Zillmann's mood-management theory has acquired a prominent place in media psychology and makes reliable predictions about people's hedonistically motivated mood regulation via entertainment offerings. However, the full potential for explaining affect regulation through media usage has not been exhausted so far. Therefore, we aim at an integrative view of the field based on empirical findings from communication studies as well as on the background of contemporary theories of mood and emotion. The purpose of this analysis is to argue towards an (...) integrative theoretical perspective which considers both unconscious and conscious/reflected processes of affect regulation through media, supplements the hedonistic motive with other non-hedonistic, instrumental motives of affect regulation, looks at selection behavior as well as at other behavioral and cognitive strategies of affect regulation, and encompasses individual attributes. (shrink)

Though predictive processing approaches to the mind were originally applied to exteroceptive perception, i.e., vision and action, recent work has started to explore the role of interoceptive perception, i.e., emotion and affect. This article builds on this work by extending PP beyond emotion to the construction of emotional dispositions. I employ principles from dynamical systems theory and PP to provide a model of how dispositional anger can develop in response to early experiences of psychosocial stress. The model is then deployed (...) to explain the established link between psychosocial stress in early life and the appearance of certain organic disease phenotypes in later life. This phenomenon can appear mysterious when viewed through the standard biomedical explanatory lens, which has difficulty accounting for the causal influence of subjective perceptions and evaluations of the social and material environment on the development of organic disease processes. The model provided presents such cases as instances of developmental mismatch. They occur when an organism develops an emotional disposition that leads them to make habitually-biased appraisals of what the social environment affords. The model provides a novel explanation of certain organic disease phenotypes with top-down and developmental causes, and demystifies one class of cases involving apparently spooky ‘mind-to-matter’ causation. (shrink)

Empirical research on the emotion disappointment has focused uniquely on disappointments produced by outcomes that are worse than expectations. Introspection suggests that in many cases persons instead of outcomes cause the disappointment. In the present study we therefore argue that the emotion word “disappointment” refers to two different emotional experiences, namely, outcome-related disappointment and person-related disappointment. Results from an empirical study support this distinction by showing that these two types of disappointment differ from each other and from anger and sadness (...) with respect to appraisals and response types. (shrink)

I argue that understanding cognition as enactive — that is, as constituted of physical interaction between embodied minds and the environment — can illuminate the opening of Kafka's novel Der Proceß, revealing it as cognitively realistic in this respect. I show how enactivism is relevant to this passage in several ways: in terms of enactive vision and imagination, enactive language, and enactive emotion. I also suggest that these cognitively realistic features might result in ambivalent reactions on the reader's part.

Past appraisal studies have shown that single appraisals are neither sufficient nor necessary for emotions but no study has examined the same issue with appraisal configurations (combinations of different single appraisals). Undergraduate participants repeatedly indicated their negative emotions (anger, sadness, fear, and guilt) and relevant appraisals as they occurred, or immediately after, in their everyday environments. The results not only replicated past findings on single appraisals but also suggested that appraisal configurations are neither sufficient nor necessary for these negative emotions.

Across four studies, we explored how feeling nostalgic about an attitude object impacts the metacognitive characteristics of the attitude toward that object and how those metacognitions predict the evaluation’s underlying strength. In each study, participants reflected on and evaluated a song or television show that either did or did not elicit nostalgia. Across these studies, we found support for the hypotheses that nostalgic attitude objects are viewed more positively, appraised with greater attitudinal importance, and exhibited less objective ambivalence. In Study (...) 4, we observed that nostalgic attitudes are associated with greater behavioural intentions and that this relationship was mediated both by attitudinal importance and objective ambivalence. These studies contribute to our understanding of how nostalgia affects attitude formation processes. (shrink)

