Debates on Emotions I

Primacy debate: appraisal vs. arousal
Zajonc (1980) claimed that simple familiarity with something creates
affective reactions, such as liking or disliking, for that item. Objects were
presented subliminally while participants were engaged in another task. The
results revealed that though the participants showed no recognition of the
subliminal items, they gave them higher preference ratings than novel items.
Zajonc argued that the form of experience that we call feeling accompanies all
cognitions, preceding them and lacking awareness, and concluded that cognition
is not necessary in order to have affective experiences.

Lazarus (1984) argued that cognitive appraisal underlies and is an integral
feature of all emotional states. LeDoux (1989, 1995) has shown that emotions,
especially fear, are recognized by the brain’s two routes, subcortical and cortical,
suggesting that Zajonc’s hypothesis of direct elicitation of emotion without the
need of cognition might be right.

Whether or not “basic”
What is the need of such a distinction? An understanding of certain
affective processes as basic would nevertheless create another category, i.e. that
of non-basic emotions. Alternatively, there could be another case and that would
probably lead to affective states as neither basic nor non-basic, an instigator state
that might be by itself the cause of such states. Why do we need at all to make
divisions between innumerable affective processes one experiences throughout
life, nay, within couple of hours?

We have already stated that the distinction among affective states is
presumed to have started with Darwin’s eagerness to connect human primates
with their non-human evolutionarily related species. Darwin (1872/1998)
considered that emotions could well fill up the explanatory gap between animals
and our humanoid ancestors. “He who admits on general ground that the
structure and habits of all animals have been gradually evolved, will look at the
whole subject of Expressions in a new and interesting light”. In his opinion,
there are six “special expression of man ... [which are] innate or universal and
which alone deserve to rank as true expressions”.

Tomkins (1962/2008), following Darwin identified emotions associating
them with corresponding facial expressions and connected these emotions with
subcortical centres in the brain. Tomkins identified eight primary motivating
mechanisms, the “inborn protocols that when triggered encourage us to spring
into action”2. He divided them into “positive” and “negative” affects
respectively, and a “very brief neutral reset button” that is associated with the
emotion of surprise.

Dana SUGU & Amita CHATTERJEE (2010). Flashback: Reshuffling Emotions International Journal on Humanistic Ideology, 3 (1), 109-133