EMOTIONS, STRESS, AND
HEALTH Emotion =
a response of the whole organism physiological arousal expressive behaviors
conscious experience
Primary•fear•anger•happiness•sadness•surprise•disgust
THEORIES OF EMOTION
Does your heart pound because you are afraid...
or Are you afraid because you
feel your heart pounding?
JAMES-LANGE THEORY OF EMOTION
Experience of emotion is awareness of physiological responses to emotion-arousing stimuli
Fear(emotion)
Poundingheart
(arousal)
Sight of oncoming
car(perception of
stimulus)
CANNON-BARDTHEORY OF EMOTION
Emotion-arousing stimuli simultaneously trigger:
physiological responses
subjective experience of emotion
Sight of oncoming
car(perception of
stimulus)
Poundingheart
(arousal)
Fear(emotion)
Think – C and B in the alphabet at the
same time
So now, you might be asking yourself which one is it?Does the emotion come after, before, or at the same time of physiological arousal?
SCHACHTER’S TWO-FACTOR
THEORY OF EMOTION
To experience emotion one must:
be physically aroused
cognitively label the arousal
babies?
Cognitivelabel
“I’m afraid”
Fear(emotion)
Sight of oncoming
car(perception of
stimulus)
Poundingheart
(arousal)
THE BRAIN & EMOTION 1) Limbic system
the amygdala-
-a neural key to fear learning
thalamus
- switchboard
hypothalamus
- hunger, thirst, sex, _______ (4 F’s)
frontal cortex- organize/process
2) Hemispheric speciality
Right = negativeLeft = positive
left frontal lobe +++
EMOTION AND PHYSIOLOGY
Autonomic Nervous System controlsphysiological arousal
Sympathetic (arousing)
Pupils dilate
Decreases
Perspires
Increases
Accelerates
Inhibits
Secrete stresshormones
Parasympathetic (calming)
Pupils contract
Increases
Dries
Decreases
Slows
Activates
Decreasessecretion of
stress hormones
EYES
SALIVATION
SKIN
RESPIRATION
HEART
DIGESTION
ADRENALGLANDS
AROUSAL AND PERFORMANCE
Performance peaks at lower levels of arousal for difficult tasks, and at higher levels for easy or well-learned tasks
Yerkes-Dodson
EMOTION-LIE DETECTORS
Polygraph machine commonly
used in attempts to detect lies
measures several of the physiological responses accompanying emotion perspiration cardiovascular breathing changes
Control QuestionUp to age 18, did you ever physically harm anyone?
Relevant QuestionDid [the deceased] threaten to harm you in any way?
Relevant > Control --> Lie
EMOTION--LIE DETECTORS
Is 70% accuracy good?
Assume 5% of 1000 employees actually guilty
test all employees
285 will be wrongly accused
What about 95% accuracy?
Assume 1 in 1000 employees actually guilty
test all employees (including 999 innocents)
50 wrongly declared guilty
1 of 51 testing positive are guilty (~2%)
OPPONENT PROCESS THEORY
Preserve homeostasis We are motivated to seek stimuli
that makes us feel emotion, after which an opposing motivational force brings us back in the direction of a baseline.
After repeated exposure, we begin to habituate,
i.e., thrill-seeking, fear=rush=calm
EXAMPLE
If you are frightened by a “mean” dog, the emotion of fear is expressed and relief is suppressed. If the fear-causing stimulus continues to be present, after a while the fear decreases and the relief intensifies. If the dog doesn’t move, your fear would decrease and relief that the dog didn’t attack would increase. If the stimulus is no longer present, then the first emotion disappears and is replaced with the second emotion. If the dog turns and runs away, you are no longer afraid, but rather feel very relieved.
Emotions and Physiology
Fear and rage do evoke similar increased heart rate, but different facial muscles.
Fear and joy have differing finger temperatures and hormone secretions.
So, who’s right? James-Lange? Cannon-Bard?
FURTHER RESEARCH
Zajonc & LeDoux
Some responses are immediate without any appraisal.
Lazarus, Schachter, Singer
It’s often our “interpretations” that evoke emotion.
EXPRESSED EMOTIONGender and
expressiveness
Women better than
men in understanding
non-verbal cues
. Sensitivity increases
with age
Men Women
Sad Happy ScaryFilm Type
16
14
12
10
8
6
4
2
0
Number of Expressions
EXPRESSED EMOTION
Nature Nurture
. temperament . shyness of Orientals
. genes . boisterousness of Irish
. Eskimos almost never express anger
EXPERIENCED EMOTION
FEARANGER HAPPINESS
How many emotions are there?
