The Development of Human Emotional Feelings
Introduction
Four main points of view can be distinguished in the modern theory of feeling and emotion: the introspective, typified by Wundt; the dynamic, typified by Freud; the behavioristic, typified by Watson; and the physiological, typified by Cannon. We shall deal with these four points of view in order. For each we shall dip into the past enough, but only enough, to bring out the trend of theory within the framework of the point of view. This means that the present chapter will be organized historically, but will not constitute a history of the subject. Such a history is already available elsewhere (Gardiner, Metcalf, and Beebe-Center, 1937).
The terms feeling and emotion, we shall find, are now considered to refer to concepts, not to data. This view was forced on introspective psychology by the finding that, as far as description of consciousness is concerned; feeling and emotion are meanings, not specific contents. It was forced on dynamic psychology by the inadequacy of conscious factors for the interpretation of conduct, and the consequent need of inferring unconscious motivating factors, including unconscious feelings and emotions (Helson, H. 1951).
This view was also forced on Behaviorism, but in a different way. It, too, failed to find any specific data–specific responses–to which the terms feeling and emotion could be applied. It could not, however, follow the other two schools in relating these terms to what appeared to be markedly subjective concepts. In consequence, it either disregarded the terms or proceeded to construct concepts corresponding to them from its behavioral data.
This latter procedure has had a tremendous effect upon the theory of feeling and emotion. It has shown that the vague concepts represented by the layman’s “notions” of feeling and emotion can be replaced by closely related concepts defined strictly in terms of experimental data–indeed, actually constructed from the data. It has thus opened the way for a truly empirical and objective theory of feeling and emotion.
Feeling and Emotion as Conscious Contents
The conception of feeling and emotion as conscious contents reached its greatest development in the psychology of Wundt (1920). Feeling, he taught, was one of two basic elements of consciousness (the other was sensation). Feelings were so varied that they required, for characterization, three descriptive dimensions, the dimensions of pleasantness-unpleasantness, excitement-depression, and strain-relaxation. Corresponding to the nature of feelings with respect to these dimensions were characteristic changes of strength and rate of pulse and breathing. Pleasantness, for instance, was accompanied by strengthening and slowing of pulse and weakening and acceleration of breathing. The bodily changes accompanied the feelings because the physiological counterpart of feeling was a spread of excitation from sensory centers to motor centers.
Emotion, for Wundt, was an interconnected series of feelings, accompanied, because of summation, by marked changes in breathing and pulse and also by certain bodily movements. Sometimes emotion fades out gradually; sometimes it is terminated abruptly by a marked change in feeling and in ideational content. Such an abrupt change is a volitional act (act of determining); and an emotion terminating with such an act is a volitional process. A typical volitional process is one where the emotion. Although both feelings and sensory contents are involved in volitional processes, it is the feelings which are important as far as motivations are concerned. “All feelings, even those of relatively indifferent character, contain in some degree an effort towards or away from some end”, (Wundt, 1902, p. 303).
Although the motivational side of this doctrine was indirectly deprived its importance by the theory of James (1884), Titchener (1910) still agreed with Wundt that emotion consists largely of feeling, and that both are conscious contents.
Feelings in the Earliest Days of Life
While in the earliest years of growth we are consequently dependent on the response mechanisms for some lead to the child’s inner experiences, it is not our position so to define the feelings and emotions that, because this is our only or main approach, these mental processes are to be considered exclusively from that angle. We are still on defensible ground when we say that, from the point of view of systematic psychology, we should be missing the central task of psychology if we went no farther than the bodily responses as such. The task is only begun if we describe the behavioral patterns of the infant. The interpretation of these activities in terms of our broader knowledge, though it be beset with pitfalls, is an unavoidable assignment in a comprehensive psychology of the feelings and emotions.
Keen interest in the early affective life of infants was aroused by Watson’s pronouncement, based on many experimental studies upon infants, that the original feeling life was limited to three emotions, namely, fear, rage, and love. Fear reactions were called out in the first months of life which responses appear at birth by either sudden removal of support, slight shake or a sudden push and by loud sounds. Rage is induced by hampering the infant’s natural movements either as a whole or in part. Love is aroused by stroking or manipulating an erogenous zone or the genitals, tickling, shaking, gentle rocking, patting, and turning the infant over on its stomach across the attendant’s lap.
Conclusion
Such study about the development of human emotional feelings is still considered to be a work in progress. After examining findings from different sources, we are then faced with the most important task of determining what we are going to do with ourselves in the future. It will be important to understand feelings and emotions and its development in talking to the developing person about their reasons for their feelings and their corresponding actions to these feelings. A theory from Dupont (1994) tells us how to identify the needs and values that inform feelings and emotions, and how these same needs and values influence a person’s choice of action as a way of expressing the value judgment inherent in his or her feelings.
From the theories in the earliest of its time, there is a need for more studies on feelings and emotions across the entire span of human development since it will involve different influences such as gender, culture, social experience, and education on emotional development. With the creation of human science of emotional development, we can then achieve self-reflective consciousness, and a range of socially relevant and effective feelings and emotions that could make us more fully human.
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