To What Extent Can Emotion Be Viewed As A Biological Phenomenon?

Authors Avatar

To What Extent Can Emotion Be Viewed As A Biological Phenomenon?

    Emotion is a complex condition, yet it is one of the most basic feelings that a human can experience.  It is closely related to the theory of motives such as hunger and sex.  Emotions like joy and anger can activate and direct behaviour in the same way that motives can, and have often been known to accompany motivated behaviour.  So emotions and motives are similar, but emotions are distinctive due to the fact that they are triggered from the outside and are usually aroused by external events.  Emotional reactions are aimed at these types of events.  Alternatively, motives are activated from within, and are generally aroused by internal events and are directed naturally.

    Fridja in 1986 and Lazarus in 1991 state that an emotion arises in response to certain affectively toned experiences, and that an intense emotion contains at least six components.  The most frequently recognised being the subjective experience of the emotion, involving the state and feelings associated with the emotion.  The second component is the body’s reaction such as trembling or giggling.  The body also has many internal reactions that have prompted psychologists to ask if emotion really is a biological event.

    Two recent multi-level theories by LeDoux in 1992 and 1996 and Power and Dalgleish in 1997 attempt to put this case forward and try and answer the question stated.  LeDoux focused all his attention to the area of anxiety.  He highlighted the role of the amgydala; a small, almond-shaped mass located in the lower brain known to register emotional reactions, and stated that it was the brain’s ‘emotional computer’ that helped to work out the emotional significance of stimuli.  He believes that sensory information about emotional stimuli is relayed simultaneously from the thalamus to the amgydala and the cortex.  This suggests that anxiety is made up of two different emotion circuits.  One is a slow-moving circuit that travels from the thalamus, to the cortex, to the amygdala, and includes a detailed analysis of sensory information.  It triggers a rapid response in threatening situations, and can be valuable in ensuring survival.  In contrast, the other is a fast-flowing circuit that travels straight from the thalamus to the amygdala, and so bypasses the cortex.  It produces a detailed evaluation of the emotional significance in a situation; this allows an appropriate response to the situation.  It is based on simple stimulus features such as intensity.

Join now!

    LeDoux related his theory to the Zajonc-Lazarus debate:

“The activation of the amygdala by inputs from the neocortex is…..consistent with the classic notion that emotional processing is post-cognitive, whereas the activation of the amygdala by thalamic inputs is consistent with the hypothesis, advanced by Zajonc (1980), that the emotional processing can be preconscious and precognitive.”

    In 1997, Power and Dalgleish introduced a ‘Schematic Propositional Associative and Analogical Representational Systems (SPAARS) theory.  It is relative to the above debate, and is made up of four systems.  The analogical system is included in the basic sensory processing of ...

This is a preview of the whole essay