Powerful Emotions
Discuss whether powerful emotions, such as anger and hate are biologically or socially determined."This is what we know now and we are reasonably certain that we're right. However, as we gather more information or learn new ways to interpret these phenomena, things could change and so it's best not to become to attached to our theories."(Unknown)When in 1884, William James asked his famous question "What is an emotion?", he implied that the answer was not obvious. Almost 150 years later, in the year 2001, his implication is still valid, because scientists still did not agree on a clear definition to emotions. This essay will not try to come up with a clear and correct definition of what an emotion is, however it will give a most general definition, but discuss, or at least try to do so, whether emotions are biologically or socially determined.Emotion, as it is defined in a Dictionary of Psychology, is "an umbrella term for any of a number of subjectively experienced, affect-laden states, the ontological status of each being established by a label whose meaning is arrived at by simple consensus. It is what we mean when we say that love, fear, anger, hope are emotions". (Reber, 1995) However the most agreed def
Rubinshtein, suggested that Darwin's biological theory of emotions is correct because it connects emotions to its organic stimulation of instincts. It is illustrated in Darwin's table on emotional expressions and emotions to which they relate. Each time Freud modified his previous theory because it did not work in a way he expected it to work. He says that emotions are "related to the verbal and social practices surrounding us. As well as an instinct, emotion is an inherited stereotypical reaction. If we take love, anger or fear as examples, a biological process can be followed. Fig. Wittgenstein (1980) also supports the idea of social determination of emotions. Cognitive perspective claims that emotions are based on appraisals. We see a person, smell blood, see or touch a dead body and all the five senses send an immediate message to the brain, which then gives a respond. So how can emotions be social? It can be seen as reasonable to say that some emotions have social cause like love for another, but love as an emotion can still be felt without social interaction, like loving for yourself. However next action of a person will be socially determined because he or she had a second to think about the emotion and analyse it and as a reaction he or she will start laughing in a particular way, a way that will be socially acceptable. From the moment the baby is born into this world it cries without any knowledge that it is experiencing an emotion. Coulter (1979) suggests that emotions are much more then sensations and that they are "shaped by attitudes, judgements and desires, which are derived from broader cultural practices. His observation on emotions began in 1838.
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