Carroll Izard
10
JoyInterest-Excitement
SurpriseSadnessAnger
DisgustContempt
FearShameGuilt
?
EXPERIENCED EMOTION
Infants’ naturally occurring emotions
joy anger interest
disgust surprise sadness fear
FEARFUNCTION
poisonous, adaptive, protects from harm/injury, helps focus, real/imagine enemies, improve sensory input
LEARNED?
BIOLOGY
conditioning, observation
. amygdala
. sympathetic nervous system . genes
Subjective Well-Being self-perceived happiness or
satisfaction with life (optimist vs. pessimist)
used along with measures of objective well-being physical and economic indicators to
evaluate people’s quality of life
So does money buy happiness?
HAPPINESS
EXPERIENCED EMOTION
Catharsis emotional release catharsis hypothesis
“releasing” aggressive energy (through action or fantasy) relieves aggressive urges
Feel-good, do-good phenomenon people’s tendency to be
helpful when already in a good mood
HAPPINESS
Does money buy happiness?
Year
100%
90%
80%
70%
60%
50%
40%
30%
20%
10%
0%
Averageper-person
after-tax incomein 1995 dollars
Percentagedescribingthemselves asvery happy
$28,000$19,000$18,000$17,000$16,000$15,000$14,000$13,000$12,000$11,000$10,000
$9,000$8,000$7,000$6,000$5,000$4,000
1930 1940 1950 1960 1970 1980 1990 2005
Percentage very happy
Personal income
So Why Doesn’t Money Buy Happiness?
Adaptation-level Phenomenon
Like an addiction, once we have more we want more; as we adjust to that new lifestyle, we want a newer, better one!
Relative deprivation
HAPPINESS IS...Researchers Have Found That Happy People Tend toHave high self-esteem (in individualistic countries)
Be optimistic, outgoing, and agreeable
Have close friendships or a satisfyingmarriage
Have work and leisure that engagetheir skills
Have a meaningful religious faith
Sleep well and exercise
However, Happiness Seems Not Much Related to Other Factors, Such as
Age
Gender (women are more often depressed, but also more often joyful)
Parenthood (having children or not)
Physical attractiveness
EMOTION & STRESS
Stress the process by
which we perceive and respond to certain events, called stressors, that we appraise as threatening or challenging
Catastrophes, Significant Life Changes, Daily Hassles
STRESS AND ILLNESS
General Adaptation Syndrome Selye’s concept
of the body’s adaptive response to stress in three stages
A
R
E
Stressresistance
Phase 1Alarm
reaction(mobilize
resources)
Phase 2Resistance(cope with stressor)
Phase 3Exhaustion(reservesdepleted)
The body’s resistance to stress canlast only so long before exhaustion sets in
Stressoroccurs
STRESS AND THE HEART
Type A
Friedman and Rosenman’s term for competitive, hard-driving, impatient, verbally aggressive, and anger-prone people
Type B Friedman and Rosenman’s term for
easygoing, relaxed people
STRESS AND DISEASE
Negative emotions and health-related consequences
Unhealthy behaviors(smoking, drinking,
poor nutrition and sleep)
Persistent stressorsand negative
emotions
Release of stresshormones
Heartdisease
Immunesuppression
Autonomic nervoussystem effects
(headaches,hypertension)
VOCABULARY REVIEW
___emotion a. easy-going relaxed people
___stress b. emotion is experienced by physiologic arousal and labeling that arousal
___g.a.s. c. hard-driving, impatient, verbally aggressive, anger-prone
___Cannon-Bard d. emotion = awareness of physiological responses to emotion-arousing stimuli
___James-Lange e. Hans Seyle’s concept of the body’s response to stress – alarm, resist, exhaust
___Schachter-Singer 2-factor f. process by which we perceive and respond to certain events, threatening/challenging
___Type A g. a response of the whole organism involving physiology, expressive behaviors, and conscious experience
___Type B h. emotion-arousing stimuli simultaneously triggers physiologic and subjective experience of emotion
VOCABULARY REVIEW
___emotion a. easy-going relaxed people
___ stress b. emotion is experienced by physiologic arousal and labeling that arousal
___ g.a.s. c. hard-driving, impatient, verbally aggressive, anger-prone
___ Cannon-Bard d. emotion = awareness of physiological responses to emotion-arousing stimuli
___ James-Lange e. Hans Seyle’s concept of the body’s response to stress – alarm, resist, exhaust
___ Schachter-Singer 2-factor f. process by which we perceive and respond to certain events, threatening/challenging
___ Type A g. a response of the whole organism involving physiology, expressive behaviors, and conscious experience
___ Type B h. emotion-arousing stimuli simultaneously triggers physiologic and subjective experience of emotion