Neurologizing the Psychology of Affects: How Appraisal-Based Constructivism and Basic Emotion Theory Can Coexist

Developmental psychopathology as a meta-paradigm: From zero-sum science to epistemological pluralism in theory and research

In a thoughtful commentary in this journal a decade ago, Michael Rutter reviewed 25 years of progress in the field before concluding that developmental psychopathology (DP) initiated a paradigm shift in clinical science. This deduction requires that DP itself be a paradigm. According to Thomas Kuhn, canonical paradigms in the physical sciences serve unifying functions by consolidating scientists' thinking and scholarship around single, closed sets of discipline-defining epistemological assumptions and methods. Paradigm shifts replace these assumptions and methods with a new field-defining framework. In contrast, the social sciences are multiparadigmatic, with thinking and scholarship unified locally around open sets of epistemological assumptions and methods with varying degrees of inter-, intra-, and subdisciplinary reach. DP challenges few if any of these local paradigms. Instead, DP serves an essential pluralizing function, and is therefore better construed as a metaparadigm. Seen in this way, DP holds tremendous untapped potential to move the field from zero-sum thinking and scholarship to positive-sum science and epistemological pluralism. This integrative vision, which furthers Dante Cicchetti's legacy of interdisciplinarity, requires broad commitment among scientists to reject zero-sum scholarship in which portending theories, useful principles, and effective interventions are jettisoned based on confirmation bias, errors in logic, and ideology.

Basic Emotions or Constructed Emotions: Insights From Taking an Evolutionary Perspective

The ongoing debate between basic emotion theories (BETs) and the theory of constructed emotion (TCE) hampers progress in the field of emotion research. Providing a new perspective, here we aim to bring the theories closer together by dissecting them according to Tinbergen's four questions to clarify a focus on their evolutionary basis. On the basis of our review of the literature, we conclude that whereas BETs focus on the evolution question of Tinbergen, the TCE is more concerned with the causation of emotion. On the survival value of emotions both theories largely agree: to provide the best reaction in specific situations. Evidence is converging on the evolutionary history of emotions but is still limited for both theories-research within both frameworks focuses heavily on the causation. We conclude that BETs and the TCE explain two different phenomena: emotion and feeling. Therefore, they seem irreconcilable but possibly supplementary for explaining and investigating the evolution of emotion-especially considering their similar answer to the question of survival value. Last, this article further highlights the importance of carefully describing what aspect of emotion is being discussed or studied. Only then can evidence be interpreted to converge toward explaining emotion.

A comparison of dimensional and discrete models for the representation of perceived and induced affect in response to short musical sounds

Introduction

In musical affect research, there is considerable discussion on the best method to represent affective response. This discussion mainly revolves around the dimensional (valence, tension arousal, energy arousal) and discrete (anger, fear, sadness, happiness, tenderness) models of affect. Here, we compared these models' ability to capture self-reported affect in response to short, affectively ambiguous sounds.

Methods

In two online experiments (n1 = 263, n2 = 152), participants rated perceived and induced affect in response to single notes (Exp 1) and chromatic scales (Exp 2), which varied across instrument family and pitch register. Additionally, participants completed questionnaires measuring pre-existing mood, trait empathy, Big-Five personality, musical sophistication, and musical preferences.

Results

Rater consistency and agreement were high across all affect scales. Correlation and principal component analyses showed that two dimensions or two affect categories captured most of the variation in affective response. Canonical correlation and regression analyses also showed that energy arousal varied in a manner that was not captured by discrete affect ratings. Furthermore, all sources of individual differences were moderately correlated with all affect scales, particularly pre-existing mood and dimensional affect.

Discussion

We conclude that when it comes to single notes and chromatic scales, the dimensions of valence and energy arousal best capture the perceived and induced affective response to affectively ambiguous sounds, although the role of individual differences should also be considered.

