from all of the above.
The emotional states of a person testify to the basic essence of a person, as they provide an opportunity to penetrate into his inner world, representing the basis on which goals and decisions, intentions and behavior are built. The emotional states of the individual are very important in relation to self-knowledge, understanding one’s own characteristics, action and planning for the future.
Emotional states of the individual regulate a person’s behavior when in contact with others. External facial expressions, gestures and postures of people, which are accompanies of any emotions, as well as a person’s speech, speak about his state inner world, about his experiences.
Among all the emotional states of a person, there are three main types that differ in strength and duration - affect, passion and mood.
Affect is a short-lived, violent, outwardly manifested emotional state. As a rule, affects manifest themselves due to some very exciting events or situations in human life. Most often, the state of affect is observed as a reaction human psyche to an event that happened not so long ago. The basis of the state of affect is the state of internal conflict that the individual experiences. The cause of the conflict may be a contradiction between desires and intentions, between requirements and the likelihood of their fulfillment.
Passion is a powerful, long-lasting, comprehensive emotional state of a person, which prevails over other aspirations and desires of a person and, as a rule, leads to concentration of attention and mental strength on the object of all human desires. The main indicator of passion is the craving for active actions and the realization that passion is taking over. In fact, the emotional state of passion can be compared to a very long-lasting state of affect. The difference is that passion is controllable, but affect is not.
Mood is a collection of many feelings. Mood is an emotional state of a person, characterized by long-term stability. Mood is a kind of basis on which all other mental and emotional processes take place. The difference between occasional emotions and states of affect is that a mood is an emotional reaction not to the consequences of any events, but to the importance of these events in relation to life plans, interests and desires. Mood is reflected in a person’s external behavior, his communication with other people, actions and deeds.
The emotional state of the individual is reflected in performance labor activity. Each individual profession has specific field requirements human emotions. Professions that involve constant contact and communication with other people call on a person to exercise self-control over their own emotional states. Since ancient times, there has been an idea that a doctor primarily treats not the disease itself, but the person. In this regard, the effectiveness of treatment largely depends on how a person can regulate and take control of his own emotions.
Emotions (from Latin emovere - to excite, excite) - special kind mental processes or human states that manifest themselves in the experience of any significant situations (joy, fear, pleasure), phenomena and events throughout life. Any need, including cognitive needs, is given to a person through emotional experiences. For a person, the main significance of emotions is that, thanks to emotions, we better understand those around us, we can, without using speech, judge each other’s state and better tune in to joint activities and communication. A remarkable fact, for example, is that people belonging to different cultures, are able to accurately perceive and evaluate expressions human face, determine from it such emotional states, such as joy, anger, sadness, fear, disgust, surprise. This fact not only convincingly proves the innate nature of basic emotions, but also “the presence of a genetically determined ability to understand them in living beings.” This refers to the communication of living beings not only of the same species with each other, but also different types between themselves. It is well known that higher animals and humans are capable of perceiving and assessing each other’s emotional states by facial expressions. Not all emotional and expressive expressions are innate. Some of them have been found to be acquired during life as a result of training and upbringing. Life without emotions is just as impossible as without sensations. Emotions, according to Charles Darwin, arose in the process of evolution as a means by which living beings establish the significance of certain conditions to satisfy their actual needs. Emotions act as an internal language, as a system of signals through which the subject learns about the need-based significance of what is happening. “The peculiarity of emotions is that they directly deny the relationship between motivations and the implementation that corresponds to these motives of activity. Emotions in human activity perform the function of assessing its progress and results. They organize activities, stimulating and directing them.” In critical conditions, when the subject is unable to find a quick and reasonable way out of a dangerous situation, a special type of emotional processes- affect. Thanks to timely emotions, the body has the ability to adapt extremely advantageously to environmental conditions. He is able to quickly, with great speed, respond to external influence without yet defining its type, shape, and other specific specific parameters. Emotional sensations are biologically, in the process of evolution, established as a unique way of maintaining the life process within its optimal boundaries and warn about the destructive nature of the lack or excess of any factors. The more complex the organization Living being, the more high level on the evolutionary ladder it occupies, the richer the range of emotional states that an individual is capable of experiencing. The quantity and quality of a person’s needs corresponds to the number and variety of emotional experiences and feelings characteristic of him, and “the higher the need in its social and moral significance, the more exalted the feeling associated with it.” Almost all elementary organic sensations have their own emotional tone. The close connection that exists between emotions and the activity of the body is evidenced by the fact that any emotional state is accompanied by many physiological changes in the body. The closer to the central nervous system the source of organic changes associated with emotions is located, and the fewer sensitive nerve endings there are, the weaker the subjective emotional experience that arises. In addition, an artificial decrease in