Objective 3.1To what extent do cognitive and biological factors interact in emotion ?

A Review of Emotion

What do we already know about emotion?

Emotion

The word emotion includes a wide range of observable behaviors, expressed feelings, and changes in the body state.

This diversity in intended meanings of the word emotion make it hard to study without the understanding of the biological and cognitive factors that influence emotion.

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Emotion (a biopsychsocial explanation)

(Branches) (Gardener)

Thoughts and Culture &

explanations experience &

expression of emotion

(Root &Trunk)

Biological

capacity for emotion

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Think about these Issues

• Are emotions and cognitions two separate processes that often conflict with each other, or are they inextricably connected?

• Can we cognitively control our emotion?

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Emotion

Elements of Emotion

1-Physiological changes in the face, brain, and body

2-Cognitive processes such as interpretations of events

3-Cultural influences that shape the experience and expression of emotion

Emotion

A biologically oriented psychologist defines emotion as physiological behavior; body arousal, hormones, brain activity and facial expressions are considered to be associated with pleasant or unpleasant mental states of the mind.

Conversely, cognitive psychologists focus on the mental aspects of emotions and how the unconscious and conscious mental processes influence emotional experiences and actions.

We will look at the interaction between the two in order to further understand emotions.

Theories of Emotion

Most theories of emotion assume that Emotions are a mix of 1) physiological

activation, 2) expressive behaviors, and 3) conscious experience.

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Controversy

1) Does physiological arousal precede or follow your emotional experience?

2) Does cognition (thinking) precede emotion (feeling)?

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Commonsense ViewWhen you become happy, your heart starts

beating faster. First comes conscious awareness, then comes physiological activity.

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Psychological View

The interaction of cognitive and biological factors in emotion (or, more colloquially, thinking and feeling) is a key topic in emotional research.

Although each of these areas has its own literature, there is overwhelming evidence that cognition and biological factors in emotion are intimately linked.

For instance, thoughts can generate feelings and vice versa, suggesting that cognition and emotion should be viewed as components of an interacting system rather than as discrete entities.

What is an example of a thought that can generate feelings?

Embodied Emotion

We know that emotions involve bodily responses. Some of these responses are very noticeable (“perceived” butterflies in our stomach when fear arises), but others are more difficult to discern (neurons activated in the brain).

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Emotions and Autonomic Nervous System

During an emotional experience, our autonomic nervous system mobilizes

energy in the body that arouses us.

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Physiological Similarities

Physiological responses related to the emotions of fear, anger, love, and boredom

are very similar. It is often cognitive labels that distinguish these emotions.

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Excitement and fear involve a similarphysiological arousal.

M. G

recco/ Stock Boston

Two Routes to Emotion

Zajonc and LeDoux (1984) emphasize that some emotions are immediate, without conscious appraisal. However, many researchers emphasize that cognitive appraisal determines emotions.

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Two-Factor Theory Stanley Schachter and

Jerome Singer proposed yet another theory which suggests our physiology and cognitions create emotions.

Emotions have two factors–physical arousal and cognitive label.

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Revisiting the two-factor theory Schachter & Singer (1962) The two-factor theory of

emotion states that emotion is a function of both cognitive factors and physiological arousal.

According to the theory, "people search the immediate environment for emotionally relevant cues to label and interpret unexplained physiological arousal."

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Revisiting the two-factor theory Schachter and Singer felt that physical arousal plays a

primary role in emotions. However, they suggested that this arousal was the same for a wide variety of emotions, so physical arousal alone could not be responsible for emotional responses.

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Examining one interaction of cognition and physiology

We appraise the emotion-causing event while also evaluating what is happening with our bodies. The key process in emotional arousal is how we interpret feedback from our bodies in light of our present situation.

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Revisiting the two-factor theory

Schachter and Singer’s Experiment

The aim of the experiment was to test the two-factor theory of emotion to see if participants exhibited both cognitive and biological reactions to a stimulus.

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Revisiting the two-factor theory

The participants were 184 male college students, taking classes in introductory psychology at Minnesota University.

As soon as the participant arrived, they were taken to a private room by the experimenter and told that the aim of the experiment was ‘to look at the effects of vitamin injections on visual skills’, and was asked if he would mind having an injection of ‘Suproxin’ (made up name).

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Revisiting the two-factor theory

They were given an injection (by a doctor) of either adrenalin (epinephrine) or a placebo, which was actually a saline solution, which has no side effects at all.

The effects of the adrenalin are an increase in blood pressure, heart rate, blood sugar level, respiration rate, and blood flow to the muscles and brain, with an accompanying decrease in blood flow to the skin. This is often experienced as tremors and faster breathing. The effects begin after three minutes and last from ten minutes to an hour.

