The causal influences of attributions on emotions: a procedural priming approach

According to attributional theories of emotion, feelings of guilt presuppose that the causes of a negative event are located within the individual (internal attribution), whereas feelings of anger presuppose that the causes of the eliciting event are located outside the individual (external attribution). This study tested whether these attributions in fact exert the claimed causal influence on emotional experiences. The study employed a procedural priming technique in which neutral events were repeatedly attributed either to oneself (internal attribution) or to another person (external attribution). Subsequently, participants were exposed to a negative event that was ambiguous as to its causes. The results reveal that the prior repeated use of internal attributions enhanced the tendency to experience guilt, whereas the repeated use of external attributions enhanced the tendency to experience anger. These findings support the assumption that attributions exert a causal influence on emotions.     

The Causal Organisation of Emotional Knowledge: A Developmental Study

Abstract

Using a theory of emotional understanding, the basis for distinguishing among happiness, anger, and sadness was investigated. Three and six-year-old children and adults predicted and explained people's emotional responses to different types of events. The events varied as to whether a person's goal was to attain or to avoid a state, whether the goal was achieved or not, who or what was responsible for success or failure, and whether the outcome was intentional or accidental. For all groups, the attainment and maintenance of goals was the primary focus of explanations for emotions and for the plans that followed emotions. A distinct set of features was used to infer and explain happiness as opposed to anger and sadness. Happiness was elicited by goal success and was followed by plans to maintain or enjoy current goal states. Anger and sadness were elicited by goal failure and were followed by plans to reinstate, replace, or forfeit goals. Anger occurred more frequently than sadness when an aversive rather than a loss state occurred, when an animate agent rather than a natural event caused a negative outcome, and when attention was focused on the cause rather than the consequence of goal failure. Two dimensions associated with anger changed as a function of age. First grade children, and adults were more likely than preschool children to predict anger in response to intentional harm, and their explanations for anger were more likely to refer to the agent or cause of goal failure. For all age groups, however, the majority of subjects responded to aversive situations with anger responses, independent of the causal conditions that produced the aversive state. The results therefore indicate that anger can be produced without intentional harm, but that intentional harm becomes an important dimension in attributing anger, especially as a function of development.     

Who gets mad,sad, scared or happy at discipline? Emotion attributions explain child externalizing behaviour

Few studies have linked parental discipline with children's emotional experiences, and not much data explore children's emotional attributions to discipline linked to externalizing behaviour. With a sample from Brazil, this study examines which emotions children most aptly attribute to a protagonist facing spanking, time-out or inductive discipline for norm violations. We hypothesized that anger, sadness, and fear would have higher attribution rates at spanking or time-out, relative to inductive discipline and that happiness would have higher attribution rates at induction relative to the other discipline modalities. We expected these findings to be more pronounced in older children. Based on emotional functions, we also tested the role of neutrality and happiness attributions to discipline in children's externalizing behaviour. A two-way MANOVA, with discipline and child age as explanatory variables, showed that children attributed more anger at time-out or spanking than at induction, and more happiness and neutrality at induction than at either time-out or spanking. Older children attributed significantly more sadness and less fear or neutrality. Hierarchical regressions showed that child externalizing behaviour was negatively related to happy attributions in discipline independently of child emotion situation knowledge or demographics. The results are interpreted in light of a functional view of emotions.     

Effort-Shape and kinematic assessment of bodily expression of emotion during gait

The purpose of this study was to identify the movement characteristics associated with positive and negative emotions experienced during walking. Joy, contentment, anger, sadness, and neutral were elicited in 16 individuals, and motion capture data were collected as they walked while experiencing the emotions. Observers decoded the target emotions from side and front view videos of the walking trials; other observers viewed the same videos to rate the qualitative movement features using an Effort-Shape analysis. Kinematic analysis was used to quantify body posture and limb movements during walking with the different emotions. View did not affect decoding accuracy except for contentment, which was slightly enhanced with the front view. Walking speed was fastest for joy and anger, and slowest for sadness. Although walking speed may have accounted for increased amplitude of hip, shoulder, elbow, pelvis and trunk motion for anger and joy compared to sadness, neck and thoracic flexion with sadness, and trunk extension and shoulder depression with joy were independent of gait speed. More differences among emotions occurred with the Effort-Shape rather than the kinematic analysis, suggesting that observer judgments of Effort-Shape characteristics were more sensitive than the kinematic outcomes to differences among emotions.     

