The Experience of Emotion in Adults

1
The Experience of Emotion in Adults

• Sarah L. Strout, Sarah E. Bush,
• James D. Laird
• For 2nd Annual GSC Multidisciplinary Conference,
  Clark University
• March 31, 2004

2
Hypotheses

• Based on the assumptions of Self-Perception
  Theory
• Participants identified as personal cuers will
  report on more physical aspects of an emotional
  experience
• Participants identified as situational cuers will
  report on more situational aspects of an
  emotional experience.

3
What is Self-Perception Theory?

• Self-Perception Theory, based on William James
  theory of emotion (1890) shows that individuals
  can be separated into two groups based on the
  manner by which the person feels an emotion.
• Personal cuers are happy because they smile and
  sad because they cry.
• Situational cuers are sad because they understand
  that sadness is customary and appropriate when a
  family pet died and that happiness follows the
  receipt of a present.

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Individual differences in the experience of
emotion has been demonstrated in numerous studies
through structured self-report scales or
physiological response data. (i.e. Bresler
Laird, 1983 Comer, 1979 Duclos Laird, 2001
Duncan Laird, 1977 Flack, Laird, Cavallaro,
1999 Kellerman Laird, 1982 Laird, 1974 Laird
Berglas, 1975 Laird Crosby, 1974 Laird,
Kuvalanka, Grubstein, Kim, Nagaraji, 1997)
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The Current Study

• The current study tested the hypothesis that
  situational and personal cuers would report on
  different aspects of an emotional experience by
  using an open-ended questionnaire.
• Specifically, we hypothesized that situational
  cuers would report on situational aspects of the
  experience while personal cuers would report on
  physical aspects.

6
Method

• Participants
• 38 volunteers (25 females and 13 males) from
  Clark University and the community of Worcester.
  The ages of participants ranged from 18-46.

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Method

• Open Ended Questionnaire
• Included questions adapted from the MetaEmotion
  Interview (Katz Gottman, 1994).
• Participants were directed to choose two emotions
  (one positive, one negative) and to answer
  questions regarding that emotion.

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Method

• Undisguised Facial Manipulation Procedure
• Instructed participants to hold a facial
  expression (either a smile or a frown) for 10
  seconds. The format of the questionnaire resulted
  in participants alternating between smiling and
  frowning.
• After 10 seconds the participants were asked to
  report the strength of eight emotions (by placing
  an X on the line from Did not feel at all to Felt
  very strongly).

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Method

• Coding Procedure
• Two judges blind to cue response group coded the
  open-ended questionnaires by assigning a
• 1, 0, or 1 based on how much the participants
  responses focused on
• the situational aspects of the emotion
  experience (1)
• the physical, bodily aspects of the emotional
  experience (1)
• or discussed aspects of the emotional event that
  described neither the situation or the bodily
  reactions (0).

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Results

• Two-way ANOVAs were performed with cue response
  group and sex as independent variables, but no
  main effects or interactions for sex were found,
  so data was collapsed into a t-test.

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Results

• The codes assigned to each question on the
  open-ended questionnaire were combined to form
  separate totals for the two emotions, positive
  and negative.
• These scores were higher if the majority of the
  questions emphasized the bodily reactions and
  lower if the emphasis was on the situation.

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Results

• T-tests comparing personal and situational cuers
  on the three total scores on the open-ended
  questionnaires were significant.
• The results for the Positive Emotion was
  significant, t (34.6) 2.175, p .037, with
  participants in the personal group reporting on
  more physical aspects of the emotion experience
  (M 2.68, SD 2.60).
• The result was also significant for the Negative
  Emotion, t (36) 3.586, p .001, (M 2.21, SD
  1.65).
• The grand total of Positive and Negative Emotion
  was also significant, t (30.8) 3.731, p .001.
  

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Means Table
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Discussion

• Participants in the personal cue group were more
  likely to report on physical aspects of an
  emotional experience.

• Participants in the situational group are more
  likely to talk about the situational context of
  their emotion experiences.

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Are there things that you do on a daily basis to
make sure that you dont feel this emotion
(Fear)?

• Personal Cuer
• YES, I TRY TO CALM MYSELF DOWN. I RELAX AND
  TAKE DEEP BREATHS.

• Situational Cuer
• NOT REALLY, IT IS AN EMOTION THAT WILL JUST COME
  ABOUT IN DIFFERENT SITUATIONS. AN EXAMPLE BEING
  AFRAID OF NOT GETTING A PAPER DONE, EVEN IF I AM
  WORKING ON IT.

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What would you look like, what would I see if I
saw you feeling this emotion (fear)?

• Personal Cuer
• MY EYES WOULD BE WIDE, MY EYES SCARED LOOKING I
  WOULD SHAKE AND CROUNCH IN A BALL, AND WOULD BE
  JUMPY

• Situational Cuer
• I WOULD LOOK CALM BUT SERIOUS

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Are there any particular physical feelings that
go along with this emotion (anger)?

• Personal Cuer
• MY HEART PUMPS, I GET SWEATY, MY BREATH GETS
  FASTER

• Situational Cuer
• NOT REALLY

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How did you arrive at the decision to choose
this emotion (shame)?

• Personal Cuer
• TRIED TO FEEL THE EMOTION AND PICKED THE ONE I
  LIKED THE LEAST

• Situational Cuer
• NO ONE LIKES TO FEEL SHAME

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Implications

• Suggests that not only do personal and
  situational cuers respond to different cues (as
  shown in previous research) but that they also
  focus on and talk about different aspects of the
  emotional experience
• It seems that personal and situational cuers are
  focusing on (either consciously or unconsciously)
  the aspects of an experience that relate directly
  to their emotions.

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Implications

• Self-Perception Theory assumes that we infer our
  emotions in the same manner that others infer our
  emotions, from the situation and our expressions.
  
• In this context, it makes sense that people would
  pay attention to information that is beneficial
  to themselves and not pay as much attention to
  information that does not assist the person

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Limitations

• Open-ended questionnaire limits responses. An
  interview would allow participants to expand and
  clarify their responses.

22
Thank You to Rosemarie Sokol for her help on the
editing of this paper.