Higher order cognitive processes, including ethical decision making (EDM), are influenced by the experiencing of discrete emotions. Recent research highlights the negative influence one such emotion, anger, has on EDM and its underlying processes. The mechanism, however, by which anger disrupts the EDM has not been investigated. The current study sought to discover whether cognitive appraisals of an emotion-evoking event are the driving mechanisms behind the influence of anger on EDM. One primary (goal obstacle) and one secondary (certainty) appraisal of (...) anger were examined. Study results suggest that appraisals of certainty are the driving mechanism behind the negative relationship between anger and EDM. Certainty appraisals led to less application of EDM-promoting strategies and more unethical social motives. Findings further highlight the value of investigating appraisals of emotional events, given their cognitive nature, for their potential effects on cognitive operations, such as EDM. Future directions and implications are discussed. (shrink)

The present study examined a relational model of appraisal that specifies the situational and dispositional antecedents of appraised problem-focused coping potential, itself a hypothesised antecedent of the emotions of hope/challenge and resignation. The hypothesised relational antecedents of this appraisal were tested in a quasi-experiment in which individuals varying in self-perceived and objectively assessed math ability attempted to solve math problems on which difficulty was manipulated. Findings for the critical test problem largely conformed to predictions: Under difficult conditions, but not easy (...) ones, increasing math ability was generally associated with elevated appraisals of problem-focused coping potential, increased hope/challenge, reduced resignation, and increased likelihood of solving the problem. However, problem-focused coping potential, hope/challenge, and the likelihood of solving the problem were all lower, and resignation was higher, for the highest ability participants, than would be predicted from their ability levels. Comparable findings were not observed for appraisals of emotion-focused coping potential or its theoretically associated emotion of anxiety, providing evidence of discriminant validity for the examined model. The results of a mediational analysis supported the hypothesis that the effects of the quasi-experimental design on hope/challenge and resignation were mediated by their effects on appraised problem-focused coping potential, lending support to the proposition that appraisals play a causal role in emotion elicitation. (shrink)

There is a growing consensus that the elicitation and differentiation of emotions can best be understood as the result of the subjective appraisal of the significance of events for individuals. The present paper addresses the process of appraisal, hitherto neglected; particularly the postulate that appraisal consists of a fixed sequence of stimulus evaluation checks, as proposed by the component process model of emotion (Scherer, 1984, 1993b). It is suggested that indirect evidence pertinent to the order assumption, which is an essential (...) aspect of the sequence hypothesis, can be obtained via the study of recognition-of-emotion-situation scenarios that have been segmented according to individual appraisal criteria or dimensions. The hypothesis that the presentation of these segments in the predicted sequence (as compared to a random sequence) will result in a faster and more accurate identification of the respective emotions is supported by data from three experiments. Potential alternative explanations are discussed. (shrink)

ABSTRACTTo date, there has been little philosophical consideration of the concept of shame in sport, yet sport seems to be an environment conducive to the experience of shame due to its public and...

Recent decades have witnessed a sea change in thinking about emotion, which has gone from being seen as a disruptive force in human thought and action to being seen as an important source of situation- and goal-relevant information and evaluation, continuous with perception and cognition. Here I argue on philosophical and empirical grounds that the role of emotion in contributing to our ability to respond to reasons for action runs deeper still: The affective system is at the core of the (...) process of evaluatively modeling situations, actions, and outcomes, which is the foundation upon which rational deliberation and action can be built. Taking up this perspective affords new approaches to long-standing problems in the theory of reason-based action. (shrink)

There is disagreement in the literature about the exact nature of the phenomenon of empathy. There are emotional, cognitive, and conditioning views, applying in varying degrees across species. An adequate description of the ultimate and proximate mechanism can integrate these views. Proximately, the perception of an object's state activates the subject's corresponding representations, which in turn activate somatic and autonomic responses. This mechanism supports basic behaviors that are crucial for the reproductive success of animals living in groups. The Perception-Action Model, (...) together with an understanding of how representations change with experience, can explain the major empirical effects in the literature. It can also predict a variety of empathy disorders. The interaction between the PAM and prefrontal functioning can also explain different levels of empathy across species and age groups. This view can advance our evolutionary understanding of empathy beyond inclusive fitness and reciprocal altruism and can explain different levels of empathy across individuals, species, stages of development, and situations. Key Words: altruism; cognitive empathy ; comparative; emotion; emotional contagion; empathy ; evolution; human; perception-action; perspective taking. (shrink)