Distinguishing Between Negative Emotions: Children's Understanding of the Social-regulatory Aspects of Emotion

This paper deals with children's understanding of the social-regulatory aspects of emotion. A total of 108 children between 6 and 12 years old responded to three vignettes describing social dilemmas. In each story one child (the expresser) displayed anger, sadness, or fear to their partner (the recipient), and children were asked about the expresser's goals as well as the effects of the emotion on recipients' actions and emotions. Anger expression was associated with children thinking that expressers feel dominant in interaction. When anger was expressed during interaction children thought that it elicited more anger and aggression from recipients. Sadness and fear elicited prosocial responses from recipients, including comfort, proximity, and goal reinstatement. The differentiation between anger, sadness, and fear was greater in older than in younger children. Results are discussed in terms of the differentiation between emotions, the development of individual differences in emotion expression, and emotion regulation.     

Another Search for the “Hot” Cognitions: Appraisal, Irrational Beliefs, Attributions, and Their Relation to Emotion

One study examined the hypothesized status of appraisal and irrational beliefs relative to attributions, as proximal antecedents of emotion. In our study, which looked at 4 pairs of functional and dysfunctional negative emotions (i.e., concern/anxiety, sadness/depression, remorse/guilt, annoyance/anger), undergraduates (N = 120) reported on their attributions, appraisal, irrational beliefs, and emotions during past encounters associated with various negative events. Congruent with both Smith and Lazarus' (1993) appraisal theory and Ellis' (1994) cognitive theory of emotion, the results of this study indicate that the emotions (both functional and dysfunctional negative emotions) were more directly associated with appraisal and with irrational beliefs (dysfunctional negative emotions only) than they were with attributions. Also, irrational beliefs were strongly associated with appraisal; while demandingness (DEM) was associated more with primary appraisal, awfulizing/catastrophizing, low frustration tolerance, and global evaluation of human worth (including self-downing) were associated more with secondary appraisal. Dysfunctional emotions seem to involve primary appraisal associated with DEM while functional emotions involve primary appraisal associated with preferences. These findings lend to support the status of appraisal and irrational beliefs as the proximal cognitive antecedents of emotion and the status of irrational beliefs as a differencing factor between functional and dysfunctional emotions.     

The experience of emotions in everyday life

Abstract

A total of 47 employed adults were asked to record, in structured diaries, details of four episodes of emotion from the set that we regard as basic (happiness, sadness, anger, fear, disgust) and also to note occurrences of other emotions not in this set. Subjects experienced an average of about one episode of consciously recognised emotion a day, and in rating intensities they said that 11% of episodes were as intense as they could imagine. Anger was the most frequent of the basic emotions, and disgust the least frequent. There were no significant differences in rates or intensities of basic emotions as a function of gender. We predicted 69% of these emotions correctly from the goal-relevant events that elicited them: happiness was typically caused by achievements, sadness by losses, anger by frustration, and fear by threat, but the causation of disgust was more difficult to identify. In 31% of episodes pairs of basic emotions occurred in mixtures. Positive emotions tended to help plans, while negative ones tended to hinder them.     

Exploring the Toolkit of Emotion: What Do Sadness and Anger Do for Us?

What do negative emotions do for people? We present a framework that defines the function of emotions as the degree to which discrete emotions result in better outcomes in particular types of situations. Focusing on sadness and anger, we review evidence related to the situations that elicit these emotions; the cognitive, physiological, and behavioral changes associated with the emotions; and the extent to which these changes result in demonstrably better outcomes in the type of situation that elicits the emotion. Sadness is elicited by perceived goal loss without possibility of restoration given current abilities and is associated with deliberative reasoning, reduced physiological activity, and behavioral expression. There is preliminary evidence suggesting that sadness can permit coping with loss, and that expression of sadness can recruit others to assist in goal attainment. Anger is elicited by perceived goal loss that can be prevented if an obstacle is overcome and is associated with heuristic reasoning, increased physiological activity, and behavioral expression. There is evidence that expression of anger prompts others to remove themselves as obstacles, and preliminary evidence that anger can promote overcoming obstacles and goal attainment. Like precision tools, specific emotions are best utilized to resolve particular problems.     