organic sensitivity leads to a weakening of the strength of emotional experiences. The main emotional states that a person experiences are divided into actual emotions, feelings and affects. Emotions and feelings anticipate the process aimed at satisfying a need; they are, as it were, at the beginning of it. Emotions and feelings express the meaning of a situation for a person from the point of view of the actual this moment needs, meaning for its satisfaction of the upcoming action or activity. “Emotions can be caused by both real and imaginary situations. They, like feelings, are perceived by a person as his own internal experiences, transmitted to other people, and empathized with.” Emotions are relatively weakly manifested in external behavior, sometimes from the outside they are completely invisible to an outsider, if a person knows how to hide his feelings well. They, accompanying one or another behavioral act, are not even always conscious, although all behavior is associated with emotions, since it is aimed at satisfying a need. A person's emotional experience is usually much broader than the experience of his individual experiences. A person’s feelings, on the contrary, are outwardly very noticeable. “Emotions usually follow the actualization of the motive and before the rational assessment of the adequacy of the subject’s activity to it. They are a direct reflection, an experience of existing relationships, and not their reflection. Emotions are capable of anticipating situations and events that have not yet actually occurred, and arise in connection with ideas about previously experienced or imagined situations.” Feelings are objective in nature and are associated with a representation or idea about a certain object. Another feature of feelings is that they are improved and, developing, form a number of levels, starting from immediate feelings and ending with your feelings related to spiritual values and ideals. Feelings play a motivating role in a person’s life and activity, in his communication with people around him. In relation to the world around him, a person strives to act in such a way as to strengthen and strengthen his positive feelings. For him, they are always connected with the work of consciousness and can be voluntarily regulated.
Emotions are mental processes in which a person experiences his attitude to other phenomena of the surrounding reality; emotions are also reflected various states human body, its relationship to own behavior and to your activities.
Emotions have the following characteristics.
Subjective nature. The attitude that is expressed in emotions is always personal in nature and differs from the awareness of objective connections between things that are established in the process of learning about the world around us. Looking out the window, we see that the street is covered with snow, and we establish a connection between the appearance of snow and the time of year “winter has come.” This connection is established by us in the process of thinking. Having reflected this objective connection through thinking, one person can experience a feeling of joy that winter has come, and another a feeling of regret that summer is over. In these different feelings expresses the subjective, personal attitude of people to objective reality: one this item likes and causes them a feeling of pleasure, others do not like the same object and causes displeasure. Extreme diversity quality features. The following, rather incomplete list of emotional states, since they are expressed in human speech, allows us to judge extremely large number and a variety of emotions:
Feelings of hunger, - thirst, - pleasant taste, pleasure, - disgust, a feeling of pain, - lust, possession, - sexual feeling; - a sense of self-satisfaction, - ambition, - arrogance, - shamelessness.
Plastic. For example, joy or fear can be experienced by a person in many shades and degrees, its causes, objects or activities with which it is associated. A person can experience joy when meeting a friend, in the process of work that interests him, admiring majestic pictures of nature, etc. - but all these manifestations of joy are very different in their quality and degree. Connection with intraorganic processes.
This connection is twofold: 1) intraorganic processes are the strongest stimulators of many emotions; 2) all emotions, without exception, in one form or another find their expression in bodily manifestations. The close connection between emotions and the vital processes of the body was noticed a long time ago.
Connection with the direct experience of one's own “I”. Even the weakest emotions capture the whole person as a whole. Since in his relationships with the environment a person does not experience changes caused in him by external influences, his emotions acquire the character of emotional states; when emotions are associated with active manifestations of personality and are expressed in activity. And emotional, relationships and emotional states are always experienced by a person as his direct experiences. Emotions and feelings are unique mental states that leave an imprint on a person’s life. The emotional state is determined mainly outside behavior and mental activity, then feelings influence the content and inner essence of a person’s experiences. Emotional states include: moods, affects, stress, frustrations and passions. Affect- a quickly arising and rapidly occurring emotional state that negatively affects the psyche and behavior of a person. If we compare affect with mood, then mood is a calm emotional state, and affect is a lot of emotions that suddenly came and destroyed the normal state of mind person. Affect takes over the human psyche. This entails a narrowing and sometimes even a shutdown of consciousness. For example, when very angry, many people lose control over themselves. Their anger turns into aggression. The person begins to scream, blush, wave his arms, and may hit the enemy. Affect occurs abruptly, in the form of a flash, an impulse. Managing and coping with this condition is very difficult. They negatively affect human activity, sharply reducing the level of its organization. In the heat of the moment, a person loses his head, he is delusional, his actions are unreasonable, committed without taking into account the situation. If a person gets objects, he can throw them in a rage, push a chair, or slam the table. It would be wrong to think that affect is completely uncontrollable. Despite the suddenness, affect has certain stages of development. The most important thing is to delay the onset of affect, “extinguish” the affective outburst, restrain yourself, and not lose power over your behavior.
