Standard dual-process models in the action domain postulate that stimulus-driven processes are responsible for suboptimal behavior because they take them to be rigid and automatic and therefore the default. We propose an alternative dual-process model in which goal-directed processes are the default instead. We then transfer the dual- process logic from the action domain to the emotion domain. This reveals that emotional behavior is often attributed to stimulus-driven processes. Our alternative model submits that goal-directed processes could be the primary determinant (...) of emotional behavior instead. We evaluate the type of empirical evidence required for validating our model and we consider implications of our model for behavior change, encouraging strategies focused on the expectancies and values of action outcomes. (shrink)

This paper discusses contemporary advancements in the affective sciences that can inform the music-emotion literature. Key concepts in these theories are outlined, highlighting their points of agreement and disagreement. This summary shows the importance of appraisal within the emotion process, provides a greater emphasis upon goal-directed accounts of behavior, and a need to move away from discrete emotion “folk” concepts and toward the study of an emotional episode and its components. Consequently, three contemporary music emotion theories are examined through a (...) skeptical lens. This critique highlights the over-reliance upon categorization and a lack of acknowledgment of appraisal processes, specifically goal-directed appraisal, in examining how individual experiences of music emerge in different contexts. Based on this critique of current music-emotion models, we present our skeptically informed CODA model - Constructivistly-Organised Dimensional-Appraisal model. This model addresses skeptical limitations of existing theories, reinstates the role of goal-directed appraisal as central to what makes music relevant and meaningful to an individual in different contexts and brings together different theoretical frameworks into a single model. From the development of the CODA model, several hypotheses are proposed and applied to musical contexts. These hypotheses address theoretical issues such as acknowledging individual and contextual differences in emotional intensity and valence, as well as differentiating between induced and perceived emotions, and utilitarian and aesthetic emotions. We conclude with a sections of recommendations for future research. Altogether, this theoretical critique and proposed model points toward a positive future direction for music-emotion science. One where researchers can take forward testable predictions about what makes music relevant and meaningful to an individual. (shrink)

This paper proposes and develops the feelings of goals hypothesis (FGH). It has two aims: first, to describe the evolutionary function of emotional feelings (EFs), and second, to describe the content and the format of EFs. According to FGH, the evolutionary function of EFs is to enable motoric flexibility. Specifically, EFs are a component of a psychological mechanism that permits differential motoric reactions to the same stimulus. Further, according to FGH, EF is a special type of mental representation with the (...) content of an action goal, and with a non-motoric, non-conceptual format. This paper thoroughly clarifies the assumptions underlying FGH and discusses its theoretical implications and empirical predictions. (shrink)

ABSTRACTApproach-avoidance training has been shown to be effective in both clinical and laboratory research. However, some studies have failed to show the effects of AAT. Therefore, finding m...

Embodiment approaches to cognition and emotion have put forth the idea that the way we think and talk about affective events often recruits spatial information that stems, to some extent, from our bodily experiences. For example, metaphorical expressions such as “being someone’s right hand” or “leaving something bad behind” convey affectivity associated with the lateral and sagittal dimensions of space. Action tendencies associated with affect such as the directional fluency of hand movements (dominant right hand-side – positive; non-dominant left hand-side (...) – negative) and approach-avoidance behaviors (forward – positive; backwards – negative) might be mechanisms supporting such associations. Against this background, experimental research has investigated whether positive and negative words are freely allocated into space (e.g., close or far from one’s body) or resonate with congruent (vs. incongruent) predefined manual actions usually performed by joysticks or button presses (e.g., positive - right; negative - left, or vice versa). However, to date, it is unclear how the processing of affective concepts resonate with directional actions of the whole body that are performed freely within a context enabling lateral and sagittal movements simultaneously. Accordingly, 67 right-handed participants were to freely step on an 8-response pad (front, back, right, left, front-right, front-left, back-right, or back-left) after being presented in front of them valence-laden personal life-events submitted before the task (e.g., words or sentences such as “graduation” or “birth of a child”). The most revealing finding of this study indicates that approach-avoidance behaviors and space-valence associations across laterality are interwoven during whole body step actions: Positive events induced steps highly biased to front-right whereas negative events induced steps highly biased to back-left. (shrink)

In this concluding piece, we identify and discuss various aspects of convergence and, to a lesser degree, divergence in the ideas expressed in the contributions to this special section. These contributions emphatically illustrate that approach–avoidance motivation is integral to the scientific study of emotion. It is our hope that the articles herein will facilitate cross-talk among researchers and research traditions, and will lead to a more thorough understanding of the role of approach–avoidance motivation in emotion.

A theory is proposed that views emotional feelings as pivotal for action control. Feelings of emotions are valued interoceptive signals from the body that become multimodally integrated with perceptual contents from registered and mentally simulated events. During the simulation of a perceptual change from one event to the next, a conative feeling signal is created that codes for the wanting of a specific perceptual change. A wanted perceptual change is weighted more strongly than alternatives, increasing its activation level on the (...) cognitive level and that of associated motor structures that produced this perceptual change in the past. As a consequence, a tendency for action is generated that is directed at the production of the wanted perception. (shrink)

Upcoming responses in the second of two subsequently performed tasks can speed up compatible responses in the temporally preceding first task. Two experiments extend previous demonstration of such backward compatibility to affective features: responses to affective stimuli were faster in Task 1 when an affectively compatible response effect was anticipated for Task 2. This emotional backward-compatibility effect demonstrates that representations of the affective consequences of the Task 2 response were activated before the selection of a response in Task 1 was (...) completed. This finding is problematic for the assumption of a serial stimulus-response translation stage. It also shows that the affective consequence of a response is anticipated during, and has an impact on stimulus-response translation, which implies that action planning considers codes representing and predicting the emotional consequences of actions. Implications for the control of emotional actions are discussed. (shrink)