The Role of Emotion Differentiation in the Association Between Momentary Affect and Tobacco/Nicotine Craving in Young Adults

INTRODUCTION

Tobacco/nicotine use is commonly initiated during adolescence or young adulthood, which increases the likelihood of continued use into adulthood and related adverse health outcomes. Despite interest in cessation, achieving and maintaining abstinence is difficult among this population. Cravings are often a barrier to abstinence, which have been associated with intensity of affect at the moment level. Emotion differentiation involves the ability to distinguish between discrete emotion states, and previous work suggests it may moderate the effect of momentary affect on craving, which has never been explored among young adults who are smoking or vaping nicotine.

AIMS AND METHODS

In a sample of young adults (N = 37, observations = 2020, ages 18-25, 51% female, and 78% white) interested in quitting smoking or vaping, we used real-time, naturalistic data capture via mobile phones to examine the interaction of momentary affect and trait emotion differentiation on nicotine craving. Participants were prompted with four surveys per day for 35 days and asked to make a 48-h quit attempt on day 7.

RESULTS

Multilevel models showed moments of higher-than-average momentary negative affect (NA; b = 0.39, p < .001), and positive affect (PA; b = 0.26, p = .001) were associated with greater levels of craving. NA emotion differentiation significantly moderated the associations between PA and craving (b = -0.63, p = .031) and NA and craving (b = -0.67, p = .003).

CONCLUSIONS

Findings from this exploratory analysis suggest that for young adults engaging in a nicotine quit attempt, greater ability to differentiate NA weakens the momentary association between intense affect and craving.

IMPLICATIONS

Results of this study show that the ability to differentiate between discrete emotional experiences may protect young adults against nicotine craving during moments of intense affective experience. These preliminary findings suggest that emotion differentiation, a modifiable construct, could be an important treatment target for individuals engaged in treatment for nicotine dependence.

Attachment-Related Differences in Emotion Regulation in Adults: A Systematic Review on Attachment Representations

In recent years, there has been an increase in the prevalence of mental disorders connected with affective dysregulation and insecure attachment. Therefore, it is even more important to understand the interplay between an individual's attachment representation and patterns of emotion regulation. To our knowledge, this is the first systematic review to examine this association. PsycInfo, PsyArticles, and PubMed were searched for studies that examined attachment-related differences in emotion regulation in adults. To examine the unconscious attachment representation, only studies using the Adult Attachment Interview or the Adult Attachment Projective Picture System were included. Thirty-seven peer-reviewed studies (with a total of 2006 subjects) matched the PICO criteria. Emotion regulation was measured via four objective approaches: autonomic nervous system, brain activity, biochemistry, or nonverbal behavior. Across all measurements, results reveal a significant correlation between attachment representation and emotion regulation. Secure attachment correlates consistently with balanced emotion regulation, whereas it is impaired in insecure and dysfunctional in unresolved attachment. Specifically, unresolved individuals display counterintuitive responses and fail to use attachment as a resource. Insecure-dismissing attachment is associated with an emotionally deactivating strategy, while on a physiological, biochemical, and nonverbal level, emotional stress is still present. There is still a lack of studies examining preoccupied individuals. In addition to interpreting the results, we also discuss the risk of bias, implications for psychotherapy and coaching, and an outlook for future research.

Happiness feels light and sadness feels heavy: introducing valence-related bodily sensation maps of emotions

Bodily sensation mapping (BSM) is a recently developed self-report tool for the assessment of emotions in which people draw their sensations of activation in a body silhouette. Following the circumplex model of affect, activity and valence are the underling dimensions of every emotional experience. The aim of this study was to introduce the neglected valence dimension in BSM. We found that participants systematically report valence-related sensations of bodily lightness for positive emotions (happiness, love, pride), and sensations of bodily heaviness in response to negative emotions (e.g., anger, fear, sadness, depression) with specific body topography (Experiment 1). Further experiments showed that both computers (using a machine learning approach) and humans recognize emotions better when classification is based on the combined activity- and valence-related BSMs compared to either type of BSM alone (Experiments 2 and 3), suggesting that both types of bodily sensations reflect distinct parts of emotion knowledge. Importantly, participants found it clearer to indicate their bodily sensations induced by sadness and depression in terms of bodily weight than bodily activity (Experiment 2 and 4), suggesting that the added value of valence-related BSMs is particularly relevant for the assessment of emotions at the negative end of the valence spectrum.