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Revisiting the two-factor theory

Participants were placed in a room with another participant who was actually a confederate in the experiment.

The confederate either acted in one of two ways: euphoric or angry. Results indicated that participants who had not been informed about the effects of the injection were more likely to feel either happier or angrier than those who had been informed.

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Revisiting the two factor theory

Schachter and Singer concluded that although individuals usually are aware of the reason for their aroused emotional state, if the reason is not apparent, they search their environment for clues to help them interpret the emotion.

This research has led to numerous studies on cognitions’ role in emotion.

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Revisiting the two factor theory

Although there are some problems with Schacter’s theory (ecologically) nonetheless been an important influence on theoretical accounts of emotion.

Lazarus has built on the work of Schachter and also proposed a theory that demonstrates the interaction of cognitions and biology in understanding emotions. He has however, emphasized the role of cognitions or cognitive appraisals.

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According to Lazarus, what matters is not what event occurs, but how we perceive and interpret that event.

The process of perceiving and interpreting the event is called appraisal.

Lazarus and Stress Appraisal Lazarus and Stress Appraisal

Lazarus’ appraisal theoryHe argued that an emotion-provoking stimulus triggers a cognitive appraisal, which is followed by the emotion and the physiological arousal.

He suggested we initially make a brief analysis of a situation in terms of whether or not it represents a threat ( we appraise a situation). You can provide a personal example of this in your essay

He assumed that cognitive appraisal of the situation determines the level of physiological arousal and the specific type of emotion to be experienced

Put simply you must first think about your situation before you can experience an emotion.

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Lazarus’ appraisal theoryHis theory focuses on the appraisal of the situation and he identified three stages of appraisal

1. Primary appraisal (relevance) – in which we consider how the situation affects our personal well-being or how threatening the situation is.

2. Secondary appraisal (options) - we consider how we might cope with the situation

3. Reappraisal ( ability to handle emotion) – Reappraisal refers to whether the emotion/situation is changeable or manageable.

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Lazarus’ appraisal theoryThe primacy of biology and cognition in emotion remains open to debate. However what research does show is that there is a high level of interaction between the two and that emotion is a combination of both physiological arousal and cognition.

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Further research on emotion:Theories of emotion:

http://www.parkerphd.com/PDFs/Chapt_09.pdf

Schacter and Singer’s experiment:

http://faculty.babson.edu/krollag/org_site/soc_psych/schachter_epineph.html

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Recall one of your most distinct and vivid memories from your past. What emotion is attached to this memory?

Objective 3.2Evaluate one theory of how emotion may affect one cognitive process?

How emotion affects our cognitive processes

Emotions play a vital role in all of our cognitive processes.

More specifically, the effects of emotion directly influence much of the way we perceive our everyday lives, affecting how we categorize information, make decisions, evaluate risks and solve problems. (Isen, 1999)

Within emotional research literature, the term used for the way that emotions affect cognition is “emotional affect“.

How emotion affects our cognitive processes

Emotional affect is the term for emotional reactions that have a high probability of producing changes in awareness, facial expression, body language, physiological function, and cogntion.

These reactions change the way we mentally process information and perform tasks, depending on whether the conditions are perceived as positive (e.g., supportive, caring,) or negative (e.g., threatening, punishing).

Commercials, for example, count on eliciting a particular emotion in order to influence your memories, decision making, and or perception.

How emotion affects our cognitive processes

Some approaches focus on basic emotions (Ekman, 1992) (e.g., fear, anger), others on an extended set of emotions, including moral ones (Haidt, 2003; Moll et al., 2005) (e.g., pride, envy).

Because of the large scope of theories that suggest the influence of emotion on cognitive processes (i.e. emotional-decision making theory, state-dependent memories, etc.), we will focus specifically focus on flashbulb memories.

Flashbulb Memories Explained

Flashbulb memories are extremely vivid, long-lasting memories for unexpected, emotionally laden, and consequential events.

The flashbulb memories are believed to be stored based on an emotionally arousing significant event and retained for a long period of time.� 

These memories are associated with important historical or autobiographical events.� Such events could include, for example, the assassinations of John F. Kennedy and Martin Luther King Jr. or the attack on The Twin Towers.

In essence, Flashbulb Memories are memories that are affected by our emotional state.

Empirical SupportBrown and Kulik

The term flashbulb memory was coined by Brown and Kulik in 1977 (although F.W. Colegrove studied the idea in 1899).

Flashbulb memories are vivid recollections of the source of news about an emotionally arousing event.

Flashbulb memories were so named because it seems as if the mind has "taken a picture" of the circumstances in which the news was learned.

