Psychology / Unit 8: Motivation and Emotion
8.3 Components and Theories of Emotion
Notes
An emotion has three parts: physiological arousal, expressive behavior and conscious experience (feeling).
- James-Lange theory: you feel emotion after your body reacts ("I'm afraid because I'm trembling").
- Cannon-Bard theory: arousal and emotion happen at the same time, triggered by the brain.
- Schachter-Singer two-factor theory: emotion = physiological arousal + a cognitive label based on the situation.
- Lazarus: appraisal of the situation comes first.
- Example for James-Lange: a student sees a snake, their heart races, then they feel fear.
- The amygdala is key in fear. Basic emotions (happiness, sadness, anger, fear, surprise, disgust) show in similar facial expressions across cultures, but display rules differ.
Practice
Which theory says that we feel emotion because we notice our body's physical reaction?
James-Lange: the body responds first, then the emotion.
According to the Schachter-Singer two-factor theory, emotion depends on:
Arousal and cognitive interpretation both matter.
A person's heart races and at the same moment they feel fear, according to the theory that arousal and emotion occur together. This is the:
Cannon-Bard says they happen simultaneously.
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