that Schachter’s adoption of a cognitive model of emotion was driven by and was necessary for his previous research on social influence. In the second part, I argue that the Schachter–Singer theory is remarkable not because it introduced a cognitive turn in emotion, but because it presented sympathetic nervous system activation as an essential constitutive element of every emotion.

Ciudadanía y emociones: hacia una verdadera interculturalidad. (A propósito de la teoría cognitiva de la emoción de Martha Nussbaum)

La democracia sustantiva en una sociedad multicultural del siglo XXI exige proyectos institucionales que eleven el nivel de solidaridad mutua para avanzar en los procesos de reconocimiento de identidades compartidas entre grupos cultural y racialmente distintos, y demanda el desarrollo de estrategias efectivas de acercamiento entre las diversas culturas y razas que permitan dar forma a la realización eficaz de objetivos comunes a todas ellas y desarrollar la idea de ciudadanía. Sobre la base de una razón compasiva, y dada la relación entre las emociones y el fuerte sentido de identidad de individuos y grupos, uno de estos proyectos debería consistir en eliminar las barreras emocionales para incluir al otro definidas, en gran medida, por las instituciones. A partir de la teoría cognitiva de la emoción de Nussbaum, se analizan elementos que pueden contribuir al desarrollo de una cultura pública de la igualdad y de la compasión civil. Necesitamos proyectos políticos para controlar los efectos dañinos del miedo, la envidia, la vergüenza y el asco. Este daño puede observarse en la jurisprudencia del Tribunal Europeo de Derechos Humanos sobre el asco hacia algunos grupos raciales (v. gr., apestosos judíos), la "vergüenza negra" o la envidia o el odio racial.

Psychometri properties of the Cognitive Emotion Regulation Questionnaire in a sample of Iranian population

Psychometri properties of the Cognitive Emotion Regulation Questionnaire in a sample of Iranian population

Emotion and Education: Reflecting on the Emotional Experience Emotion and Education

<p style="text-align:justify">The paper presents an educative experience organized in a postgraduate course in a faculty of education with the aim of facilitating students’ “affective self-understanding”. Affective self-understanding is a reflective practice that allows people to comprehend their own emotions in order to gain awareness of them. Students were spontaneously engaged in a laboratory, where they were invited to reflect on their emotional lives. The educative experience was subdivided into different phases requiring writing and analysis tasks. At the end of the experience, students were asked what they thought they had learned, what had been difficult, and what had been the most important phase for learning. Students’ answers were analyzed on the basis of grounded theory through an inductive process of analysis. The theoretical framework of the research is the cognitive theory of emotions. According to this theory, an emotional education is possible because we can understand emotions by identifying their cognitive component and the actions they induce.</p>

Disillusionment and Change: A Cognitive-Emotional Theory of Gang Exit

Exit from street gangs has received increased attention in recent years; however, a number of important questions regarding the process of leaving remain unanswered. Relying on identity theory, we present a cognitive-emotional theory of gang exit that emphasizes functional dimensions of anger in terms of motivating individuals to pursue identity change related to gang membership. Specifically, anger provides gang members with an opportunity to identify the gang as a major source of their problems. According to identity theory, anger is generated when there is an inability to meet an identity standard. This article argues that an inability to meet identity goals produces disillusionment and anger, which reduces the relative importance of the gang identity and facilitates exit from gangs.