Fifth-Grade Children’s Daily Experiences of Peer Victimization and Negative Emotions: Moderating Effects of Sex and Peer Rejection

This study examined the relations of fifth-grade children’s (181 boys and girls) daily experiences of peer victimization with their daily negative emotions. Children completed daily reports of peer victimization and negative emotions (sadness, anger, embarrassment, and nervousness) on up to eight school days. The daily peer victimization checklist was best represented by five factors: physical victimization, verbal victimization, social manipulation, property attacks, and social rebuff. All five types were associated with increased negative daily emotions, and several types were independently linked to increased daily negative emotions, particularly physical victimization. Girls demonstrated greater emotional reactivity in sadness to social manipulation than did boys, and higher levels of peer rejection were linked to greater emotional reactivity to multiple types of victimization. Sex and peer rejection also interacted, such that greater rejection was a stronger indicator of emotional reactivity to victimization in boys than in girls.     

Are facial displays social? Situational influences in the attribution of emotion to facial expressions

Observers are remarkably consistent in attributing particular emotions to particular facial expressions, at least in Western societies. Here, we suggest that this consistency is an instance of the fundamental attribution error. We therefore hypothesized that a small variation in the procedure of the recognition study, which emphasizes situational information, would change the participants' attributions. In two studies, participants were asked to judge whether a prototypical "emotional facial expression" was more plausibly associated with a social-communicative situation (one involving communication to another person) or with an equally emotional but nonsocial, situation. Participants were found more likely to associate each facial display with the social than with the nonsocial situation. This result was found across all emotions presented (happiness, fear, disgust, anger, and sadness) and for both Spanish and Canadian participants.     

THE GENDER STEREOTYPING OF EMOTIONS

Three studies documented the gender stereotypes of emotions and the relationship between gender stereotypes and the interpretation of emotionally expressive behavior. Participants believed women experienced and expressed the majority of the 19 emotions studied (e.g., sadness, fear, sympathy) more often than men. Exceptions included anger and pride, which were thought to be experienced and expressed more often by men. In Study 2, participants interpreted photographs of adults'ambiguous anger/sadness facial expressions in a stereotype-consistent manner, such that women were rated as sadder and less angry than men. Even unambiguous anger poses by women were rated as a mixture of anger and sadness. Study 3 revealed that when expectant parents interpreted an infant's ambiguous anger/sadness expression presented on videotape only high-stereotyped men interpreted the expression in a stereotype-consistent manner. Discussion focuses on the role of gender stereotypes in adults'interpretations of emotional expressions and the implications for social relations and the socialization of emotion.     

Effects of discrete emotions on young children's suggestibility

Two experiments investigated the effects of sadness, anger, and happiness on 4- to 6-year-old children's memory and suggestibility concerning story events. In Experiment 1, children were presented with 3 interactive stories on a video monitor. The stories included protagonists who wanted to give the child a prize. After each story, the child completed a task to try to win the prize. The outcome of the child's effort was manipulated in order to elicit sadness, anger, or happiness. Children's emotions did not affect story recall, but children were more vulnerable to misleading questions about the stories when sad than when angry or happy. In Experiment 2, a story was presented and emotions were elicited using an autobiographical recall task. Children responded to misleading questions and then recalled the story for a different interviewer. Again, children's emotions did not affect the amount of story information recalled correctly, but sad children incorporated more information from misleading questions during recall than did angry or happy children. Sad children's greater suggestibility is discussed in terms of the differing problem-solving strategies associated with discrete emotions.     

