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Emotion Theories Ali Patrice Seyed SNeRG 2/8/2008

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Page 1: Emotion Theories

Emotion Theories

Ali Patrice Seyed

SNeRG 2/8/2008

Page 2: Emotion Theories

– “What is it’s nature, what is it’s role in human life?”

– Plato • emotions are dangerous for achieving true

knowledge because they can overcome and subvert reason and the intellect

• Emotive and cognitive aspects of human understanding were seen as in opposition

• Philosophy

Page 3: Emotion Theories

• Stoicism– Emotion is a judgment that is wrong, untrustworthy and incorrect – Minimize confusion by cultivating more detached states.

• Aristotle– Emotion is part of moral/character only when in balance.

• Kant– A moral decision cannot be made on emotion.

• Hume– Defines emotions as “impressions” which is his term for

conscious feelings.– Although reason can judge notions, ideas and matters of fact,

the most noticeable results never persuade us to action as much as the slightest emotion or feeling can do.

Page 4: Emotion Theories

Descartes

• Located in the soul, the seat of consciousness• Called passions because the soul is passive in

relation to them• “species of perception” – perceptions of the soul,

caused/changed by movement of the spirits• Differ from sensory perceptions, which have

external objects– Passions are related to the soul.

• Distinguished from desires, which are caused by the soul itself.

Page 5: Emotion Theories

Descartes (cont.)

• Their causation in the condition of the body gives them an inertia that lends agents a capacity for “follow through” more consistently on their intentions.– A motivator to guide in the face of shifting

thoughts.

• Activity of the body that affects the soul.

Page 6: Emotion Theories

• Social psychology• Expressed emotion as communication in group settings

• Folk psychology• Ungrounded in scientific study, based on assumptions of

“common sense”

• Neuropsychology• Relationship between brain functioning and psychological

processes– Psychological tasks during brain imaging techniques (fMRI,

MEG, EEG).

Psychology

Page 7: Emotion Theories

• Cognitive neuropsychology• Branch of neuropsychology dealing with studying the

cognitive effects of brain injury in support of models of normal brain functioning

• Damasio• Brain lesions to emotion centers have a practical cost• Emotion different but evaluated by criteria that is “connected”

to reason• Some emotions are grounded by belief, but not belief

themselves.• Holds "that our most refined thoughts and best actions,

our greatest joys and deepest sorrows, use the body as a yardstick"

Page 8: Emotion Theories

Damasio (cont.)

• Phineas Gage case study, railway worked with steel rod through the pre-frontal lobe region

• After the accident Gage’s personality change, became more child-like and impulsive, the shrewd businessman his friends knew before the accident was no longer.

• He was incapable of making good and effective decisions, although his memory, language and traditional notions of intelligence were untouched.

• Kierkegaard and Heidegger hold that without care, concern, and interest, nothing would be salient, indeed the world would have no categories.

Page 9: Emotion Theories

Somatic Feeling Theory

• Rooted in work by William James

• Emotions are just the feelings of certain bodily changes as a result of perception of some fact

• ‘our feelings of the changes as they occur is the emotion’

Page 10: Emotion Theories

Somatic Feeling Theory

• Part of the nervous system that receives information about the muscles of the body

• Perception of the Object -> Change in bodily state -> Feeling of bodily change (The emotion)

• James, Damasio: emotion is experiences of changes in the body.• Damasio:

– Emotions can register changes in the levels of chemicals in the brain (e.g. changes in hormone levels caused by the endocrine system).

– Emotional response can occur in the absence of bodily changes when brain centers ordinarily associated with bodily change are active

» Sensory areas of the brain can be activated endogenously, Damasio calls this pathway the “as-if” loop.

» Emotions can bypass the body altogether, somatic brain centers become active when we imagine undergoing an emotion.

apseyed
Page 11: Emotion Theories

Somatic Feeling Theory

• Emotional feelings are feelings of bodily changes, but emotions are not exhausted by feelings.

• For definitional purposes, I liken emotional feelings to sensory awareness or more accurately conscious perception of the condition known as an emotion. Feelings of the condition of one’s body.