Recent studies have used self-report methods to defend a close associative or causal connection between appraisal and emotion. The present experiments used similar procedures to investigate remembered experiences of reasonable and unreasonable anger and guilt, and of nonemotional other-blame and selfblame. Results suggest that the patterns of appraisal reported for reasonable examples of emotions and for situations where there is a near absence of emotion may be highly similar, but that both may differ significantly from the appraisal profiles reported for (...) unreasonable examples of the same emotions. Further, relevant appraisals were not always identified by participants as the most influential determinants of guilt and anger. These findings demonstrate either that the relationship between certain appraisals and emotions is less consistent than implied in some contemporary versions of appraisal theory, or that there are problems with the validity of existing questionnaire-based measures of the variables in question. (shrink)

Appraisal theories predict that emotional experiences are tightly linked to context appraisals. However, depressed people tend to perceive a variety of emotional events more negatively and stressfully and their emotional experience has been described as context insensitive. This raises the question: how different is the intensity of context appraisals from related emotion experiences among depressed relative to healthy people? Surprisingly, we do not know how cohesive intensity of context appraisals and emotional experiences are in depression. In this study, we assessed (...) differences in intensity of context appraisals and emotional experiences across 1634 daily events during three days within and between depressed participants (N = 41) and healthy controls (N = 33) using linear mixed models. Models compared intensities of stressfulness and unpleasantness appraisals to the intensity of negative affect, and intensity of pleasantness appraisals to the intensity of positive affect. Our findings partially supported our predictions of lower cohesiveness in depression: while intensities of pleasantness appraisals and positive affect were more alike among control participants, intensities of unpleasantness and stressfulness appraisals were more similar to the intensities of negative affect in the depressed group. Current work suggests that hedonic dysfunction in depression is possibly driven by a loosely tied positive context appraisal-emotion experience process. (shrink)

To say Early Confucians advocated the possession of a sense of shame as a means to moral virtue underestimates the tact and forethought they used successfully to mold natural dispositions to experience shame into a system of self, familial, and social governance. Shame represents an adaptive system of emotion, cognition, perception, and behavior in social primates for measurement of social rank. Early Confucians understood the utility of the shame system for promotion of cooperation, and they build and deploy cultural modules (...) – e.g., rituals, titles, punishments – with this in mind. These policies result in subtle alterations to components of the evolved shame system that are detectable in data form contemporary cross-cultural psychology that show that populations in the Confucian diaspora have a unique shame profile compared to Western and non-Western populations. The status of Confucian diaspora populations as outliers in the context of shame is partially explained by appeal to the cultural transmission and historical endurance of relevant Early Confucian cultural modules. (shrink)

I present an overview of emotion theories, organised around the question of emotion causation. I argue that theories of emotion causation should ideally address the problems of elicitation, intensity, and differentiation. Each of these problems can be divided into a subquestion that asks about the relation between stimuli and emotions (i.e., the functional level of process description, cf. Marr, 1982) and a subquestion that asks about the mechanism and representations that intervene (i.e., the algorithmic level of process description). The overview (...) reveals that theories of emotion causation sometimes differ with regard to the kind of process that they hold responsible for emotion causation. More precisely, they hold different assumptions regarding the conditions under which the process is supposed to operate (optimal versus suboptimal), the format of the representations involved (propositional versus perceptual), and the object or input of the central process (stimulus versus responses/experience). Further, the overview reveals that theories of emotion causation sometimes differ with regard to the level of process description that they focus on. Finally, the overview brings to light several similarities among the theories discussed. (shrink)