Stress- an emotional state that suddenly arises in a person under the influence extreme situation associated with life-threatening or strenuous activities. Stress, like affect, is the same strong temporary emotional experience
No person manages to live and work without experiencing stress. Every person experiences severe life losses, failures, trials, conflicts from time to time. Stressful conditions influence people's behavior differently. Some, under the influence of stress, show complete helplessness and are unable to withstand the effects of stress, others, on the contrary, are stress-resistant individuals and perform best in moments of danger and in activities that require the exertion of all forces. An emotional state close to stress is the “emotional burnout” syndrome. This condition occurs in a person who long time experiences negative emotions. Emotional burnout manifests itself in indifference, avoidance of responsibility, negativism or cynicism towards other people. As a rule, the causes of emotional burnout are monotony and monotony of work, lack of career growth.
Frustration- a deeply felt emotional state that arose under the influence of failures. It can manifest itself in the form of negative experiences, such as anger, frustration, apathy, etc. Frustration is accompanied by a whole set of negative emotions that can destroy consciousness and activity. In a state of frustration, a person may become angry and depressed. For example, when performing some activity a person fails, which causes him negative emotions - grief, dissatisfaction with himself. If in such a situation the people around you support and help correct mistakes, the experienced emotions will remain only an episode in a person’s life. If failures are repeated and significant people at the same time they reproach, shame, call them incapable or lazy, this person usually develops an emotional state of frustration. The level of frustration depends on the strength of the factor, the person’s condition and his existing forms of response to life difficulties.. A person’s resistance to frustrating factors depends on the degree of his emotional excitability, type of temperament, and experience of interaction with such factors. Passion- a deep and very stable emotional state that captures a person completely and completely and determines all his thoughts. The object of passion can be various types of things, objects, phenomena, people that a person strives to possess at any cost. Passion is a strong, persistent, all-encompassing feeling that determines the direction of a person’s thoughts and actions. The reasons for the emergence of passion are varied - they can be determined by conscious beliefs. Passion is usually selective and objective. For example, a passion for music, for collecting, for knowledge, etc.
Passion captures all the thoughts of a person, in which all the circumstances related to the object of passion revolve, which imagines and ponders ways to achieve the need. What is not related to the object of passion seems secondary, unimportant. For example, some scientists who are passionately working on a discovery do not attach importance to their appearance, often forgetting about sleep and food. The most important characteristic is its connection with the will. Since passion is one of the significant motivations for activity, because it has great strength. In reality, assessing the meaning of passion is twofold. Public opinion plays a big role in evaluation. For example, the passion for money and hoarding is condemned by some people as greed, acquisitiveness, while at the same time within the framework of another social group can be considered as economy, prudence.
Any need, including cognitive needs, is given to a person through emotional experiences.
Emotions are elementary experiences that arise in a person under the influence general condition the body and the progress of the process of meeting current needs. This definition of emotions is given in a large psychological dictionary.
In other words, “emotions are subjective psychological states that reflect, in the form of direct experiences, feelings of pleasant or unpleasant, a person’s attitude to the world and people, to the process and result of his practical activity.”
A number of authors adhere to following definition. Emotions are a mental reflection in the form of direct, biased experience, life meaning phenomena and situations determined by the relationship of their objective properties to the needs of the subject.
According to the authors, this definition contains one of the main features of emotions, distinguishing them, for example, from cognitive processes- direct presentation in them to the subject of the relationship between the need and the possibility of its satisfaction.
A.L. Groysman notes that emotions are a form of mental reflection that stands on the verge (to the content of the cognizable) with physiological reflection and represents a unique personal attitude of a person both to the surrounding reality and to himself.
Types of emotions
Depending on the duration, intensity, objectivity or uncertainty, as well as the quality of emotions, all emotions can be divided into emotional reactions, emotional states and emotional relationships (V.N. Myasishchev).
Emotional reactions are characterized by a high rate of occurrence and transience. They last minutes, are characterized by a fairly pronounced quality (modality) and sign (positive or negative emotion), intensity and objectivity. The objectivity of an emotional reaction is understood as its more or less unambiguous connection with the event or object that caused it. An emotional reaction normally always arises in relation to events produced in a specific situation by something or someone. This could be fear from a sudden noise or scream, joy from heard words or perceived facial expressions, anger due to an obstacle that has arisen or about someone’s action, etc. It should be remembered that these events are only a trigger for the emergence of emotion, and the cause is either the biological significance or the subjective meaning of this event for the subject. The intensity of emotional reactions can be different - from barely noticeable, even for the subject himself, to excessive - affect.