How emotion affects memory According to this early theory, two critical components for

the formation of Flash Bulb Memories are required: Surprise (not anticipating the event) and Consequentiality (the level of importance of the event).

Brown and Kulik believed that significant events would create accurate and consistent mental narratives of the event.

How emotion affects memory

Furthermore, Brown and Kulik believed that high levels of these variables would also result in frequent rehearsal, being either covert (“always on the mind”) or overt (ex. talked about in conversations with others).

Rehearsal, which acts as a mediating process in the development of a flashbulb account, creates stronger associations and more elaborate accounts.

Therefore, the flashbulb memory becomes more accessible and vividly remembered for a long period of time

Flashbulb Memories Brown and Kulik suggested that each individual has a

physiological mechanism referred to as the “now print” that is elicited for events that are highly consequential and emotional to an individual.

In short, they tested their hypothesis by comparing non-consequential events against consequential events (which were culturally dependent).

Flashbulb memory On the basis of their results, Brown and Kulik

concluded that the surprising and consequential nature of these public events triggers a unique mechanism that conserves what occurred at that instant, producing a picture-like representation commonly called a “flashbulb memory.”

With their original theory, they argued that flashbulb memories impact us both biologically and cognitively. The interaction is what appears to make the memory for vivid and perceivably more accurate.

Strengths of FBM

Kulik and Brown’s research has laid a significant foundation for a large body of research supporting the existence of flashbulb theories.

The Emotional-Integrative Model, for example is highly supported and adds to the idea that emotions play a significant role in memories. (Although proponents of this theory point to significant limitations in the original photographic theory).

Strengths of FBM

Finkenauer and colleagues’ developed the Emotional-Integrative model of Flashbulb memories as a method of distinguishing between different components of emotions, something missing from Photographic Model.

Finkenauer argued that the manner in which emotions affect FBM is more complex than that proposed by previous models

Read more: http://psicobiologia.campusnet.unito.it/didattica/att/4ab8.9646.file.pdf

Strengths of FBM

The emotional-integrative model assumes that original event is appraised in terms of novelty and personal importance (consequentiality).

The appraisal of novelty leads to a reaction of surprise. The appraisal of personal importance, together with the level of surprise, determines the intensity of the emotional feeling state.

Limitations of Photographic Theory

In recent time, there has been much debate over Brown and Kulik’s theory of Photographic Flashbulb Memories.

Criticisms (limitations)arise from their claim that “these memories do not decay like memories for other events: they are always there, and unchanging (Wright, Gaskell, & O’Muircheartaigh 1998).”

Can we say that our emotional memories lack the unreliability of non-emotional memories?

Limitations of Photographic Theory

Although there is little doubt that these groundbreaking studies captured the subjective qualities of memories for these historic events, the claim that there is a unique mechanism underlying memories for shocking public events has been controversial.

Brown and Kulik's initial suggestion relied on the assumption that these vivid and detailed recollections were unusually accurate. However, these original studies were based on an analysis of memories reported several years after the initiating event

Limitations of Photographic Theory

The memories were not compared with self-reports collected shortly after the shocking events or with memories for non-emotional events.

When such comparisons were made by later researchers, it was found that, like normal memories, flashbulb memories are susceptible to forgetting ,perhaps at the same rate as other memories.

Thus, flashbulb memories are assumingly more vivid, but not any more reliable than “ordinary memories”.

Empirical Evidence of FBMJennifer M. Talarico and David C. Rubin

On September 12, 2001, 54 Duke students recorded their memory of first hearing about the terrorist attacks of September 11 and of a recent everyday event.

They were tested again either 1, 6, or 32 weeks later. Consistency for the flashbulb and everyday memories did not differ, in both cases declining over time.

Read more: http://911memory.nyu.edu/abstracts/talarico_rubin.pdf

Empirical Evidence of FBM

However, ratings of vividness, recollection, and belief in the accuracy of memory declined only for everyday memories.

Initial visceral emotion ratings correlated with later belief in accuracy, but not consistency, for flashbulb memories.

Research Findings

Flashbulb memories are not special in their accuracy, as (Brown and Kulik initially previously claimed), but only in their perceived accuracy.

Flashbulb memories

Relatively little evidence for FMBs as a distinct memory process

They ‘feel’ accurate (we are confident in recall) but are just as prone to forgetting & change as other episodic memories

Flashbulb memory Platania & Hertkorn (1998) – recall for death of Princess

Diana

consistency

Imm. 10 weeks

confidence

Imm. 10 weeks

everyday

Dianaeveryday

Diana

Accuracy was measured by comparing the consistency of an accountgiven immediately and those given later. Confidence was a self-ratingon a scale of 1 to 10.