Many appraisal theories claim that appraisal causes emotion. Critics have rejected this claim because they believe (a) it is incompatible with the claim that appraisal is a part of emotion, (b) it is not empirically supported, (c) it is circular and hence nonempirical, and (d) there are alternative causes. I reply that (a) the causal claim is incompatible with the part claim on some but not all interpretations of the causal claim and the part claim, (b) the lack of empirical (...) support can be remedied, (c) there may even be ways to cope with the circularity problem, and (d) it is unclear to what extent the alternative causes differ from appraisal. (shrink)

Critics of appraisal theory have difficulty accepting appraisal (with its constructive flavor) as an automatic process, and hence as a potential cause of most emotions. In response, some appraisal theorists have argued that appraisal was never meant as a causal process but as a constituent of emotional experience. Others have argued that appraisal is a causal process, but that it can be either rule-based or associative, and that the associative variant can be automatic. This article first proposes empirically investigating whether (...) rule-based appraisal can also be automatic and then proposes investigating the automatic nature of constructive (instead of rule-based) appraisal because the distinction between rule-based and associative is problematic. Finally, it discusses experiments that support the view that constructive appraisal can be automatic. (shrink)

We investigated whether motivationally determined stimulus valence can be processed in an automatic way, as is assumed in many appraisal theories (e.g., Frijda, 1986, 1993; Lazarus, 1991; Scherer, 1993a). Whereas appraisal theorists typically use conscious self-report methods to investigate their assumptions, our experiments used indirect experimental methods that leave less room for deliberate, conscious reflections of the participants. Using variants of the affective priming and Simon paradigms, we demonstrated that intrinsically neutral, but wanted stimuli facilitated responses with a positive valence, (...) whereas intrinsically neutral, but unwanted stimuli facilitated negative responses. In addition, the second experiment proved to be supportive of another assumption made by appraisal theorists according to which a relation exits between different (automatic) outcomes of motivational appraisal (positive-negative) and different action tendencies (approach-withdrawal). (shrink)

This paper first demonstrates that recognition of the diversity of ways that emotional responses modulate ongoing attention generates what I call the puzzle of emotional attention, which turns on recognising that distinct emotions (e.g., fear, happiness, disgust, admiration etc.) have different attentional profiles. The puzzle concerns why this is the case, such that a solution consists in explaining why distinct emotions have the distinct attentional profiles they do. It then provides an account of the functional roles of different emotions, as (...) tied to their evaluative themes, which explains and further elucidates the distinctive attentional profiles of different emotions, so solving the puzzle of emotional attention. Following that, it outlines how such attentional profiles are reflected in the character of emotional experience and its attentional phenomenology. The resulting picture is a more detailed account of the connections between emotion and attention than is currently on offer in the philosophical literature. (shrink)

This work provides an analysis of the basic cognitive components of envy. In particular, the roles played by the envious party's social comparison with, and ill will against, the better off are emphasised. The ill will component is characterised by the envier's ultimate goal or wish that the envied suffer some harm, and is distinguished from resentment and sense of injustice, which have often been considered part of envy. The reprehensible nature of envy is discussed, and traced back to the (...) analysis of its components. Finally, we explore both points of overlap and distinguishing features between envy and other emotions such as jealousy or emulation, and make a few general remarks, pointing to the necessity of overcoming conceptual looseness in the notion of envy. (shrink)

The widespread assumption that anger is a response to wrongdoing and motivates people to sanction it, as well as the lack of distinction between resentment and indignation, obscure notable differences among these three emotions in terms of their specific beliefs, goals, and action tendencies, their nonmoral or moral character, and the kinds of moral claim implied. We provide a cognitive-motivational analysis of anger, resentment, and indignation, showing that, while sharing a common core, they are distinguishable from one another because they (...) comprise nonoverlapping belief–goal compounds. We also emphasize the usefulness of applying a belief–goal analysis to kin emotions because, by comparison, one can sharpen the analysis and identify the distinctive features of each of them. (shrink)