Emotional reactions are often reactions of frustration of some expressed needs. Frustration (from the Latin frustatio - deception, destruction of plans) in psychology is a mental state that arises in response to the appearance of an objectively or subjectively insurmountable obstacle to satisfying a need, achieving a goal or solving a problem. The type of frustration reaction depends on many circumstances, but is very often a personality characteristic this person. This could be anger, frustration, despair, or guilt.
Emotional states are characterized by: longer duration, which can be measured in hours and days; normally, less intensity, since emotions are associated with significant energy expenditure due to the accompanying physiological reactions, in some cases, pointlessness, which is expressed in the fact that the reason and the reason that caused them may be hidden from the subject, as well as some uncertainty of the modality of the emotional state. According to their modality, emotional states can appear in the form of irritability, anxiety, complacency, various shades of mood - from depressive states to a state of euphoria. However, most often they are mixed conditions. Since emotional states are also emotions, they also reflect the relationship between the needs of the subject and objective or subjective possibilities their satisfactions rooted in the situation.
In the absence of organic disorders of the central nervous system, the state of irritation is essentially a high readiness for anger reactions in a long-term situation of frustration. A person has outbursts of anger for the slightest and various reasons, but they are based on dissatisfaction with some personally significant need, which the subject himself may not be aware of.
A state of anxiety means the presence of some uncertainty about the outcome of future events related to the satisfaction of some need. Often the state of anxiety is associated with a sense of self-esteem (self-esteem), which may suffer if there is an unfavorable outcome of events in the expected future. The frequent occurrence of anxiety in everyday activities may indicate the presence of self-doubt as a personality, i.e. about unstable or low self-esteem inherent in a given person in general.
A person's mood often reflects the experience already achieved success or failure, or a high or low probability of success or failure in the near future. In bad or good mood reflects the satisfaction or dissatisfaction of some need in the past, success or failure in achieving a goal or solving a problem. It is no coincidence that a person in a bad mood is asked if something has happened. Long-term reduced or high mood(over two weeks), not typical for a given person, is a pathological sign in which an unsatisfied need is either truly absent or deeply hidden from the subject’s consciousness, and its detection requires special psychological analysis. A person most often experiences mixed states, for example, a depressed mood with a tinge of anxiety or joy with a tinge of anxiety or anger.
A person can also experience more complex conditions, an example of which is the so-called dysphoria - a pathological condition lasting two to three days in which irritation, anxiety and Bad mood. Less severe dysphoria may occur in some people and is normal.
Emotional relationships are also called feelings. Feelings are stable emotional experiences associated with a specific object or category of objects that have special meaning for a person. Feelings in a broad sense can be associated with various objects or by actions, for example, you may not like a given cat or cats in general, you may or may not like to do morning exercises etc. Some authors suggest calling only stable emotional relationships towards people feelings. Feelings differ from emotional reactions and emotional states in duration - they can last for years, and sometimes for a lifetime, for example, feelings of love or hatred. Unlike states, feelings are objective - they are always associated with an object or an action with it.
Emotionality. Emotionality is understood as stable individual characteristics emotional sphere of this person. V.D. Nebylitsyn proposed to take into account three components when describing emotionality: emotional impressionability, emotional lability and impulsiveness.
Emotional sensitivity is a person’s sensitivity to emotional situations, i.e. situations that can evoke emotions. Since different people Different needs dominate, each person has his own situations that can cause emotions. At the same time, there are certain characteristics of the situation that make them emotional for all people. These are: unusualness, novelty and suddenness (P. Fress). Unusuality differs from novelty in that there are types of stimuli that will always be new for the subject, because there are no “good answers” for them, such as loud noise, loss of support, darkness, loneliness, images of the imagination, as well as connections between the familiar and stranger. Available individual differences in the degree of sensitivity to emotiogenic situations common to everyone, as well as in the number of individual emotiogenic situations.
Emotional lability is characterized by the speed of transition from one emotional state to another. People differ from each other in how often and how quickly their state changes - in some people, for example, the mood is usually stable and depends little on minor current events, in others, with high emotional lability, it changes several times for the slightest reasons in a day.
Impulsivity is determined by the speed with which emotion becomes the motivating force of actions and actions without prior thought. This personality quality is also called self-control. There are two different mechanisms of self-control - external control and internal. With external control, it is not the emotions themselves that are controlled, but only their external expression; emotions are present, but they are restrained; the person “pretends” that he does not experience emotions. Internal control is associated with such a hierarchical distribution of needs in which lower needs are subordinated to higher ones, therefore, being in such a subordinate position, they simply cannot cause uncontrollable emotions in appropriate situations. Example internal control a person may be passionate about a task when he for a long time does not notice hunger (“forgets” to eat) and therefore remains indifferent to the type of food.