– Unconscious neural responses to changes in bodily states count as emotions for Damasio.

• Therefore, Damasio holds:– A somatic theory of emotion– A somatic theory of emotional feelings– BUT NOT a somatic feeling theory of emotion

» Emotion need not be consciously observed.» Can bypass the body (bodily changes through sensory

input) and also bypass consciousness

Page 12: Emotion Theories

Somatic Feeling Theory

• Darwin observed the connection b/w body changes and emotion.– Our hair stands on end when afraid: in earlier, hairier

mammals this would have increased apparent body size, scaring off predators.

• Darwin inspires not only this link, but also that one may identify emotions with behaviors to which bodily changes dispose us.– In essence, we attach emotion to its effect rather than

the root cause

Page 13: Emotion Theories

Damasio’s Somatic Theory

Perception of the object

Changes in bodily state

Perception ofbodily change

The emotion

As-if loop

apseyed
Damasio a famous neuroscientist
Page 14: Emotion Theories

Somatic Feeling Theory

• Emotions are therefore cognitive representations of body states that are part of a homeostatic mechanism by which the internal milieu is monitored and controlled, and by which this internal milieu influences behavior of the whole organism.

• Emotions are a result of nerve activation patterns and subsequent bodily changes

Page 15: Emotion Theories

Behavioral conditioning theory

• Watson: emotions are not behavioral dispositions but rather are behavioral responses to reward/punishments.

• Naturally behaviorists do not appeal to “inner states”.

• Rolls holds that emotions are the responses to rewards and punishment, but regards emotions as internal states.

Page 16: Emotion Theories

Processing mode theory

• Emotions lead to systematic changes in faculties of attention, memory, and reasoning.– Impacts our overall processing

• E.g. sadness makes us pessimistic and sensitive to our flaws.

• Oatley, Johnson, and Laird argue this applies to an important set of emotions: anger, anxiety, happiness, and sadness.

Page 17: Emotion Theories

A pure cognitive theory of emotion

• Emotions are identical to thoughts.– Solomon: Evaluative judgments that provide the

structure of our world.– Although judgments do not cover desires or wishes.

• Gordon: emotions involve wish-frustration or wish-satisfaction.

– Philosophers hold that the word ‘cognitive’ pertains only to beliefs or judgments, and construals/desire theories do not qualify as pure cognitive theories of emotion, unless desires are reducible to beliefs.

Page 18: Emotion Theories

Hybrid theories

• Cognitive labeling theory: If you fail to assign emotional significance to a physiological attribute, it doesn’t qualify as an emotion at all.

• Cognitive cause theory: The reverse of labeling theory, emotions arise when we form a thought about a situation and that thought gives rise to some state.

• Cognitive cause theories in psychology can be called dimensional appraisal theories.

Page 19: Emotion Theories

Schachter and Singer’s Cognitive labeling theory

Recognition of the event

ArousalCognitive

label

The emotion

EmotionallySignificantevent

Dotted line: It is possible for emotions to arise through misattribution.

Page 20: Emotion Theories

Cognitive cause theory

Perception of the object

Appraisal judgment

Emotional state

EmotionallySignificantobject

Page 21: Emotion Theories

Dimensional appraisal theory

• Primary appraisals– Something is emotionally significant

• Goal relevance• Goal congruence• Type of ego-involvement

• Secondary appraisals– Pertains to resources one has available for coping

• Blame or credit• Coping potential• Future expectancy

Page 22: Emotion Theories

Appraisals that Generate Anger

• Goal relevance: relevant

• Goal congruence: incongruent

• Ego involvement: self-esteem, social-esteem, or identity

• Blame or credit: some is to blame

• Coping potential: attack is viable

• Future expectancy: goal congruence predicted to increase by attack.

Page 23: Emotion Theories

Dimensional appraisal theory

Perception of the object

Appraisal judgment

Emotional state

EmotionallySignificantevent

Appraisal 1

Appraisal 2

Appraisal 3

Appraisal n

Page 24: Emotion Theories

Dimensional appraisal theory

• Six appraisal dimensions– molecular appraisals.

