Introduction to PsychologySuzy Scherf

Lecture 7: How Do We Act?

Motivation and Emotion

Motives and Emotions

What would life be like without:

• Happiness

• Fear

• Sadness

• Anger

• Disgust

• Surprise

• Contempt

• Embarrassment

• Guilt

• Shame

Motives and Emotions

Life without a range of emotions:

• Hebephrenic schizophrenia -

• Sociopaths -

• Frontal lobe indifference -

• Amygdala damage -

Motives and Emotions

Reverse-engineering emotions – what is their function?

• Happiness

• Fear

• Sadness

• Anger

• Disgust

• Surprise

• Contempt

• Embarrassment

• Guilt

• Shame

Previous Notions of Motives and Emotions

Motives Emotions

Intellect

More Current Notions of Motives and Emotions

Motives

Emotions

Intellect

The Limbic System: Managing Emotions

Current Notions of Motives and Emotions

1. Motives are not Instincts

Current Notions of Motives and Emotions

2. Motives are evolved adaptations that organize and stimulate behavior to solve problems that existed in the EEA.

Current Notions of Motives and Emotions

3. All motives are equally biological –

4. Not all motives have equal importance.

Current Notions of Motives and Emotions

5. Motives are not socially constructed

Current Notions of Motives and Emotions

1. Emotion is the affective component of motivation.

Current Notions of Motives and Emotions

2. Emotions felt when we have to focus attention on solving a motivational problem that isn’t being handled by an unconscious mechanism.

Current Notions of Motives and Emotions

3. Some emotions about things different than emotions about people.

• Emotions about things –

• Emotions about people –

Current Notions of Motives and Emotions

4. Emotions often accompanied with universal facial expressions.

Current Notions of Motives and Emotions

4. Emotions often accompanied with universal facial expressions.

Current Notions of Motives and Emotions

4. Emotions often accompanied with universal facial expressions.

Current Notions of Motives and Emotions

5. Emotions serve different functions:

• Happiness –

• Happiest people –

Current Notions of Motives and Emotions

5. Emotions serve different functions:

• Sadness –

• Grief over the loss of a family member proportional to -

Current Notions of Motives and Emotions

5. Emotions serve different functions:

• Friendliness and love –

Current Notions of Motives and Emotions

5. Emotions serve different functions:

• Anger and guilt –

• Moralistic aggression –

Current Notions of Motives and Emotions

5. Emotions serve different functions:

• Spite –

• “Amok” -

Current Notions of Motives and Emotions

5. Emotions serve different functions:

• Spite – “running amok”• “I am not an important or “big man.” I possess only my personal

sense of dignity. My life has been reduced to nothing by an intolerable insult. Therefore, I have nothing to lose except my life, which is nothing, so I trade my life for yours, as your life is favored. The exchange is in my favored, so I shall not only kill you, but I shall kill many of you, and at the same time rehabilitate myself in the eyes of the group of which I am a member, even though, I might be killed in the process.” - Papua New Guinea man hospitalized for amok syndrome.

Current Notions of Motives and Emotions

5. Emotions serve different functions:

• Shame –

• Pride –

Current Notions of Motives and Emotions

5. Emotions serve different functions:

• Guilt –

Current Notions of Motives and Emotions

5. Emotions serve different functions:

• Fear –

Current Notions of Motives and Emotions

5. Emotions serve different functions:

• Disgust –

Current Notions of Motives and Emotions

5. Emotions serve different functions:

• Appreciation of natural beauty –