IN psychological literature It is also common to divide the emotional states that a person experiences into actual emotions, feelings and affects.
Emotions and feelings are personal formations that socio-psychologically characterize a person; associated with short-term and working memory.
Affect is a short-term, rapidly flowing state of strong emotional arousal, resulting from frustration or some other reason that has a strong effect on the psyche, usually associated with the dissatisfaction of very important needs for a person. Affect does not precede behavior, but forms it at one of its final stages. Unlike emotions and feelings, affects occur violently, quickly, and are accompanied by pronounced organic changes and motor reactions. Affects are capable of leaving strong and lasting traces in long-term memory. Emotional tension accumulated as a result of the occurrence of afetogenic situations can accumulate and sooner or later, if it is not given a way out in time, lead to a strong and violent emotional release, which, while relieving tension, often entails a feeling of fatigue, depression, depression.
One of the most common types of affects these days is stress - a state of mental (emotional) and behavioral disorder associated with a person’s inability to act expediently and wisely in the current situation. Stress is a state of excessively strong and prolonged psychological tension that occurs in a person when his nervous system receives emotional overload. Stresses are the main “risk factors” for the manifestation and exacerbation of cardiovascular and gastrointestinal diseases.
Thus, each of the described types of emotions has subtypes within itself, which in turn can be assessed by different parameters- intensity, duration, depth, awareness, origin, conditions of emergence and disappearance, impact on the body, dynamics of development, focus (on oneself, on others, on the world, on the past, present or future), according to the way they are expressed in external behavior ( expression) and on a neurophysiological basis.
The role of emotions in human life
For a person, the main significance of emotions is that, thanks to emotions, we better understand those around us, we can, without using speech, judge each other’s state and better tune in to joint activities and communication.
Life without emotions is just as impossible as life without sensations. Emotions, according to Charles Darwin, arose in the process of evolution as a means by which living beings establish the significance of certain conditions to satisfy their actual needs. Emotionally expressive movements of a person - facial expressions, gestures, pantomime - perform the function of communication, i.e. communicating to a person information about the state of the speaker and his attitude to what is currently happening, as well as the function of influence - exerting a certain influence on the one who is the subject of the perception of emotional and expressive movements.
Remarkable, for example, is the fact that people belonging to different cultures are able to accurately perceive and evaluate the expression of a human face, and determine from it such emotional states, such as joy, anger, sadness, fear, disgust, surprise. This fact not only convincingly proves the innate nature of basic emotions, but also “the presence of a genetically determined ability to understand them in living beings.” This refers to the communication of living beings not only of the same species with each other, but also of different species with each other. It is well known that higher animals and humans are capable of perceiving and assessing each other’s emotional states by facial expressions.
Not all emotional and expressive expressions are innate. Some of them have been found to be acquired during life as a result of training and upbringing.
Life without emotions is just as impossible as without sensations. Emotions, according to Charles Darwin, arose in the process of evolution as a means by which living beings establish the significance of certain conditions to satisfy their actual needs.
In higher animals, and especially in humans, expressive movements have become subtle differentiated language, with the help of which living beings exchange information about their states and what is happening around them. These are the expressive and communicative functions of emotions. They are also the most important factor regulation of cognitive processes.
Emotions act as an internal language, as a system of signals through which the subject learns about the need-based significance of what is happening. “The peculiarity of emotions is that they directly deny the relationship between motivations and the implementation that corresponds to these motives of activity. Emotions in human activity perform the function of assessing its progress and results. They organize activities, stimulating and directing them.”
In critical conditions, when the subject is unable to find a quick and reasonable way out of a dangerous situation, a special type of emotional processes arises - affect. One of the significant manifestations of affect is that, as V.K. believes. Vilyunas, “imposing stereotypical actions on the subject, represents a certain way of “emergency” resolution of situations fixed in evolution: flight, numbness, aggression, etc.” .
The important mobilization, integrative and protective role of emotions was pointed out by a large domestic psychologist PC. Anokhin. He wrote: “By producing almost instantaneous integration (unification into a single whole) of all functions of the body, emotions themselves and first of all can be an absolute signal of a useful or harmful effects on the body, often even before the localization of the effects and the specific mechanism of the body’s response are determined.”
Thanks to timely emotions, the body has the ability to adapt extremely advantageously to environmental conditions. He is able to quickly, with great speed, react to an external influence, without yet determining its type, shape, or other particular specific parameters.
Emotional sensations are biologically, in the process of evolution, established as a unique way of maintaining the life process within its optimal boundaries and warn about the destructive nature of the lack or excess of any factors.