Martha C. Nussbaum’s Political Emotions

Martha Nussbaum’s new book Political Emotions is a contribution to political philosophy and, simultaneously, a moral-psychological study of the emotions. In it, she revisits some of the most prominent themes in her 2004 book Hiding from Humanity and her 2001 treatise, Upheavals of Thought. As Nussbaum points out in the opening pages of Political Emotions, one of her goals in this work is to answer a call issued by John Rawls for a “reasonable moral psychology” (9) that would be conceptually refined and empirically grounded, since a complete theoretical account of the just society must be informed by a suitably complex, accurate conception of human emotions. On the whole, Political Emotions is a remarkably successful book that combines several areas of philosophical research in which the author’s proficiency is well known. It shows how problems that lie on the more intimate side of ethics, pertaining for instance to friendship and family life, have relevance for social justice and public culture; along the way, it also incorporates insightful readings of literary texts. Nussbaum’s book therefore ought to introduce readers of her work in one area (such as social philosophy) to aspects of her work in another (such as the philosophy of mind, or literary criticism). It explores the nature of human emotions, as they form early in life and develop in the context of personal relationships, in order to clarify some of the conditions of possibility for a just liberal democracy. Political Emotions asks: which emotions are essential for such a society to flourish, and which are apt to undermine its values and goals? In order to offer an account that can answer this question, Nussbaum draws upon her influential cognitive theory of emotion and, in the process, reformulates it in subtle yet significant ways. For the sake of this book symposium, I concentrate mainly upon how human emotions are depicted and explained in Political Emotions, and on what Nussbaum’s latest work reveals about her considered view about the nature of emotion. First, I address her analysis of some types of emotion that are specifically important to her project, voicing a few critical worries about how Nussbaum describes certain emotions that can undermine a just society; then, in the latter (and larger) part of this essay, I make several related observations about how Political Emotions appears to modify Nussbaum’s theory of emotion, making some friendly suggestions about which Phenom Cogn Sci (2014) 13:643–650 DOI 10.1007/s11097-014-9389-4

Positive interpretation bias predicts well-being in medical interns.

Cognitive theories of emotion posit that affective responses may be shaped by how individuals interpret emotion-eliciting situations. This study tested whether individual differences in interpretation bias (i.e., interpreting ambiguous scenarios in a more negative or positive manner) independently predict trait resilience and depression in medical interns. Interpretation bias and trait resilience scores were assessed in 47 interns prior to their first internship. Depressive symptoms were assessed twice during internship. Nearly half of the sample (42%) scored above the cut-off for mild depressive symptoms during internship, a significant rise compared to the initial assessment. Those with a more positive interpretation bias had higher trait resilience (β = 0.44, p = 0.004) and a 6-fold decreased depressive symptom risk during internship (OR = 6.41, p = 0.027). The predictive power of a positive interpretation bias for decreased depression symptoms held over and above initial depressive symptoms, demographics and trait reappraisal. Assessing positive interpretation bias may have practical utility for predicting future well-being in at risk-populations.

Emotions and Nationalism: The Case of Joan Maragall’s Compassionate Love of Country

This essay explores the role of emotions in the constitution of nationalism. It takes as its case study the function of compassion in Joan Maragall’s writings about the events of the Tragic Week in Barcelona (26 July–1 August 1909). Drawing on current studies that interrogate the ongoing anti- nationalist scholarly consensus (; ; ), I look at cognitive theories of emotion () to trace the role of compassion in Maragall’s life and works, from his early poems such as ‘Paternal’ (1893) to his later writings on Barcelona’s social violence from 1909. I argue that in his later writings Maragall articulates a compassionate love of country that conflicted with the policies of the Lliga Regionalista, the hegemonic nationalist party at the time, but that was difficult to translate into public action. This essay demonstrates how emotions are essential to the historical constitution of nationalisms, and how such emotions cannot be reduced to hatred, the emotion that is conventionally identified with nationalist movements.

Problem-Focused Content in the Job Search: Two Tests of the Cognitive-Emotional Theory of Esteem Support Messages

The Cognitive-Emotional Theory of Esteem Support Messages posits that messages intended to enhance recipients' state self-esteem focus on cognitions and/or behaviors. In the current studies, problem-focused message content (i.e., content focused on enacting behavior to alleviate the esteem threat) was of particular interest. College students (Study 1, n= 227) applying for postgraduation jobs and unemployed, underemployed, and/or displaced workers recruited from a government one-stop career center (Study 2, n = 292) rated esteem support messages varying in degree of focus on behaviors vs. cognitions relevant to the job search process. Messages focused on behavior were rated as less effective than those focusing on cognitions relevant to the esteem threat, although support for this result was stronger in Study 2.

