The Experience of Emotions

Feelings are the foundation of human encounters and play a crucial role in shaping our beliefs, behavior, and connections. Despite variations in emotions between people and cultures, psychologists have identified a set of universal emotions recognized in all human societies. These feelings encompass happiness, sadness, anger, fear, surprise, disgust, and contempt.

Understanding universal emotions goes beyond academic curiosity; it has important implications for our understanding of human psychology and behavior. They provide us with valuable knowledge about our environment, informing us about potential opportunities, risks, and social cues. Understanding and controlling these emotions is essential for adapting to the ever-changing world and building healthy connections with both us and those around us.

 

Understanding Emotional Expression

Emotional expression refers to the outward manifestation of internal emotional states through various means. These manifestations can be through facial expressions, body language, vocal cues, and verbal communication [1].

People can also explicitly express their emotions through spoken or written language, using words to describe how they feel and why. However, verbal communication can also be subtle and indirect, with nuances in language and phrasing conveying underlying emotional meanings.

Facial expressions are perhaps the most recognizable form of emotional expression, involving movements of the facial muscles that convey different emotions. For example, a smile typically signifies happiness, while a frown indicates sadness or displeasure.

Body language includes gestures, posture, and physical movements. For instance, crossed arms and a tense posture may signal defensiveness or discomfort, while open gestures and relaxed body language may indicate openness and confidence.

Vocal cues such as tone of voice, pitch, volume, and speech patterns can also convey emotional information. Changes in vocal intonation and rhythm can reflect shifts in emotional states, with variations in pitch and volume often corresponding to different emotions.

The Evolution of Expression

The facial expression theory, proposed by Charles Darwin in the 19th century [2], suggests that facial expressions are universal signals of emotion that are understood across cultures and species. In other words, whether you're in New York City or a remote village in India, a smile typically means happiness, and a frown usually indicates sadness. Darwin believed that these expressions are innate, meaning we're born with the ability to recognize and use them to communicate our feelings.

Paul Ekman, a psychologist, built on Darwin's ideas and studied whether emotions were universally expressed across different cultures [3]. He travelled to various parts of the world, from the United States to remote tribes in Papua New Guinea, to study how people express emotions through their faces. What he found was remarkable: regardless of culture or background, people everywhere display the same facial expressions for basic emotions like happiness, sadness, anger, fear, surprise, and disgust.

This led Ekman to propose the idea of universal emotions, meaning certain emotions are understood and expressed the same way by everyone, no matter where they're from.

Ekman also developed something called the Facial Action Coding System (FACS) [4], which is like a dictionary for facial expressions. It breaks down the movements of each muscle in the face and assigns them codes, allowing researchers to accurately describe and measure different facial expressions. This tool today provides scientists with a way to objectively analyze and compare facial expressions across cultures and populations.

Universal Emotions

So, what were the universal emotions that Ekman discovered?

The universal emotions are:

1. Happiness: A state of positive emotional well-being, often triggered by achieving goals or spending time with loved ones. It leads to longer-lasting effects like increased creativity and resilience.

2. Sadness: A natural response to loss or disappointment, helping us process and cope with difficult experiences. It can lead to growth and resilience through emotional healing.

3. Anger: Characterized by feelings of annoyance and animosity, serving as a survival mechanism in our evolutionary past. Learning to manage and express anger constructively is crucial for maintaining healthy relationships.

4. Fear: An adaptive response to perceived threats, triggering physiological changes to prepare us for fight or flight. Strategies like exposure therapy and relaxation techniques can help overcome irrational fears.

5. Surprise: A reaction to unexpected events, momentarily disrupting our expectations and encouraging attention and response. It contributes to curiosity and appreciation of the unexpected in life.

6. Disgust: A feeling of dislike towards unpleasant stimuli, serving an evolutionary purpose in avoiding harm. It also influences social interactions and decision-making.

Ekman added in the seventh emotion after he further investigated the research he had done.

7. Contempt: Involves a dislike or disrespect towards others, often seen in social hierarchies. It can lead to unfair judgments and a focus on flaws, overlooking positive qualities.

How We Are Conditioned to Perceive Emotions

Conditioning refers to the process through which people learn to associate specific stimuli or behaviors with specific outcomes. There are two main types of conditioning: classical conditioning and operant conditioning [5].