The more complexly organized a living being is, the higher the level on the evolutionary ladder it occupies, the richer the range of emotional states that an individual is capable of experiencing. The quantity and quality of a person’s needs corresponds to the number and variety of emotional experiences and feelings characteristic of him, and “the higher the need in its social and moral significance, the more exalted the feeling associated with it.”
The most ancient in origin, the simplest and most widespread form of emotional experiences among living beings is the pleasure received from satisfying organic needs, and the displeasure associated with the inability to do this when the corresponding need intensifies.
Almost all elementary organic sensations have their own emotional tone. The close connection that exists between emotions and the activity of the body is evidenced by the fact that any emotional state is accompanied by many physiological changes in the body. (In this work we partially try to trace this dependence.)
The closer to the central nervous system the source of organic changes associated with emotions is located, and the fewer sensitive nerve endings it contains, the weaker the subjective emotional experience that arises. In addition, an artificial decrease in organic sensitivity leads to a weakening of the strength of emotional experiences.
The main emotional states that a person experiences are divided into actual emotions, feelings and affects. Emotions and feelings anticipate the process aimed at satisfying a need; they are, as it were, at the beginning of it. Emotions and feelings express the meaning of a situation for a person from the point of view of the currently relevant need, the significance of the upcoming action or activity for its satisfaction. “Emotions,” believes A.O. Prokhorov, - can be caused by both real and imaginary situations. They, like feelings, are perceived by a person as his own internal experiences, transmitted to other people, and empathized with.”
Emotions are relatively weakly manifested in external behavior, sometimes from the outside they are completely invisible to an outsider, if a person knows how to hide his feelings well. They, accompanying one or another behavioral act, are not even always conscious, although all behavior is associated with emotions, since it is aimed at satisfying a need. A person's emotional experience is usually much broader than the experience of his individual experiences. A person’s feelings, on the contrary, are outwardly very noticeable.
Feelings are objective in nature, associated with a representation or idea about a certain object. Another feature of feelings is that they are improved and, developing, form a number of levels, starting from immediate feelings and ending with your feelings related to spiritual values and ideals. Feelings play a motivating role in a person’s life and activity, in his communication with people around him. In relation to the world around him, a person strives to act in such a way as to strengthen and strengthen his positive feelings. For him, they are always connected with the work of consciousness and can be voluntarily regulated.
Emotional condition- This is the direct experience of a feeling.
Depending on the satisfaction of needs, the states experienced by a person can be positive, negative or ambivalent(duality of experiences). Taking into account the nature of the impact on human activity, emotions are sthenic(encourage to active work, mobilize forces, for example, inspiration) and asthenic(they relax a person, paralyze his strength, for example, sadness). Some emotions can be both sthenic and asthenic at the same time. The different impact of the same feeling on the activities of different people is due to the individual characteristics of the individual and his strong-willed qualities. For example, fear can disorganize a cowardly person, but mobilize a courageous one.
According to the dynamics of the course, emotional states are long-term and short-term, according to intensity - intense and weakly expressed, according to stability - stable and changeable. Depending on the form of the course, emotional states are divided into mood, affect, stress, passion, frustration, higher feelings.
The simplest form emotional experience is emotional tone, i.e. emotional coloring, a kind of qualitative shade mental process, inducing a person to preserve or eliminate them. The emotional tone accumulates a reflection of the most general and frequently occurring signs of useful and harmful factors surrounding reality and allows you to accept fast decision about the meaning of a new stimulus (beautiful landscape, unpleasant interlocutor). The emotional tone is determined personal characteristics a person, the process of his activity, etc. The purposeful use of emotional tone makes it possible to influence the mood of the team and the productivity of its activities.
Mood- these are relatively long-lasting, sustainable mental states moderate or weak intensity, manifested as a positive or negative emotional background mental life. Mood depends on social activities, worldview, orientation of a person, his state of health, time of year, environment.
Depression- This is a depressed mood associated with a weakening of excitement.
Apathy characterized by loss of strength and represents psychological condition caused by fatigue.
Affect- this is a short-term, violent emotion that has the character of an emotional explosion. The experience of affect is stage-specific. At the first stage, a person, seized by a flash of rage or wild delight, thinks only about the object of his feelings. His movements become uncontrollable, his breathing rhythm changes, and small movements are disrupted. At the same time, at this stage everyone mentally normal person can slow down the development of affect, for example, by switching to another type of activity. In the second stage, a person loses the ability to control his actions. As a result, he can commit actions that he would not have committed in his normal state. At the third stage, relaxation occurs, the person experiences states of fatigue and emptiness, and sometimes he is not able to remember episodes of events.
When analyzing an affective act, it is necessary to remember that in the structure of this act there is no goal, and the motive is the experienced emotions. To prevent the formation affective personality It is necessary to teach schoolchildren methods of self-regulation, to take into account their type of temperament in the process of education. Students with choleric and melancholic temperaments (the latter in a state of fatigue) are prone to affect.
