Emotions

PSY 208

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 James-Lange Theory
Conceptualizing Emotions
Basic Emotions
Functions of Emotions
Contents
Heredity and Environment
Fear and Anxiety
Stress and Health
Immune System
Tan (2021)
Emotions
• Emotions are not easy to define
• Psychologists generally agree that emotion has components
including
• Cognition: “This is a dangerous situation”
• Action: Run away
• Feeling: “I feel frightened”
• Physiological changes: increased heart rate
James-Lange Theory
Autonomic
Arousal
• Emotional situations
arouse the autonomic
nervous system

• Most situations evoke a

combination of sympathetic
and parasympathetic
arousal
James-Lange Theory
• Suggests that autonomic arousal and
skeletal action occurs first in an emotion
• The emotion felt is the label we give the
arousal of the organs and muscles
• James-Lange theory leads to two
predictions:
• People with a weak autonomic or
skeletal response should feel less
emotion
• Increasing one’s response should
enhance an emotion
Emotions and Pure
Autonomic Failure
• Research findings
• Paralyzed people report feeling emotion to the
same degree as prior to their injury

• Pure autonomic failure

• People with this condition report feeling same
emotions, but less intensely
• Suggests other factors are involved in the
perception of emotion
 BOTOX

• People with BOTOX

injections report:
• Weaker than usual
emotional responses
after watching short
videos

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Physiological Arousal Sufficient?
• Mostly yes, but not necessarily – e.g. exercise
• Creating certain body actions may also slightly influence
emotion
• Smiling slightly increases happiness ratings
• Indicates that perception of the body’s actions do contribute to
emotional feeling
• Different theories emphasized on different aspects of emotions
Conceptualizing Emotion
Is Emotion a Useful Concept?
• An emotion is usually considered a coherent “whole”
• However, it has three or more aspects (cognition, feeling and action)
• All aspects do not always occur together
The Limbic
System
• Emotional experiences
arouse many areas of the
brain
• The limbic system includes
the forebrain areas
surrounding the thalamus
• Traditionally regarded
as critical for emotion
Brain Imaging

• Not so easy to localize

emotions
• No brain area is critical for
emotion in general without
contributing to other
behavioral aspects
Social construct?

• Emotions are a category in the same

sense that weeds are a category
(Lisa Feldman Barrett)
• Socially constructed category that
serves our purposes
• Nothing in nature makes weeds
different from flowers
• Differ only because people favor
certain plants and disfavor other
plants

Image: psychologicalscience.org/observer/sharing-a-shift-in-emotion-science
Basic Emotions
Basic Emotion
• Main support for the
idea of basic emotions

• Facial expressions exist

for happiness, sadness,
fear, anger, disgust,
surprise, and perhaps
other emotions
But…
• We rarely interpret emotion
based solely on facial
expressions
• Two or more emotions can be
present in a single facial
expression
• Context and gestures important
Alternate view
• Jeffrey Gray (1970)
• Behavioural activation system:
• Left frontal, temporal activity-> tendency to approach
• Marked by low to moderate autonomic arousal

• Behavioural inhibition system:

• Right frontal, temporal activity -> inhibits action
• Increases attention and arousal, stimulates fear and disgust

• People responded quicker and more accurate at identifying happy faces when
information went to left hemisphere
Functions of Emotions
Functions of Emotion
• Emotion has adaptive value
• Examples: fear leads to escape, and anger leads to attack
• Adaptive value of other emotions is less obvious
• Emotions help communicate needs to others
• And understand others’ needs
• Aid in quick decision making
Emotions and Moral Decisions
• Making important moral decisions
• We pay much attention to how the outcome
will make us feel

• Contemplating moral decisions activates

the prefrontal cortex and cingulate gyrus

• People with strongest autonomic arousal

least likely to make “logical” decision to
kill one person to save five others
Decision Making after Brain Damage that
Impairs Emotions
• Damage to parts of the prefrontal cortex blunts emotions
• Impairs decision-making
• Leads to impulsive decision-making without pausing to consider
consequences

• Those with damage to the ventromedial prefrontal cortex show:

• More likely than average to choose the utilitarian option of killing one to
save five
• Little concern for others
Attack and Escape Behaviors
• Attack and escape behaviors and
corresponding emotions (anger
and fear)
• Closely related physiologically and
behaviorally