Bridging the Gap: Human Emotions and Animal Emotions

Our experiences of the conscious mental states that we call emotions drive our interest in whether such states also exist in other animals. Because linguistic report can be used as a gold standard (albeit indirect) indicator of subjective emotional feelings in humans but not other species, how can we investigate animal emotions and what exactly do we mean when we use this term? Linguistic reports of human emotion give rise to emotion concepts (discrete emotions; dimensional models), associated objectively measurable behavioral and bodily emotion indicators, and understanding of the emotion contexts that generate specific states. We argue that many animal studies implicitly translate human emotion concepts, indicators and contexts, but that explicit consideration of the underlying pathways of inference, their theoretical basis, assumptions, and pitfalls, and how they relate to conscious emotional feelings, is needed to provide greater clarity and less confusion in the conceptualization and scientific study of animal emotion.

Cognitive bias in animal behavior science: a philosophical perspective

Emotional states of animals influence their cognitive processes as well as their behavior. Assessing emotional states is important for animal welfare science as well as for many fields of neuroscience, behavior science, and biomedicine. This can be done in different ways, e.g. through assessing animals’ physiological states or interpreting their behaviors. This paper focuses on the so-called cognitive judgment bias test, which has gained special attention in the last 2 decades and has become a highly important tool for measuring emotional states in non-human animals. However, less attention has been given to the epistemology of the cognitive judgment bias test and to disentangling the relevance of different steps in the underlying cognitive mechanisms. This paper sheds some light on both the epistemology of the methods and the architecture of the underlying cognitive abilities of the tested animals. Based on this reconstruction, we propose a scheme for classifying and assessing different cognitive abilities involved in cognitive judgment bias tests.

Emotional Word Processing in Patients With Juvenile Myoclonic Epilepsy

Objective

According to Panksepp's hierarchical emotion model, emotion processing relies on three functionally and neuroanatomically distinct levels. These levels comprise subcortical networks (primary level), the limbic system (secondary level), and the neocortex (tertiary level) and are suggested to serve differential emotional processing. We aimed to validate and extend previous evidence of discrete and dimensional emotion processing in patient with juvenile myoclonic epilepsy (JME).

Methods

We recorded brain activity of patients with JME and healthy controls in response to lexical decisions to words reflecting the discrete emotion fear and the affective dimension negativity previously suggested to rely on different brain regions and to reflect different levels of processing. In all study participants, we tested verbal cognitive functions, as well as the relationship of psychiatric conditions, seizure types and duration of epilepsy and emotional word processing.

Results

In support of the hierarchical emotion model, we found an interaction of discrete emotion and affective dimensional processing in the right amygdala likely to reflect secondary level processing. Brain activity related to affective dimensional processing was found in the right inferior frontal gyrus and is suggested to reflect tertiary level processing. Psychiatric conditions, type of seizure nor mono- vs. polytherapy and duration of epilepsy within patients did not have any effect on the processing of emotional words. In addition, no differences in brain activity or response times between patients and controls were observed, despite neuropsychological testing revealed slightly decreased verbal intelligence, verbal fluency and reading speed in patients with JME.

Significance

These results were interpreted to be in line with the hierarchical emotion model and to highlight the amygdala's role in processing biologically relevant stimuli, as well as to suggest a semantic foundation of affective dimensional processing in prefrontal cortex. A lack of differences in brain activity of patients with JME and healthy controls in response to the emotional content of words could point to unaffected implicit emotion processing in patients with JME.

Mechanisms supporting the social regulation of neural threat responding with marital partners: A test of the opioid hypothesis

Positive social contact predicts better health, but the mechanisms for this association remain debated. One way to explore this link is through the social regulation of emotion, particularly anticipatory anxiety. Previous research finds less neural threat response during partner handholding than when people are alone or stranger handholding. Various mechanistic accounts have been forwarded, including the hypothesis that this effect is mediated by endogenous opioid activity. This experiment critically tested the opioid hypothesis in 60 married participants and their partners. The study used a naltrexone opioid blockade in a double-blind placebo control with functional magnetic resonance imaging to determine whether endogenous opioids were necessary for handholding effects. Regulatory effects of supportive handholding manifested in threat network regions during opioid blockade, but not with placebo. Despite a surprising lack of effect in the placebo group, the overall study findings provide initial evidence that endogenous opioids may not be necessary for the social regulation of neural threat responding.