Looking at You or Looking Elsewhere: The Influence of Head Orientation on the Signal Value of Emotional Facial Expressions

The role of horizontal head tilt for the perceptions of emotional facial expressions was examined. For this, a total of 387 participants rated facial expressions of anger, fear, sadness, and happiness, as well as neutral expressions shown by two men and two women in either a direct or an averted face angle. Decoding accuracy, attributions of dominance and affiliation, emotional reactions of the perceivers, and the felt desire to approach the expresser were assessed. Head position was found to strongly influence reactions to anger and fear but less so for other emotions. Direct anger expressions were more accurately decoded, perceived as less affiliative, and elicited higher levels of anxiousness and repulsion, as well as less desire to approach than did averted anger expressions. Conversely, for fear expressions averted faces elicited more negative affect in the perceiver. These findings suggest that horizontal head position is an important cue for the assessment of threat.

Investigating the Appraisal Patterns of Regret and Disappointment

Regret and disappointment are the two emotions that are most closely linked to decision making. This study compares the appraisal patterns of the two emotions. This is done in the context of the related negative emotions anger and sadness. The results show clear differences between regret and disappointment in this respect while replicating prior findings concerning the appraisal patterns of anger and sadness. The results are of interest for emotion researchers and decision researchers.     

Prejudice from thin air: The effect of emotion on automatic intergroup attitudes

Two experiments provide initial evidence that specific emotional states are capable of creating automatic prejudice toward outgroups. Specifically, we propose that anger should influence automatic evaluations of outgroups because of its functional relevance to intergroup conflict and competition, whereas other negative emotions less relevant to intergroup relations (e.g., sadness) should not. In both experiments, after minimal ingroups and outgroups were created, participants were induced to experience anger, sadness, or a neutral state. Automatic attitudes toward the in- and outgroups were then assessed using an evaluative priming measure (Experiment 1) and the Implicit Association Test (Experiment 2). As predicted, results showed that anger created automatic prejudice toward the outgroup, whereas sadness and neutrality resulted in no automatic intergroup bias. The implications of these findings for emotion-induced biases in implicit intergroup cognition in particular, and in social cognition in general, are considered.     

Understanding emotional display rules at work and outside of work: The effects of country and gender

This study examined the long-held, but empirically untested assumption that emotional display rules at work are different from more general display rules. We examined whether the effect of context (work vs. non-work) on display rules depended on rater gender, rater country (i.e., Singapore, United States), and discrete emotion (anger, contempt, disgust, fear, sadness, and happiness). Results revealed that display rules at work involved less expressivity of emotion than did display rules outside of work for all six emotions. Further, display rules in Singapore involved less expressivity of anger, sadness, and fear than display rules in the US, with no country differences being observed for the emotions of happiness, contempt, and disgust. These results were qualified by significant country-by-gender interactions for anger, contempt, and disgust, a significant country-by-context interaction for fear, and a three-way interaction (i.e., country-by-gender-by-context) for sadness.     

Emotions associated with different textures during touch

Haptics plays an important role in emotion perception. However, most studies of the affective aspects of haptics have investigated emotional valence rather than emotional categories. In the present study, we explored the associations of different textures with six basic emotions: fear, anger, happiness, disgust, sadness and surprise. Participants touched twenty-one different textures and evaluated them using six emotional scales. Additionally, we explored whether individual differences in participants’ levels of alexithymia are related to the intensity of emotions associated with touching the textures. Alexithymia is a trait related to difficulties in identifying, describing and communicating emotions to others. The findings show that people associated touching different textures with distinct emotions. Textures associated with each of the basic emotions were identified. The study also revealed that a higher alexithymia level corresponds to a higher intensity of associations between textures and the emotions of disgust, anger and sadness.     

Coping with the 10th anniversary of 9/11: Muslim Americans' sadness,fear, and anger

The events of 9/11 marked an increase in prejudice, discrimination, and other forms of unfair treatment toward Muslim Americans. We present a study that examined the emotions of Muslim Americans in the days preceding the ten-year 9/11 anniversary. We measured the antecedents (concerns) and consequences (coping) of sadness, fear, and anger. The 9/11 anniversary precipitated intense concerns with loss and discrimination, and intense feelings of sadness, fear, and anger. We measured three coping responses: rumination, avoidance of public places, and religious coping. Participants engaged in all three coping responses, with seeking solace in one's religion being the most frequent response. Moreover, emotions mediated the relationship between concerns and coping responses. Sadness accounted for the association between concern with loss and rumination. Fear explained the association between concern with discrimination and avoidance. Anger accounted for the association between concern with discrimination and religious coping.