Image: 9gag
Attack Behaviors
• Attack behaviors depend
on the individual and the
situation

• Example: hamster intruder

• Initial attack causes activity
in the corticomedial area of
the amygdala
• Increases victim hamster’s
probability of attacking back
when faced with subsequent
attack
Heredity and Environment
Heredity and Environment in
Violence
• Individual differences in aggressive, violent, or
antisocial behavior depend on both heredity
and environment
• Environment
• Witness or victim of violence in childhood
• Living in a violent neighborhood
• Abused children are more likely to
express violent behavior
• Exposure to lead harms developing
brains
Heredity
• Heredity
• Twin studies indicate
significant amount of
heritability although there is
some debate about
experimental design
• MAOA gene—low activity form
shows a link to aggression
• There still seems to be a high
interaction between genetics
and the environment in which
a person was raised
Effect of Hormones
• Male aggressive behavior
heavily depends on
testosterone
• Young men have highest rates
of aggressive behaviors and
violent crimes

• Increasing testosterone in
women
• Increased the amount of time Testosterone levels are higher, on the average, for men
looking at angry faces convicted of murder or rape than for those convicted of
• Results in more arguing during burglary or drug offenses.
collaborative tasks
Serotonin Synapses
Serotonin turnover
• The amount of serotonin that neurons
released, absorbed, and replaced

• Experimental results in several genetic

strains of mice
• Social isolation lowered serotonin turnover
greatest
• Serotonin activity is lower in juvenile rodents
than in adults, and fighting is more frequent
in the juveniles

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Serotonin Synapses

• Studies in humans
• Low serotonin turnover found in people with history of
violent behavior
• Arson
• Suicide by violent means

• Mixed results:
• Relationship between serotonin and aggression is small
(more recent studies)
• Cannot be used to make predictions about an individual
Testosterone, Cortisol, Serotonin
• According to a growing consensus, aggressive behavior does
not correlate strongly with any one chemical because it
depends on a combination

• Testosterone, facilitates aggressive, assertive, dominant behavior

• Serotonin tends to inhibit impulsive behaviors
• Cortisol inhibits aggression
Fear and Anxiety
 Fear and Anxiety
• Proneness to approach, avoidance, and anxiety varies
with the situation and the individual

• Role of the amygdala

• Important for enhancing the startle reflex

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Startle Reflex

• Auditory information stimulates an area of the pons that

commands tensing of neck and other muscles

• Startle reflex is more vigorous if already tense (PTSD)

• Startle reflex can be used as a behavioral measure of

anxiety
Amygdala and Study of Rodents
• Conditioned fear with a stimulus
• Cells in the amygdala get input from pain fibers, vision, and
hearing
• Different paths through the amygdala responsible for different
fears
• Emotion is a conglomerate of separate aspects, not a single indivisible
state

• Rat with damage to amygdala shows normal startle reflex

• Signals presented before the noise do not modify reflex
 Hijacking amygdala
Toxoplasma gondii
• Protozoan that infects many mammals but
reproduces only in cats
• Cats excrete parasite’s eggs
• Can infect burrowing rats that come into contact
with eggs
• Damages the rat’s amygdala
• Rat approaches cat without fear and gets eaten
• Parasite finds its way back into the cat

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minds-early-permanently-study-finds-4b11194722
Long Term Fear
and Anxiety
• If a person is attacked or
has a fearful experience,
he/she becomes fearful in
a wide variety of
circumstances
• Bed nucleus of the stria
terminalis
• Brain area that controls
long-term, generalized
emotional arousal
Klüver-Bucy syndrome
• Klüver-Bucy syndrome
• Damage to the temporal lobes (including amygdala)
• Monkeys with this syndrome are tame/placid
• Display less than normal fear of snakes and larger, more dominant monkeys
• Have impaired social behaviors, including learning what to fear
• Non-damaged monkeys with a vigorously active amygdala
show fear to noise/intruder
Human Amygdala to Visual Stimuli
• Responds strongly to photos that
arouse fear or photos of faces
showing fear
• Response is stronger when the
meaning is unclear and requires some
processing

• Adams, R. B. et al. “Effects of gaze on

amygdala sensitivity to anger and
fear faces,” Science, 2003, 300:1536.
Reprinted with permission from
AAAS/Science Magazine.
Individual Differences
• People’s tendency toward anxiety remains fairly consistent over
time