➢ Classical conditioning was proposed by Ivan Pavlov and involves learning through associations between two stimuli. For example, Pavlov's famous experiments with dogs showed that the dogs could learn to associate the sound of a bell with the presentation of food, leading to the bell eliciting a conditioned response of salivation even when no food was present.

➢ Operant conditioning was proposed by B.F. Skinner and involves learning through the consequences of behaviour. Individuals learn to associate their actions with either reinforcement (behaviour more likely to occur again) or punishment (behaviour less likely to occur again). For example, a child who receives praise (positive reinforcement) for sharing toys with others is likely to continue sharing in the future.

Conditioning affects emotional expression by shaping how individuals learn to express and regulate their emotions in response to environmental cues and consequences.

Referring to classical conditioning, people may learn to associate specific situations with specificemotional responses. For example, if a person consistently experiences fear in response to loud noises, they may develop a conditioned fear response to loud noises in general, even if they are not inherently threatening.

Or when considering operant conditioning, emotions that are reinforced by positive outcomes, such as social approval, are more likely to be expressed in similar situations in the future. On the other hand, emotions that are punished by negative outcomes, such as rejection or criticism, may be suppressed or concealed to avoid further punishment.

Does Emotional Expression Differ Across Cultures & Sexes

Classical and operant conditioning are not the only ways that people learn to express emotions in certain contexts – observational learning and cultural conditioning are two other ways in which emotional expression may differ across cultures and sexes.

From the moment we are born, we are exposed to specific societal and cultural environments that shape how we perceive and are expected to express emotions. Our family, friends, and society at large play a big role in teaching us the "rules" of emotional expression—the dos and don'ts, the acceptable and unacceptable ways of feeling and showing our emotions. This allows us to learn which and when emotions should be expressed.

Different cultures can also have their own unique norms and expectations. In some cultures, such as collectivist societies, there may be greater emphasis on social harmony and emotional restraint, while in others, such as individualistic cultures, there may be more emphasis on personal autonomy and self-expression [6]. These cultural differences can shape our attitudes towards emotions and influence how we navigate social relationships.

There are also differences in how men and women tend to express and experience emotions.While these differences are not absolute and can vary from individual to individual, they may reflect societal expectations and gender roles [7]. From a young age, boys and girls are socialized to conform to gender-specific expectations regarding emotional behavior. Boys are often encouraged to suppress vulnerability and express emotions such as anger, while girls may be expected to be nurturing and emotionally expressive.

It's important to understand that both men and women can experience a wide spectrum of emotions, and how they exhibit those feelings can vary widely based on environmental conditions, cultural influences, and even individual variances.

Sources Used

1. Keltner, D., Sauter, D., Tracy, J., & Cowen, A. (2019). Emotional Expression: Advances in Basic Emotion Theory. Journal of nonverbal behavior, 43(2), 133–160. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10919-019-00293-3

2. Ekman P. (2009). Darwin's contributions to our understanding of emotional expressions. Philosophical transactions of the Royal Society of London. Series B, Biological sciences, 364(1535), 3449–3451. https://doi.org/10.1098/rstb.2009.0189

3. Ekman, P. (1971). Universals and cultural differences in facial expressions of emotion. In Nebraska symposium on motivation. University of Nebraska Press.

4. Clark, E. A., Kessinger, J., Duncan, S. E., Bell, M. A., Lahne, J., Gallagher, D. L., & O'Keefe, S. F. (2020). The Facial Action Coding System for Characterization of Human Affective Response to Consumer Product-Based Stimuli: A Systematic Review. Frontiers in psychology, 11, 920. https://doi.org/10.3389/fpsyg.2020.00920

5. Chengwei Yao and Gencai Chen, "A emotion development agent model based on OCC model and operant conditioning," 2001 International Conferences on Info-Tech and Info-Net. Proceedings (Cat. No.01EX479), Beijing, China, 2001, pp. 246-250 vol.3, doi: 10.1109/ICII.2001.983064.  

6. Keltner, D., Tracy, J. L., Sauter, D., & Cowen, A. (2019). What Basic Emotion Theory Really Says for the Twenty-First Century Study of Emotion. Journal of nonverbal behavior, 43(2), 195–201. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10919-019-00298-y

7. Chaplin T. M. (2015). Gender and Emotion Expression: A Developmental Contextual Perspective. Emotion review : journal of the International Society for Research on Emotion, 7(1), 14–21. https://doi.org/10.1177/1754073914544408