The objective of this article is to develop a faith development perspective on corporate sustainability. A firm’s management of sustainability is arguably determined by the way decision-makers relate to the other and the natural environment, and this relationship is fundamentally shaped by faith. This study advances theoretical understanding of the approach managers take on sustainability issues by explaining how four distinct phases of faith development—improvidence, obedience, irreverence and providence—determine a manager’s disposition towards sustainability. Combining insights from intentional and relational faith (...) development theories, the analysis reveals that a manager’s faith disposition can be measured according to four interrelated process criteria: (1) connectivity as a measure of a manager’s actual engagement and activities aimed at relating to sustainability; (2) inclusivity as a measure of who and what is included or excluded in a manager’s moral consideration; (3) emotional affinity as a measure of a manager’s sensitivity and affection towards the well-being of others and ecological welfare; and (4) reciprocity as a measure of the degree to which a manager is rewarded for responding to the needs and concerns of ‘Others’, mainly in the form of a positive emotional (and relational) stimulus. The conceptual model consolidates earlier scholarly works on the psychological drivers of sustainability management by illuminating our search for a process of faith development that connects with an increasingly complex understanding of the role of business in society. (shrink)

The encyclical proclaims the centrality of human development, which includes acting with gratuitousness and solidarity in pursuing the common good. This paper considers first whether such relationships of gratuitousness and solidarity can be analysed through the prism of traditional theories of social psychology, which are highly influential in current management research, and concludes that certain aspects of those theories may offer useful tools for analysis at the practical level. This is contrasted with the analysis of such relationships through Aristotelian virtue (...) ethics (in particular as interpreted by MacIntyre 1985 , 1998 , 1999 ), which is emerging as a strong force in the field of business ethics, and which has strong conceptual similarities with the ideas put forward by Benedict XVI. Aristotelian virtue ethics offers a better fit with the aims of the encyclical at the theoretical level but it presents a number of challenges at the practical level, which the paper suggests may be addressed through the integration in its analysis of human action of models derived from social psychology. (shrink)

This paper reports the results of three studies using mood induction procedures (MIPs) designed to investigate the relationship between anxiety and disgust. Study 1 used guided imagery vignettes (i.e., asking participants to imagine themselves in a series of described situations) and music (Mayer, Allen, & Beauregard, 1995). Study 2 used video clips (Gross & Levenson, 1995). Study 3 used autobiographical recall and music (Blagden & Craske, 1996). In order to be as sure as possible that target moods were being induced, (...) and that manipulation checks provided good evidence of mood induction, Studies 1 and 2 measured six moods (anxiety, sadness, happiness, anger, disgust, and contempt) on visual analogue scales. In addition, Study 3 included two further mood measures: a 30-adjective rating scale measuring 10 emotions, the Differential Emotion Scale (DES; Izard, 1972) and a free label questionnaire, allowing participants to record how they feel without any prior imposed structure. Results from all three studies demonstrated that induced anxiety will produce increases in reported disgust, but there was no evidence for an effect of induced disgust on reported anxiety. These findings were independent of the type of MIP (guided imagery vignette and music, video clips, and autobiographical recall and music), and the type of dependent mood measure used (visual analogue scale, differential emotion scale or a free label questionnaire). The findings have important implications for the putative role of disgust in anxious psychopathologies, and suggest that if disgust does have a causal influence in some anxious psychopathologies, this influence is not mediated simply by experienced disgust facilitating experienced anxiety. (shrink)

The distinction between cognitive and perceptual theories of emotion is entrenched in the literature on emotion and is openly used by individual emotion theorists when classifying their own theories and those of others. In this paper, I argue that the distinction between cognitive and perceptual theories of emotion is more pernicious than it is helpful, while at the same time insisting that there are nonetheless important perceptual and cognitive factors in emotion that need to be distinguished. A general representational metatheoretical (...) framework for reconciling cognitive and perceptual theories is proposed. This is the Representational Theory of Emotion (RTE). A detailed case study of Antonio Damasio's important new contribution to emotion theory is presented in defense of the RTE. The paper is intended for readers interested in the foundations of emotion theory and cognitive science. (shrink)

Appraisal theories of emotions have gained widespread acceptance in the field of emotion research (for a recent overview, see, e.g., Scherer, Schorr, & Johnstone, 2001). In these theories, it is as...