How laboratory studies of cigarette craving can inform the experimental alcohol craving literature

Interest in alcohol and other drug craving has flourished over the past two decades, and evidence has accumulated showing that craving can be meaningfully linked to both drug use and relapse. Considerable human experimental alcohol craving research since 2000 has focused on craving as a clinical phenomenon. Self-reported craving to drink typically has served as a catch-all for the craving construct in these studies, whereas few studies have considered craving as a process (or hypothetical construct) that interacts with other phenomena to affect use. In contrast to alcohol, we believe that recently there has been more mechanistic work targeting cigarette craving-related processes. Here, we briefly present a narrative review of studies of acute alcohol craving in humans that have been conducted during the past two decades. We then specify important ways in which alcohol and tobacco differ (e.g., the role of withdrawal), and we note the unique challenges in inducing robust alcohol craving states in the laboratory. Finally, we offer recommendations for how the alcohol field might advance its conceptual understanding of craving by adopting ideas and methods drawn from the smoking research literature. Specifically, we suggest that researchers extend their studies to not only examine the link between alcohol craving and relapse but also to focus on why and, in some instances, how alcohol cravings matter clinically, and the circumstances under which craving especially matters. We propose research to investigate the shifts in alcohol-related cognitive and affective processing that occur during alcohol craving states. Furthermore, we highlight the value of research examining the level of insight that individuals with varying levels of alcohol involvement possess about their own craving-related processing shifts. We believe that laboratory studies can provide rich opportunities to examine conceptual questions about alcohol craving that are central to addiction.

What is an Emotion? A Connectionist Perspective

Researchers often disagree as to whether emotions are largely consistent across people and over time, or whether they are variable. They also disagree as to whether emotions are initiated by appraisals, or whether they may be initiated in diverse ways. We draw upon Parallel-Distributed-Processing to offer an algorithmic account in which features of an emotion instance are bi-directionally connected to each other via conjunction units. We propose that such indirect connections may be innate as well as learned. These ideas lead to the development of the Interactive Activation and Competition framework for Emotion (IAC-E) which allows us to specify when emotions are consistent and when they are variable, as well as when they are appraisal-led and when they are input-agnostic.

Temporal dynamics of affect in the brain: Evidence from human imaging and animal models

Emotions are time-varying internal states that promote survival in the face of dynamic environments and shifting homeostatic needs. Research in non-human organisms has recently afforded specific insights into the neural mechanisms that support the emergence, persistence, and decay of affective states. Concurrently, a separate affective neuroscience literature has begun to dissect the neural bases of affective dynamics in humans. However, the circuit-level mechanisms identified in animals lack a clear mapping to the human neuroscience literature. As a result, critical questions pertaining to the neural bases of affective dynamics in humans remain unanswered. To address these shortcomings, the present review integrates findings from humans and non-human organisms to highlight the neural mechanisms that govern the temporal features of emotional states. Using the theory of affective chronometry as an organizing framework, we describe the specific neural mechanisms and modulatory factors that arbitrate the rise-time, intensity, and duration of emotional states.

Contactless differentiation of pleasant and unpleasant valence: Assessment of the acoustic startle eyeblink response with infrared reflectance oculography

The ability to distinguish between discrete emotions by monitoring autonomic or facial features has been an elusive "holy grail" for fields such as psychophysiology, affective computing, and human-computer interface design. However, cross-validated models are lacking, and contemporary theory suggests that emotions may lack distinct physiological or facial "signatures." Therefore, in this study, we propose a reorientation toward distinguishing between pleasant and unpleasant affective valence. We focus on the acoustic eyeblink response, which exhibits affective modulation but remains underutilized. The movement of the eyelid was monitored in a contactless manner via infrared reflectance oculography at 1 kHz while 36 participants viewed normatively pleasant, neutral, and unpleasant images, and 50-ms bursts of white noise were presented binaurally via headphones. Startle responses while viewing pleasant images exhibited significantly smaller amplitudes than those while viewing unpleasant images, with a large effect size (d = 1.56). The affective modulation of the eyeblink startle response is a robust phenomenon that can be assessed in a contactless manner. As research continues on whether systems based on psychophysiological or facial features can distinguish between discrete emotions, the eyeblink startle response offers a relatively simple way to distinguish between pleasant and unpleasant affective valence.