• Summary or gist of appraisals– molar appraisals– Lazarus calls this “core relational themes”, a relation

that pertains to well-being.

• Relief is an emotion – core relational theme: a distressing goal-incongruent

condition that has changed for the better or gone away

Page 25: Emotion Theories

Prinz: Jamesian-Damasio feeling theory with appraisal theory

• Emotions are valenced embodied appraisals

• Emotions do not just ‘register’ bodily changes

Page 26: Emotion Theories

Valence as a building block (Barrett, 2005)

• No biological or behavioral basis for usage of commonsense categories like anger, sadness, fear.

• Error of arbitrary aggregation– Perceptual processes lead people to

aggregate their experiences of themselves and other people into categories that do not necessarily reveal the causal structure of the underlying emotional processing.

Page 27: Emotion Theories

Valence as a building block (cont.)

• Natural selection– A view holds a protruding chin in humans

helped expand their diet, find mates, develop language.

– But chin is not a morphological/functional feature of the face that can be shaped by evolution

– People perceive the face in a way such that that they see a chin

Page 28: Emotion Theories

Valence as a building block (cont.)

• To understand what an emotion is, you want to understand the causal processes that support the perception of it.

• To understand the impact an emotion has on an situation(object,event).– We are asking how the perceptions of the

emotion influence a situation

Page 29: Emotion Theories

Valence as a building block (cont.)

• Positive/negative valuation, not discrete emotion categories that is invariant.

• Concept of “core affect” which results from the process of valuation, e.g. something is judged as helpful or harmful in a given instance.

• “People continually and automatically evaluate situations and objects”

Page 30: Emotion Theories

Role of feelings

• Scientific perspective excludes what it is like to have an emotional experience from a personal perspective (Goldie, 2004).

• Appraisal theories are ok, but incomplete without feeling.– At some level, emotional experiences involve characteristic

bodily feelings

• Emotion is not just, as (Nussbaum 2001) puts in her cognitive-evaluative view, “judgments of value”.

• Also, emotional feeling not always accurate.– I.e. You may be mistaken that a feeling is a part of an emotional

experience.

Page 31: Emotion Theories

Role of feelings

• Intentionality– Emotional feelings directed towards the

condition of one’s body.• Can provide reasons for believing one is

experiencing an emotion (introspective knowledge)• Reasons something in the environment that has

led to the emotion (extraspective knowledge)

– Directed towards the object of one’s emotion• E.g. fear directed towards a burglar• Object: person, thing, event/action, situation

Page 32: Emotion Theories

Moods

• Some emotions are grounded in belief– Grief, pity, compassion, anger

• Others less so, described as moods• Unlike emotions proper, moods do not

clearly have intentional objects, vague– May have a cause, but is not “directed”

towards that cause

• Moods can only be loosely connected to the propositions “in terms of” which they are expressed.

Page 33: Emotion Theories

• De Sousa – Takes Modern Cognitivist position– A thought requirement in emotion– Defends charge emotion is irrational and argues for

their “intelligence”

• A fully developed emotion has a belief, which is true/false or at least justifiable.– E.g. grief - directed at a terrible event, if belief is

false, the emotion goes away.• w/o grounding in belief there is no emotion

Page 34: Emotion Theories

• Relational Schema– Emotions are relations between the subject and the

various kinds of objects.– R(Stfacmp)

• R emotive type• S subject• t target• f focal property• a motivating aspect (which in standard case identical to f)• c the cause• m the aim• p the proposition specifying the ground

Page 35: Emotion Theories

• Formal object: for each emotion, the second-order property that must be implicitly ascribed to the motivating aspect if the emotion is to be intelligible.

• “implicit in the species of the emotion involved” and “each emotion type is a unique species defined by it’s formal object”

Page 36: Emotion Theories

• Not all emotions have the same number of relevant constituent factors– Depression is typically targetless– Love typical lacks a propositional object,

typically “thoughtless”– Jealousy may have two targets instead of

one.

