Understanding Psychology (10th Ed)

RETHINK
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Are basic facial expressions inborn or are they learned?
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R E C A P / E V A L U A T E / R E T H I N K
R E C A P 
What are emotions, and how do we experience them?
• Emotions are broadly defi ned as feelings that may affect 
behavior and generally have both a physiological com-
ponent and a cognitive component. Debate continues 
over whether separate systems govern cognitive and 
emotional responses and whether one has primacy over 
the other. (p. 328)
What are the functions of emotions?
• Emotions prepare us for action, shape future behavior 
through learning, and help us interact more effectively 
with others. (p. 329)
What are the explanations for emotions?
• Several theories explain emotions. The James-Lange 
theory suggests that emotional experience is a reaction to 
bodily, or visceral, changes that occur as a response to an 
environmental event and are interpreted as an emotional 
response. (p. 331)
• In contrast, the Cannon-Bard theory contends that both 
physiological arousal and an emotional experience are 
produced simultaneously by the same nerve stimulus 
and that the visceral experience does not necessarily 
differ among differing emotions. (p. 332)
• The Schachter-Singer theory suggests that emotions are 
determined jointly by a relatively nonspecifi c physiologi-
cal arousal and the subsequent labeling of that arousal, 
using cues from the environment to determine how 
others are behaving in the same situation. (p. 333)
• The most recent approaches to emotions focus on their 
biological origins. For instance, it now seems that 
specifi c patterns of biological arousal are associated with 
individual emotions. Furthermore, new scanning 
techniques have identifi ed the specifi c parts of the brain 
that are activated during the experience of particular 
emotions. (p. 334)
How does nonverbal behavior relate to the expression of 
emotions?
• A person’s facial expressions can reveal emotions. In fact, 
members of different cultures understand others’ emo-
tional expressions in similar ways. One explanation for 
this similarity is that an innate facial-affect program 
activates a set of muscle movements representing the 
emotion being experienced. (p. 336)
• The facial-feedback hypothesis suggests that facial 
expressions not only refl ect, but also produce, emotional 
experiences. (p. 336)