The Concept of Involvement and the Paradox of Fiction

I will divide my paper into two parts. First of all, I will discuss, three tentative solutions of the paradox of fiction which are, in my opinion, untenable. In arguing against these theories a special weight will be given to a single question: why and how is it possible to calm someone by repeating that what they are reading or looking at is a fiction? In the second part, I will suggest a realistic and anti-judgmentalist solution of the paradox. It rests on what I believe to be general features of imagination, but it also implies an understanding of the primary relation of involvement – a relation which somehow echoes Heidegger’s notion of Befindlichkeit . A concluding remark is devoted to the origin of the paradox: in my opinion it is not only an aftermath of a cognitive theory of emotion, but it is also a clue of a mistaken behavior toward fiction

What Is an Emotion? Musil’s Adverbial Theory

1. IntroductionAt the beginning of the so-called Emotion Psychology in Robert Musil's The Man Without Qualities we find the claim everything that happens among people has its origin ... in emotions.1 Musil's protagonist, Ulrich, then tries to give a theoretical answer to the question of what an emotion, which plays such a central role in human life, is. It does not come as a surprise that his answer differs significantly from the classical one developed by William James. After all, Musil was a pupil of Carl Stumpf who rejected James's view that an emotion is the feeling of bodily changes.2 As Ulrich puts it, emotions are, on this view, nothing more than sensations in the bowels or wrists . . . fear consists of accelerated heartbeat and shallow breathing (1245). Opposing the so-called James-Lange Theory of Emotion, Ulrich, just like Stumpf, distinguishes between 'emotion' (Gefuhl) and mere 'feeling' (Gefuhlsempfindung).3 This distinction brings him more into line with currently predominant 'cognitive' theories of emotion, by which I generally mean theories that attribute representational content to emotion. However, it will tum out in the following that Ulrich's-and Musil's-analysis of emotion is unique. Although there are parallels, especially to Peter Goldie's account,4 Musil is the only one to conceive emotions as Gestalt qualities of a specific kind, i.e., as higherorder phenomena that are extended in time and dynamically structured according to certain Gestalt principles.My first aim in this paper is to show that the specific concept of a Gestalt quality which underlies Musil's emotion analysis is provided by Kurt Lewin, a member of the Berlin School and also a pupil of Stumpf. Ever since research on Musil started, it has been pointed out that his work is strongly influenced by the Gestalt psychology of his time, but Lewin's impact on Musil has been greatly underestimated.51 will argue that Musil could find the two major ideas of the Emotion Psychology in Lewin's Comments Concerning Psychological Forces and Energies, and the Structure of the Psyche and On the Structure of the Mind, which are two parts of one article.6My second aim is to give Musil's views their due position in contemporary cognitive emotion theory. In the course of my argument it will emerge that Musil's Gestalt-theoretical account of emotion differs significantly from the currently predominant 'judgemental', 'perceptual', or 'neojudgemental' theories of emotion.7 He instead holds what I shall call an 'adverbial' theory of emotion, according to which the evaluative qualities that cognitivists associate with the different emotion types are instantiated as the Gestalt-organization of the emotion's first-order components, and not as qualities of the emotion's object. The analogy is with the adverbial theory of perception;8 evaluative qualities in emotion theory, like sensory qualities in perception theory, function as adverbs which in this case characterize the shape and distinct phenomenology of the subject's worldview.Musil was concerned that his theory of emotion might be caught up and thus outdated within ten years.9 I hope to demonstrate that, today, it is still an option, even though I have to leave its ultimate assessment to future research.10 I will instead conclude this paper by sketching how Musil, on the basis of his theory of emotion, may justifiably come to the conclusion everything that happens among people has its origin . . . in emotions. Musil's emotion theory is in fact the heart of his overall theoretical approach-or so I will argue.2. The Emotion PsychologyThe Emotion Psychology is developed in chapters 50, 52, 54, 55, 57, and 58 of the 1938 galley proofs, either in the form of extracts from Ulrich's diary or as reflected upon by Ulrich in gathering his thoughts prior to writing his diary. Clearly, we must not simply take Ulrich's views as expressions of Musil's own. But as I have argued elsewhere, the Emotion Psychology allows two readings: one as part of The Man Without Qualities, and a second one as the nucleus of Musil's overall theoretical approach. …

Cognitive Specificity in Fear and Sad Affect: An Investigation of Emotional Reactivity and Recovery from Experimental Mood Induction

Beck’s (Cognitive therapy of the emotional disorders. New American Library, New York, 1976) cognitive content specificity hypothesis states that anxiety and depression can be differentiated by their thought content. Although Beck extended the hypothesis to normal emotion states, the generalizability of content specificity has not been demonstrated. In the current study 183 students were randomly assigned to view a fearful or sad movie clip, followed by an expressive writing task to induce mood recovery. Positive and negative cognitions and emotional reactivity were assessed before and after the movie clip, as well as after recovery. Only threat/danger cognitions demonstrated specificity after fear induction. Negative and coping loss/failure thoughts exhibited the same pattern of change with induction and recovery across both emotion conditions, thus showing non-specificity. The findings supported the cognitive specificity hypothesis for fear but not normal sad affect. Discussion of the generalizability of the cognitive content specificity hypothesis and its implication for cognitive theories of emotion are considered.