The concept of “stress” was introduced into science by G. Selye. The scientist determined stress as a nonspecific reaction of the human (animal) body to any demand. Depending on the stress factor, physiological and mental stress. The latter, in turn, is divided into informational(EMERCOM worker does not have time to accept the right decision at the required pace in a situation of high responsibility) and emotional(occurs in situations of threat, danger, for example, during an exam). The body's response to stress is called general adaptation syndrome. This reaction includes three stages: the alarm reaction, the resistance phase and the exhaustion phase.
From the point of view of G. Selye, stress is not just nervous tension, this is not always the result of damage. The scientist identified two types of stress: distress and eustress. Distress occurs in difficult situations, under great physical and mental overload, if necessary, to make quick and responsible decisions and is experienced with great internal tension. The reaction that occurs during distress resembles affect. Distress negatively affects the results of a person’s activities and has a detrimental effect on his health. Eustress, on the contrary, is positive stress, which accompanies creativity, love, has a positive impact on a person and contributes to the mobilization of his spiritual and physical strength.
Ways to adapt to stressful situation are rejection of it on a personal level ( psychological protection personality), complete or partial disconnection from the situation, “activity shift”, use of new solutions problematic task, ability to carry out complex look activities despite tension. To overcome distress, a person needs physical movements, promoting the activation of the parasympathetic department of the higher nervous activity, music therapy, bibliotherapy (listening to excerpts from works of art), occupational therapy, play therapy, as well as mastering self-regulation techniques.
Passion- a strong, stable, all-encompassing feeling, which is the dominant motive of activity, leads to the concentration of all forces on the subject of passion. Passion can be determined by a person's worldview, beliefs, or needs. In its direction, this emotional manifestation can be positive or negative (passion for science, passion for hoarding). When we talk about children, we mean hobbies. Truly positive hobbies unite a child with others and expand his sphere of knowledge. If a positive hobby isolates a child from his peers, then perhaps it compensates for the feeling of inferiority experienced by him in other areas of activity (in studies, sports) that are not related to his interests, which indicates a dysfunctional personality.
Frustration is a mental state caused by the appearance of insurmountable obstacles (real or imaginary) when trying to satisfy a need that is significant to the individual. Frustration is accompanied by disappointment, annoyance, irritation, anxiety, depression, and devaluation of the goal or task. For some people, this condition manifests itself in aggressive behavior or is accompanied by withdrawal into the world of dreams and fantasies. Frustration can be caused by a lack of abilities and skills necessary to achieve a goal, as well as by experiencing one of three types internal conflicts(K. Levin). This is: a) conflict of equal positive opportunities, which arises when it is necessary to choose in favor of one of two equally attractive prospects; b) conflict of equal negative possibilities, arising from a forced choice in favor of one of two equally undesirable prospects; V) conflict of positive-negative possibilities, arising from the need to accept not only positive, but also negative aspects the same perspective.
The dynamics and forms of manifestation of states of frustration vary from person to person. Research shows that intelligence plays a special role in shaping the direction of emotional reactions. The higher a person’s intelligence, the more likely it is to expect an externally accusatory form of emotional reaction from him. People with less high intelligence are more inclined to take the blame on themselves in situations of frustration.
Higher feelings of a person arise in connection with the satisfaction or dissatisfaction of his spiritual needs, with the fulfillment or violation of the norms of life he has learned and social behavior, progress and results of activities. Depending on the subject area to which they relate, higher feelings can be intellectual, moral and aesthetic.
TO intellectual feelings include experiences that arise in the process cognitive activity person (surprise, interest, doubt, confidence, feeling of something new, etc.). Intellectual feelings may be conditioned by content, problematic nature activities, the degree of complexity of the tasks being solved. Intellectual feelings, in turn, stimulate activity, accompany it, influence the course and results of a person’s mental activity, acting as its regulator.
Moral feelings include moral assessment object, phenomenon, other people. The group of moral feelings includes patriotism, love for the profession, duty, collectivism, etc. The formation of these feelings involves the assimilation by a person moral rules and the norms that are worn historical character and depend on the level of development of society, customs, religion, etc. The basis for the emergence of moral feelings are social interpersonal relationships, defining their content. Being formed moral feelings encourage a person to accomplish moral actions. Violation of moral standards is fraught with the experience of shame and guilt.
Aesthetic feelings represent a person’s emotional attitude to beauty. Aesthetic feelings include a sense of tragic, comic, ironic, sarcastic, manifested in assessments, tastes, external reactions. They intensify activities and help to better understand art (music, literature, painting, theater).
Many psychologists believe that there are only three basic emotions: anger, fear and joy.
