Webster defines emotion as "A mental state that arises spontaneously rather than through conscious effort and is often accompanied by physiological changes."
Carroll Izard, Ph.D., an American psychologist, defines 10 basic emotions and although other developmental psychologists may name them differently, there is little substantive difference between their lists.
Emotions are a part of the human experience but they may experienced and expressed differently based on gender, age, culture and context. How an emotion is processed and interrupted by the individual can be influenced by the reactions of others as well as his own framing of the experience.
Factors Determining Frequency of Emotions
Which emotions are most commonly felt depends on who you ask.
Reporting in the March 2004 issue of The American Journal of Sociology, Robin Simon, Ph.D., and Leda Nath, Ph.D., presented the results of interviews conducted with 2,904 men and women across the United States about how frequently they experienced various emotions. They found that men and women had nearly the same number of emotional occurrences in a week, but women had more negative emotions and men more positive. Growing up and becoming increasingly educated decreases the number of reported emotions but increases their variety, and as household income rises, the number of emotions expressed declines. As the research team predicted, marriage decreases the frequency of negative emotions for women but married men experience fewer positive emotions than they did while single. A surprising finding was that in households with children under 18, all inhabitants experienced a decreased number of positive emotions.
Common Positive Emotions
Among Dr. Izard's 10 human emotions, only three are positive: interest, joy and surprise.
Interest draws our attention to an event of an object; joy occurs when we discover pleasant experiences, nurturance, comfort or excitement; and surprise is the finding of the unexpected.
These basic positive emotions are blended to form higher-order emotions. One of these, security, is essential for healthy growth and development. Security develops when interest and engagement result in joy. It is built on many episodes of predictable, positive responses from those in his world, and it gives a child fertile ground for exploration. In their book "Raising a Resilient Child," psychologists Sam Goldstein, Ph.D., and Robert Brooks, Ph.D., note that when life is stable a child can better handle change and when the rules of life are predictable he feels more secure facing new situations.
Common Negative Emotions
Anger, contempt, disgust, distress, fear, guilt and shame were named by Dr. Izard as negative emotions.
Distress and fear are felt and expressed in the moments after birth when the warmth and cuddling sensation of the womb is replaced by a sudden shock of cold air and open space. Dr. Frederick Le Boyer, the French obstetrician who pioneered a return to gentle birth practices, encouraged a major revision in the way infants are delivererd, one that respected the baby's need for a calm and supportive transition. Le Boyer's method called for darkness, silence, gentle hands and a return to warm water after birth -- all designed to eliminate distress and fear at this critical juncture.
Guilt and shame come later when the child does something displeasurable to his parents, something that does not elicit the positive facial and vocal reaction his infant behaviors have brought constantly. One of the characteristics of a mature parent is the consistent ability to discipline the actions of the child, largely by exemplifying positive behavior, without causing shame and guilt.
Contempt and disgust require conditioning that differs largely from culture to culture. They are imitations of the emotions adults express and may not be actually felt by the child or the adult who feels compelled, by his societies standards, to express them.
A 6-year-old boy may not be at all disgusted when he sees a stray dog. It's only his mom's reaction that makes petting this animal "yucky" because she has imposed her own fear and disgust to his experience. If, instead mom expresses empathy, compassion and interest, the child's emotional experience is very different.
References
- "Merriam-Webster Dictionary": Definition of Emotion
- Steven Chen, Ph.D.; Emotions: 2009
- "American Journal of Sociology"; Gender and Emotion in the US; Robin Simon, Ph.D. and Leda Nath, Ph.D.; March 2004
- "Raising Resilient Children"; Robert Brooks, Ph.D. and Sam Goldstein, Ph.D.
- "Birth Without Violence" (excerpts), Fredrick Le Boyer, M.D.