Page 37: Emotion Theories

Service to rational thinking

• (Greenspan, 1999)– At the very least emotions can function as

"enabling" causes of rational decision-making (despite the many cases in which they are disabling) insofar as they direct attention toward certain objects of thought and away from others. They serve to heighten memory and to limit the set of salient practical options to a manageable set, suitable for "quick-and-dirty" decision-making.

Page 38: Emotion Theories

Cognitive Structure of Emotions (Ontony, Clore, and Collins, 1988)

• Strives to give a systematic account of the qualitative differences among individual emotions such as fear, envy, anger, pride, relief, and admiration.

• Explains how people’s construals of the world cause them to experience emotions.– System as a whole– Individual emotion makeup

• Valenced reactions to events, agents, or objects, with their particular nature being determined by the way in which the eliciting situation is construed

Page 39: Emotion Theories

Cognitive Structure of Emotions (cont.)

• Effort to distinguish genuinely emotion states and those that are not.

• Includes broad classes of emotion– Focus on distinct emotion types, rather than

emotion states

• 3 elements to appraisal– Goals, standards, and attitudes

Page 40: Emotion Theories

Emotional coherence theory, Dr. Thagard of U. of Waterloo

• In a purely cognitive coherence problem– the elements are divided into ones that are

accepted and rejected in such a way as to satisfy the most constraints

• Emotional coherence problem– Have positive and negative valences

• Reflect the emotional attitudes associated with different representations

Page 41: Emotion Theories

Emotional coherence theory (cont.)

• Elements can have positive and negative emotional connections to other elements– Valence of an element is determined by the

valences and acceptability of all the elements to which it is connected.

• Emotional reactions result from emotional valences attached to the goals that affect decision-making

Page 42: Emotion Theories

Computational model of emotional inference

• HOTCO, a type of ANN.– Activation of artificial neurons is interpreted as

a measure of their degree of acceptability– Each unit has a valence, a numerical measure

of emotional appeal of what is represented

• Activation corresponds to cognition, where valence corresponds to emotion.

Page 43: Emotion Theories

Computational model of emotional inference (cont.)

• HOTCO not very neurologically realistic, in that it uses single artificial neurons to stand for complex representation

• Compatible with GAGE– models decision making using distributed

representations over spiking neurons that are organized into anatomical groups,

• prefontal cortex, hippocampus, amygdala, and nucleus accubens.

Page 44: Emotion Theories

Computational Models of Emotion

• Approached at different levels of abstraction– Architecture Level

• Overall processing– Cognitive Appraisal Theory of emotion, Ortony, Collins, and

Clore implemented by Bates, Elliot, Reilly.» “The Affective Reasoner A process model of emotions in a

multiagent system”, dissertation of Clark Elliot

– Task level• NLP or problem-solving

– “Annotating Expressions of Opinions and Emotions in Language”, Weibe, Wilson, Cardie

– Mechanism level• Emulate some specific aspect of affective processing

Page 45: Emotion Theories

ReferencesBarrett, L. 2005. Valence is a basic building block of emotional life. Journal of

Research in Personality.Ortony, Clore, and Collins, 1988. The Cognitive Structure of Emotions.

Cambridge University Press.Prinz, J. 2004. Gut Reactions. Oxford University Press.Goldie, P. “Emotion, Feeling, and Knowledge of the World”. In Thinking about

Feeling, Oxford University Press.Greenspan, P. 1999. “Emotions, Rationality, and Mind/Body”. In Thinking about

Feeling. Oxford University Press.Barnes, A. and P. Thagard. 1996. Emotional Decisions. Proceedings of the

Eighteenth Annual Conference of the Cognitive Science Society. Erlbaum, 426-429.

http://gustavus.edu/academics/philosophy/kaaren.htmlhttp://www.free-essays.us/dbase/c6/dkt110.shtmlhttp://www.philosophy.umd.edu/Faculty/PGreenspan/Res/prem.htmlhttp://emotion.nsma.arizona.edu/Emotion/EmoRes/CompAI/Framework.htmlhttp://www.philosophy.umd.edu/Faculty/PGreenspan/Res/prem.html