Anger is a negative emotion caused by frustration. The most common way to express anger is aggression- an intentional action intended to cause harm or pain. Ways of expressing anger include: direct expression of feelings, indirect expression feelings (transferring anger from the person who caused the frustration to another person or object) and containing anger. Optimal options for overcoming anger: thinking about the situation, finding something comic in it, listening to your opponent, identifying yourself with the person who caused anger, forgetting old grievances and strife, striving to feel love and respect for the enemy, awareness of your condition.
Joy- this is active positive emotion, which is expressed in a good mood and a feeling of pleasure. A lasting feeling of joy is called happiness. According to J. Friedman, a person is happy if he simultaneously feels satisfaction with life and peace of mind. Research shows that people who have families, have active religious beliefs, and have good relationships with others are happier.
Fear is a negative emotion that arises in situations of real or perceived danger. Justified fears play an important adaptive role and contribute to survival. Anxiety- this is a specific experience caused by a premonition of danger and threat, and characterized by tension and concern. The state of anxiety depends on the problem situation (exam, performance) and on personal anxiety. If situational anxiety is a state associated with a specific external situation, then personal anxiety- stable personality trait constant an individual's tendency to experience anxiety. People with low personal anxiety are always calmer, regardless of the situation. Required relatively high level stress in order to trigger a stress response in them.
Glossary
Emotions, feelings, emotional state, positive emotional state, negative emotional state, ambivalent emotional state, sthenic emotional state, asthenic emotional state, emotional tone, mood, depression, apathy, affect, stress, information stress, emotional stress, general syndrome adaptation, distress, eustress, passion, frustration, higher feelings, intellectual feelings, aesthetic feelings, moral feelings, anger, aggression, joy, fear, anxiety, situational anxiety, personal anxiety.
Questions for self-control
1. Compare emotions and feelings. What are their similarities? What are the differences?
2. How does Charles Darwin explain the emergence of emotions?
3. What is the essence of the theory of cognitive dissonance?
4. Name emotional states depending on the form of their occurrence.
5. What is the specificity of affect?
6. How are stress and affect similar? What are the differences?
7. Is passion a feeling or an emotion?
8. What causes the experience of frustration?
Emotional states are mental states that arise in the process of a subject’s life and determine not only the level of information and energy exchange, but also the direction of behavior. Emotions control a person much more powerfully than it seems at first glance. Even the absence of emotions is an emotion, or rather an entire emotional state, which is characterized by big amount features in human behavior.
According to their influence on human life, emotions can be divided into two groups:
sthenic - increasing the vital activity of the body and
asthenic - lowering them.
An emotional state in which sthenic or asthenic emotions predominate can manifest itself in a person in any type of activity and become his characterological trait.
His life, his health, his family, his work, his entire environment depend on a person’s emotional state, and a change in a person’s emotional state leads to fundamental changes in his life.
IN Everyday life people are stratified into groups based on similar emotional states. Various groups They understand each other poorly, communication is worse, but within the group things are somewhat better. As a rule, a whole, formed group belongs to the same emotional state.
Each person is unique and has his own personal opinion about life, but his point of view is not determined by reasoning or education, but by his emotional state.
There is a set of unchanging reactions corresponding to each emotional state. All people's emotions change in a strictly in a certain order. This pattern is applicable to all people without exception, it is the same and unchanged in appearance for everyone.
The sequence of human emotional states is as follows:
1. Active life zone:
a) Enthusiasm.
b) Fun.
c) Strong interest.
2. Zone of conservatism:
a) Conservatism.
Average interest, moderate interest.
Satisfaction, satisfied, weak interest.
Lack of interest.
Monotony, monotony.
3. Zone of antagonism:
a) Antagonism, open hostility.
Hostility, enmity, strong dislike.
4. Anger Zone:
a) Anger (anger, rage).
Hatred.
Indignation.
5. Fear Zone:
a) Lack of emotions.
b) Hidden hostility.
Despair.
Numbness.
d) Sympathy.
d) Appeasement, the need to appease (reconciliation).
6. Zone of grief and apathy:
a) Grief (sadness).
b) Making amends, atonement for guilt.
c) Victim.
d) Apathy.
Briefly, the main emotional states identified in psychology:
1) Joy (satisfaction, fun)
2) Sadness (apathy, sadness, depression), 3) Anger (aggression, bitterness),
4) Fear (anxiety, fright),
5) Surprise (curiosity),
6) Disgust (contempt, disgust).
Usually a person knows his emotional state well and transfers it to other people and throughout his life. The higher a person’s emotional state, the easier it is for him to achieve his goals in life. Such a person is rational, reasonable, therefore he is happier, more alive, more confident. The lower his emotional state, the more a person's behavior is controlled by his immediate reactions, despite his education or intelligence.