Emotions as Overlapping Causal Networks of Emotion Components: Implications and Methodological Approaches

A widespread perspective describes emotions as distinct categories bridged by fuzzy boundaries, indicating that emotions are distinct and dimensional at the same time. Theoretical and methodological approaches to this perspective still need further development. We conceptualize emotions as overlapping networks of causal relationships between emotion components—networks representing distinct emotions share components with and relate to each other. To investigate this conceptualization, we introduce network analysis to emotion research and apply it to the reanalysis of a data set on multiple positive emotions. Specifically, we describe the estimation of networks from data, and the detection of overlapping communities of nodes in these networks. The network perspective has implications for the understanding of distinct emotions, their co-occurrence, and their measurement.

Associations between physiological and self-reported indices of emotion dysregulation across varying levels of alcohol use among individuals with and without borderline personality disorder

Emotional functioning can be assessed across multiple levels of analysis (e.g., subjective, physiological). The degree of concordance/discordance across such indices may mark psychopathology risk. The current study assessed associations between physiological and subjective indices of emotional responding among drinkers, with (n = 39) and without (n = 42) borderline personality disorder. Subjective changes in affect were assessed by calculating difference scores on the Positive and Negative Affective Schedule, administered before and following a lab-based stress task. Physiological dysregulation was indexed by respiratory sinus arrhythmia (RSA) reactivity. We created Discordance Index scores to examine the direction and magnitude of misalignment. More frequent alcohol use was associated with greater discordance between RSA and positive affect changes (β = -0.07, p-value = 0.009). Findings were confirmed with a response surface modeling analysis. Results highlight that individuals with greater discordance between indices of emotional responding may be at elevated risk for frequent alcohol use.

Vocal signals only impact speakers' own emotions when they are self-attributed

Emotions are often accompanied by vocalizations whose acoustic features provide information about the physiological state of the speaker. Here, we ask if perceiving these affective signals in one's own voice has an impact on one's own emotional state, and if it is necessary to identify these signals as self-originated for the emotional effect to occur. Participants had to deliberate out loud about how they would feel in various familiar emotional scenarios, while we covertly manipulated their voices in order to make them sound happy or sad. Perceiving the artificial affective signals in their own voice altered participants' judgements about how they would feel in these situations. Crucially, this effect disappeared when participants detected the vocal manipulation, either explicitly or implicitly. The original valence of the scenarios also modulated the vocal feedback effect. These results highlight the role of the exteroception of self-attributed affective signals in the emergence of emotional feelings.

Not All Emotions Are Equal: Fear Chemosignals Lower Awareness Thresholds Only for Fearful Faces

Exposure to body odors (chemosignals) collected under different emotional states (i.e., emotional chemosignals) can modulate our visual system, biasing visual perception. Recent research has suggested that exposure to fear body odors, results in a generalized faster access to visual awareness of different emotional facial expressions (i.e., fear, happy, and neutral). In the present study, we aimed at replicating and extending these findings by exploring if these effects are limited to fear odor, by introducing a second negative body odor—that is, disgust. We compared the time that 3 different emotional facial expressions (i.e., fear, disgust, and neutral) took to reach visual awareness, during a breaking continuous flash suppression paradigm, across 3 body odor conditions (i.e., fear, disgust, and neutral). We found that fear body odors do not trigger an overall faster access to visual awareness, but instead sped-up access to awareness specifically for facial expressions of fear. Disgust odor, on the other hand, had no effects on awareness thresholds of facial expressions. These findings contrast with prior results, suggesting that the potential of fear body odors to induce visual processing adjustments is specific to fear cues. Furthermore, our results support a unique ability of fear body odors in inducing such visual processing changes, compared with other negative emotional chemosignals (i.e., disgust). These conclusions raise interesting questions as to how fear odor might interact with the visual processing stream, whilst simultaneously giving rise to future avenues of research.