Esteem Support Messages Received during the Job Search: A Test of the CETESM

The current study extends research on the Cognitive-Emotional Theory of Esteem Support Messages (CETESM) and examines the role of esteem support during the job search. Unemployed, underemployed, and/or displaced job seekers (N=197) recalled an esteem support message they had received during their job search. Messages were coded using a scheme derived from the CETESM. Results indicate that helpful messages (i.e., those that enhanced state self-esteem related to the job search) were significantly more likely than unhelpful messages to contain message features predicted by the CETESM. Helpful messages were also associated with greater job search activity than were unhelpful messages. Theoretical implications, as well as pragmatic implications for those who wish to support job seekers, are discussed.

Research of Knowledge - Affection Interaction Mechanism Based on Comprehensive Cognition Emotional Theory

This paper absorbed research fruits of comprehensive information, emotional motive - information and three-dimensional PAD emotion theory, defined the main body of the priori knowledge and affection, and posteriori knowledge and affection, obtained knowledge and affections and expectation knowledge and affection, analyzed cognitive mechanism of knowledge, formation mechanism of affection, proposed knowledge-affection interaction mechanism model, deduced the principle of knowledge-affection interaction mechanism (that is, the first and second law), unveiled the human’s rich and complex knowledge-affection interaction and the emotion changing laws. Comprehensive cognitive emotional theory is a new doctrine of cognition - emotion interaction mechanism.

The multimodal representation of emotion in film: Integrating cognitive and semiotic approaches

This study provides a semiotic theorization of how emotion is represented in film to complement the cognitive approach, which focuses on how film elicits emotion from viewers. Drawing upon social semiotic theories and cognitive theories of emotion, we develop a multimodal framework in which filmic representation of emotion is seen as combinations of semiotic choices derived from cognitive components of emotion. The semiotic model is employed to investigate how emotive meaning is realized through verbal and nonverbal resources. At the discursive level of film, the choices available in the shot organization of eliciting condition and expression are examined. The paper demonstrates how the social semiotic approach, combined with cognitive theory of emotion structure, is able to provide a comprehensive theoretical account of how various film techniques represent emotion. It is also significant for the study of viewer emotion, which to a large degree stems from character emotion.

A perspectiva cognitiva no design para emoção: análise de concerns em projetos para a experiência

Design for emotions can be based on user research. These researches have the role of feeding the design process with information that allows designers to establish design guidelines that have the potential to increase the probability of achieving the intended emotional impact over users. This paper explores the basis of Appraisal Theory, a cognitive theory of emotions from Psychology, which offers, since its adaptation to the Design field (Desmet, 2002), a way to understand the triggers (probable causes) of certain emotions associated to design elements. In this paper, the author also suggests research methods to develop these studies, including example and a critical evaluation of its applicability. Key words: design for emotion, emotional design, appraisal theory, user research.

Interactional Justice and Counterproductive Work Behaviors: The Mediating Role of Negative Emotions

Perceptions of interactional justice have been shown to explain why employees engage in counterproductive work behaviors (CWB; Bies, 2005). However, the processes involved in this relationship have yet to be clarified. In this study, we drew on the cognitive theory of emotions and extended work published on the mediating role in this relationship (Fox & Spector, 1999) by conducting a survey with insurance company employees (N = 187). Data analyses confirmed that CWB are significantly predicted by both low perceived interactional justice and negative emotions. In addition, 2 significant mediation effects were observed: (a) perceived anger mediates the relationship between low perceived interpersonal justice and active CWB, and (b) perceived fear mediates the relationship between low perceived informational justice and passive CWB. The theoretical and organizational implications of these findings are discussed.