• Soldiers with initial high levels of amygdala response showed

more combat stress

• Anxiety depends on more than just the amygdala

• Reappraisal as coping mechanism
• Prefrontal - amygdala
Urbach-Wiethe Disease
• Rare genetic condition that
causes calcium to accumulate in
the amygdala until it wastes away
• Case study of person called SM
• Experiences fearlessness
• Correctly drew faces with various
emotions but had trouble drawing a
fearful face
• Did not generally look at people’s
eyes
• Lack of fear is dangerous to her
Recognizing Facial Expressions
• Amygdala
damage affects
the ability to
recognize facial
expressions of
fear
• When
recognized, rated
as less intense
than other people
The eye whites alone enable most people to guess that the person on the left was
feeling afraid. Source: From “Human amygdala responsivity to masked fearful eye
whites,” by P. J. Whalen et al., Science, 2004, 306, p. 2061. Reprinted by
permission from AAAS/Science magazine.
Anxiety Disorders

• Panic disorder
• Frequent periods of anxiety and
occasional attacks of rapid
breathing, increased heart rate,
sweating, and trembling
• More common in women than men,
and in adolescents and young
adults
• Possible genetic component
• Linked to hypothalamus
abnormalities
• Decreased GABA, increased orexin
Post Traumatic
Stress Disorder

• Frequent distressing recollections and

nightmares about traumatic event
• Vigorous reactions to noises and
other stimuli
• Not all people who endure trauma get
PTSD
• Smaller hippocampus may
predispose people to PTSD
Benzodiazepins
• The most commonly used anti-anxiety drugs
• Examples: diazepam (Valium), alprazolam (Xanax)
• Bind to the GABAA receptor, and facilitate the effects of GABA
• Exert their effects in the amygdala, hypothalamus, midbrain,
and other areas
Stress and Health
Stress and Health

• Behavioral medicine
• Emphasizes the effects on health of
diet, smoking, exercise, stressful
experiences, and other behaviors
• Emotions and other experiences
influence people’s illness and recovery
patterns
General Adaptation Syndrome
• Hans Selye (1979) defined stress as the non-specific response
of the body to any demand made upon it

• General adaptation syndrome: threats to the body activate a

general response to stress
• Alarm stage: increased sympathetic nervous system activity
• Resistance stage: sympathetic response declines; adrenal cortex
continues releasing cortisol and other hormones to prolong alertness
• Exhaustion stage: occurs after prolonged stress; individual no longer
has energy to sustain responses
Hypothalmus-Pituitary-Adrenal Axis
• Stress activates two systems in the body:
• The sympathetic nervous system: “fight or flight”
response that prepares the body for brief emergency
responses (ANS)
• The HPA axis: the hypothalamus, pituitary gland, and
adrenal cortex

• The HPA axis becomes the dominant response to

prolonged stressors
• Activation of the hypothalamus induces the
pituitary gland to secrete adrenocorticotropic
hormone (ACTH)
• Stimulates the adrenal cortex to secrete cortisol
• Cortisol helps to mobilize energies to fight a
difficult situation
Immune System
Immune System
• The immune system protects the body against viruses and
bacteria by producing leukocytes (white blood cells)

• B-cells: leukocytes that mature in the bone marrow and secrete

antibodies
• Antibodies: Y-shaped proteins that attach to particular kinds of
antigens
• Antigens: surface proteins that are antibody-generator molecules
• T-cells
• Attack intruders directly and help other T-cells or B-cells to multiply

• Natural killer cells

• Leukocytes that attack tumor cells and cells infected with viruses
• During an infection, leukocytes and other cells produce small
proteins called cytokines
• Combat infection and communicate with the brain to inform of illness

• Cytokines stimulate the release of prostaglandins

• Produce fever, sleepiness, lack of energy
• Sleep and inactivity conserve energy to fight illness
Stress on Immune System
• In response to a stressful
experience, the nervous
system activates the immune
system
• Increases production of
natural killer cells,
leukocytes and cytokines
• The cytokines combat
infections but also trigger
prostaglandins
Prolonged Stress
• Produces symptoms similar to depression
• Weakens the immune system
• Can harm the hippocampus
• Toxins or overstimulation more likely to damage or kill neurons in the
hippocampus
Controlling Stress
• Methods to control stress
responses
• Breathing routines, exercise,
meditation, distraction, and
addressing issues
• Social support from a loved one
helps to reduce stress