Read My Face: Automatic Facial Coding Versus Psychophysiological Indicators of Emotional Valence and Arousal

Facial expressions provide insight into a person's emotional experience. To automatically decode these expressions has been made possible by tremendous progress in the field of computer vision. Researchers are now able to decode emotional facial expressions with impressive accuracy in standardized images of prototypical basic emotions. We tested the sensitivity of a well-established automatic facial coding software program to detect spontaneous emotional reactions in individuals responding to emotional pictures. We compared automatically generated scores for valence and arousal of the Facereader (FR; Noldus Information Technology) with the current psychophysiological gold standard of measuring emotional valence (Facial Electromyography, EMG) and arousal (Skin Conductance, SC). We recorded physiological and behavioral measurements of 43 healthy participants while they looked at pleasant, unpleasant, or neutral scenes. When viewing pleasant pictures, FR Valence and EMG were both comparably sensitive. However, for unpleasant pictures, FR Valence showed an expected negative shift, but the signal differentiated not well between responses to neutral and unpleasant stimuli, that were distinguishable with EMG. Furthermore, FR Arousal values had a stronger correlation with self-reported valence than with arousal while SC was sensitive and specifically associated with self-reported arousal. This is the first study to systematically compare FR measurement of spontaneous emotional reactions to standardized emotional images with established psychophysiological measurement tools. This novel technology has yet to make strides to surpass the sensitivity of established psychophysiological measures. However, it provides a promising new measurement technique for non-contact assessment of emotional responses.

A neurocognitive model of perceptual decision-making on emotional signals

Humans make various kinds of decisions about which emotions they perceive from others. Although it might seem like a split-second phenomenon, deliberating over which emotions we perceive unfolds across several stages of decisional processing. Neurocognitive models of general perception postulate that our brain first extracts sensory information about the world then integrates these data into a percept and lastly interprets it. The aim of the present study was to build an evidence-based neurocognitive model of perceptual decision-making on others' emotions. We conducted a series of meta-analyses of neuroimaging data spanning 30 years on the explicit evaluations of others' emotional expressions. We find that emotion perception is rather an umbrella term for various perception paradigms, each with distinct neural structures that underline task-related cognitive demands. Furthermore, the left amygdala was responsive across all classes of decisional paradigms, regardless of task-related demands. Based on these observations, we propose a neurocognitive model that outlines the information flow in the brain needed for a successful evaluation of and decisions on other individuals' emotions. HIGHLIGHTS: Emotion classification involves heterogeneous perception and decision-making tasks Decision-making processes on emotions rarely covered by existing emotions theories We propose an evidence-based neuro-cognitive model of decision-making on emotions Bilateral brain processes for nonverbal decisions, left brain processes for verbal decisions Left amygdala involved in any kind of decision on emotions.

The neuroscience of sadness: A multidisciplinary synthesis and collaborative review

Sadness is typically characterized by raised inner eyebrows, lowered corners of the mouth, reduced walking speed, and slumped posture. Ancient subcortical circuitry provides a neuroanatomical foundation, extending from dorsal periaqueductal grey to subgenual anterior cingulate, the latter of which is now a treatment target in disorders of sadness. Electrophysiological studies further emphasize a role for reduced left relative to right frontal asymmetry in sadness, underpinning interest in the transcranial stimulation of left dorsolateral prefrontal cortex as an antidepressant target. Neuroimaging studies - including meta-analyses - indicate that sadness is associated with reduced cortical activation, which may contribute to reduced parasympathetic inhibitory control over medullary cardioacceleratory circuits. Reduced cardiac control may - in part - contribute to epidemiological reports of reduced life expectancy in affective disorders, effects equivalent to heavy smoking. We suggest that the field may be moving toward a theoretical consensus, in which different models relating to basic emotion theory and psychological constructionism may be considered as complementary, working at different levels of the phylogenetic hierarchy.

