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  3. Controversy about Causing EmotionP1: The fact that we react to certain experien

Controversy about Causing EmotionP1: The fact that we react to certain experien

游客2024-01-03  24
问题 Controversy about Causing Emotion
P1: The fact that we react to certain experiences with "emotion" is obvious. For example, the feeling of embarrassment, which triggers a physiological response that may cause blushing, is often caused by a foolish act committed in the company of friends. Although this description of an "embarrassment reaction" seems logical, there are different theories of emotion to explain what emotions are and how they operate. Giving definitive answers to these questions can be challenging, since emotions can be analyzed from many different perspectives. In one sense, emotions are sophisticated and subtle, the epitome of what make us human. In another sense, however, human emotions seem to be very similar to— if not the same as—the responses that other animals display.
P2: "What Is an Emotion," the title of one of the most influential journal articles in psychology, appeared in 1884 in reference to an article written by William James. In this article James defended what he considered to be a revolutionary thesis concerning the nature of emotion. He insisted that only when both physiological and physical reactions are generated by an incident does the individual perceive or interpret the physical response as an emotion. For example, when we come across a bear in the forest, our heart races, our knees tremble, and, because we are perceiving these physiological changes, we feel afraid. Just as James was first putting forth this proposition, Carl Lange, a Danish physiologist and psychologist, was independently formulating a virtually identical theory, and therefore these theories have traditionally been spoken of as the combined "James-Lange theory." According to this theory, then, different patterns of arousal in the autonomic nervous system are elicited by the different emotions people feel, and that physiological arousal occurs prior to the emotion being perceived.
P3: In 1927, another early theory, the Cannon-Bard theory of emotion, rose as a challenge to the James-Lange theory. It was actually a compilation of work from two different individuals, Water Cannon and Philip Bard. Their theory was that we simultaneously experience emotions and physiological reactions, and that physical changes caused by our many different emotions are not sufficiently distinct to allow people to distinguish one emotion from another. The hypothesis further claimed that a similar chain of events takes place when any emotion is felt. Stimuli which trigger emotion are received by the senses and are then relayed simultaneously to the cerebral cortex, which imparts the conscious mental experience of the emotion, and to the sympathetic nervous system, which generates the physiological state of arousal. In other words, the experience of emotions and physiological responses occur simultaneously, and there is no causal relationship between the two.
P4: At the beginning of the 1960s, the experimental social psychologist Stanley Schachter was one of the first to propose a cognitive theory of emotion. While accepting several of the fundamental tenets of James-Lange theory, he thought that the early theories of emotion left out a critical component about the subjective cognitive interpretation of why a state of arousal has occurred. According to his view, two factors are required in order to elicit and differentiate emotion as feeling. At first, the person must perceive physiological arousal. Then, there must be active congnition about the interpretation of the situation in light of one’s past experiences. Thus, Schachter concluded that a true emotion can appear only if a person is both physically aroused and can perceive the reason for it. If a person detects a heightened level of sympathetic arousal that he cannot attribute to an extraneous factor, he will then carefully scrutinize his physical and social environment and decide which emotion is appropriate. It is this final resulting emotion, then, that the person will feel. There have been several attempts to replicate the findings of this theory, but they have not been successful.
P5: In the 1990s, Richard Lazarus proposed a theory of emotion that formally pointed out the significance of the cognitive aspect. He asserted that our emotions are determined by our appraisals of stimuli. This appraisal mediates between the stimulus and the emotional response, and it is immediate and often unconscious. This theory is most compatible with the subjective experience of an emotion’s sequence of events—the very sequence that William James reversed long ago. Emotion was understood to arise from how individuals conceived of or appraised their ongoing interactions with the world. This cognitive appraisal determines whether the person will have an emotional response, and if so, what type of response. From this appraisal, the individual then evaluates his coping resources and options that may be available, and all other aspects of the emotion arise. In brief, Lazarus contends that emotions are roused when cognitive appraisals of events or circumstances are positive or negative—but not neutral.
P6: Emotion is a ubiquitous phenomenon in human social behavior. Given its key function in adaptation, it is not surprising that emotion involves virtually all of an organism’s subsystems, which are synchronized during the emotional episode to muster all the resources of the organism in an effort at adaptation. Increasingly, research is directed towards the study of strong, real-life emotions rather than on the laboratory induction of relatively weak and non-specific emotional processes.
P3: In 1927, another early theory, the Cannon-Bard theory of emotion, rose as a challenge to the James-Lange theory. It was actually a compilation of work from two different individuals, Water Cannon and Philip Bard. Their theory was that we simultaneously experience emotions and physiological reactions, and that physical changes caused by our many different emotions are not sufficiently distinct to allow people to distinguish one emotion from another. ■ The hypothesis further claimed that a similar chain of events takes place when any emotion is felt. ■ Stimuli which trigger emotion are received by the senses and are then relayed simultaneously to the cerebral cortex, which imparts the conscious mental experience of the emotion, and to the sympathetic nervous system, which generates the physiological state of arousal. ■ In other words, the experience of emotions and physiological responses occur simultaneously, and there is no causal relationship between the two. ■ [br] According to paragraph 3, Walter Cannon claimed that the James-Lange theory of emotion is not convincing for which of the following reasons?
选项 A、The body can be affected by different emotions in similar ways.
B、It is often not easy for people to distinguish one emotion from another.
C、It is not significant enough for bodily changes to be perceived.
D、It is often not obvious that bodily changes are caused by emotions or other factors.
答案 A
解析 【事实信息题】第3句提到“…physical changes caused by our many different emotions are not sufficiently distinct to allow people to distinguish one emotion from another．”即不同情感也可产生类似生理变化，因此答案为A。
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