That emotions are especially valuable for our well-being has become a widely agreed upon claim. In this article, we argue that many of the ways in which the emotions are commonly considered to be prudentially valuable – hedonically, experientially, and adaptively – are not specific to the emotions: they are in fact shared by other affective reactions such as drives and sensory affects. This may suggest that emotions are not prudentially valuable in any distinctive manner. We challenge this suggestion by (...) arguing that, unlike other affective reactions, emotions provide unique contexts in which to refine our general sensibility to a wide variety of evaluative properties – and that in this sense they are prudentially valuable in a distinctive way. (shrink)

The well-replicated observation that many people maintain mental health despite exposure to severe psychological or physical adversity has ignited interest in the mechanisms that protect against stress-related mental illness. Focusing on resilience rather than pathophysiology in many ways represents a paradigm shift in clinical-psychological and psychiatric research that has great potential for the development of new prevention and treatment strategies. More recently, research into resilience also arrived in the neurobiological community, posing nontrivial questions about ecological validity and translatability. Drawing on (...) concepts and findings from transdiagnostic psychiatry, emotion research, and behavioral and cognitive neuroscience, we propose a unified theoretical framework for the neuroscientific study of general resilience mechanisms. The framework is applicable to both animal and human research and supports the design and interpretation of translational studies. The theory emphasizes the causal role of stimulus appraisal (evaluation) processes in the generation of emotional responses, including responses to potential stressors. On this basis, it posits that a positive (non-negative) appraisal style is the key mechanism that protects against the detrimental effects of stress and mediates the effects of other known resilience factors. Appraisal style is shaped by three classes of cognitive processes – positive situation classification, reappraisal, and interference inhibition – that can be investigated at the neural level. Prospects for the future development of resilience research are discussed. (shrink)

In this article, I consider the structure of interpersonal emotional relations. I argue that current cognitive-developmental theory has overestimated the role of conceptual thinking, and underestimated the role of intrinsic social-emotional organization, in the early development of such feelings as jealousy, shame, and concern. I suggest that human forms of social experience are shaped by a process through which one individual identifies with the bodily expressed attitudes of other people, and stress the diversity of self–other relational states. I draw on (...) studies in developmental psychopathology, and specifically research in autism and borderline personality disorder, to illustrate some implications of this viewpoint. (shrink)

This paper presents a new approach to the demarcation of social emotions, based on their dependence on social appraisals that are designed to assess events bearing on social concerns. Previous theoretical attempts to characterize social emotions are compared, and their inconsistencies highlighted. Evidence for the present formulation is derived from theory and research into links between appraisals and emotions. Emotions identified as social using our criteria are also shown to bring more consistent consequences for social behavior than nonsocial emotions. We (...) conclude by considering ways of validating and refining our classification. (shrink)

Weiner’s attribution theory of motivation and emotion assumes emotions are determined by beliefs about causality. Individuals share a naïve understanding of this linkage between causal attribution and emotions and use it in order to draw inferences from and influence others’ emotions. Evidence for such uses is provided and recent research and theory that goes beyond the attribution–emotion linkage is discussed. Specifically, recent research considers the naïve use of a larger set of emotions and appraisals and their connections, and the role (...) of context in this process. However, still missing is a fuller understanding when this naïve knowledge is employed and how and when it is based on an explicit understanding of the emotion–appraisal linkage rather than more automatic processes. (shrink)