Keeping in Touch with Mental Health: The Orienting Reflex and Behavioral Outcomes from Calatonia

Physical and psychological therapy based on touch has been gradually integrated into broader mental health settings in the past two decades, evolving from a variety of psychodynamic, neurobiological and trauma-based approaches, as well as Eastern and spiritual philosophies and other integrative and converging systems. Nevertheless, with the exception of a limited number of well-known massage therapy techniques, only a few structured protocols of touch therapy have been standardized and researched to date. This article describes a well-defined protocol of touch therapy in the context of psychotherapy-the Calatonia technique-which engages the orienting reflex. The orienting reflex hypothesis is explored here as one of the elements of this technique that helps to decrease states of hypervigilance and chronic startle reactivity (startle and defensive reflexes) and restore positive motivational and appetitive states.

Toward an Integrative Psychometric Model of Emotions

Emotions are part and parcel of the human condition, but their nature is debated. Three broad classes of theories about the nature of emotions can be distinguished: affect-program theories, constructionist theories, and appraisal theories. Integrating these broad classes of theories into a unifying theory is challenging. An integrative psychometric model of emotions can inform such a theory because psychometric models are intertwined with theoretical perspectives about constructs. To identify an integrative psychometric model, we delineate properties of emotions stated by emotion theories and investigate whether psychometric models account for these properties. Specifically, an integrative psychometric model of emotions should allow (a) identifying distinct emotions (central in affect-program theories), (b) between- and within-person variations of emotions (central in constructionist theories), and (c) causal relationships between emotion components (central in appraisal theories). Evidence suggests that the popular reflective and formative latent variable models-in which emotions are conceptualized as unobservable causes or consequences of emotion components-cannot account for all properties. Conversely, a psychometric network model-in which emotions are conceptualized as systems of causally interacting emotion components-accounts for all properties. The psychometric network model thus constitutes an integrative psychometric model of emotions, facilitating progress toward a unifying theory.

Animal affect and decision-making

The scientific study of animal affect (emotion) is an area of growing interest. Whilst research on mechanism and causation has predominated, the study of function is less advanced. This is not due to a lack of hypotheses; in both humans and animals, affective states are frequently proposed to play a pivotal role in coordinating adaptive responses and decisions. However, exactly how they might do this (what processes might implement this function) is often left rather vague. Here we propose a framework for integrating animal affect and decision-making that is couched in modern decision theory and employs an operational definition that aligns with dimensional concepts of core affect and renders animal affect empirically tractable. We develop a model of how core affect, including short-term (emotion-like) and longer-term (mood-like) states, influence decision-making via processes that we label affective options, affective predictions, and affective outcomes and which correspond to similar concepts in schema of the links between human emotion and decision-making. Our framework is generalisable across species and generates questions for future research.

Towards a comparative science of emotion: Affect and consciousness in humans and animals

The componential view of human emotion recognises that affective states comprise conscious, behavioural, physiological, neural and cognitive elements. Although many animals display bodily and behavioural changes consistent with the occurrence of affective states similar to those seen in humans, the question of whether and in which species these are accompanied by conscious experiences remains controversial. Finding scientifically valid methods for investigating markers for the subjective component of affect in both humans and animals is central to developing a comparative understanding of the processes and mechanisms of affect and its evolution and distribution across taxonomic groups, to our understanding of animal welfare, and to the development of animal models of affective disorders. Here, contemporary evidence indicating potential markers of conscious processing in animals is reviewed, with a view to extending this search to include markers of conscious affective processing. We do this by combining animal-focused approaches with investigations of the components of conscious and non-conscious emotional processing in humans, and neuropsychological research into the structure and functions of conscious emotions.

Fear in infancy: Lessons from snakes, spiders, heights, and strangers

This review challenges the traditional interpretation of infants' and young children's responses to three types of potentially "fear-inducing" stimuli-snakes and spiders, heights, and strangers. The traditional account is that these stimuli are the objects of infants' earliest developing fears. We present evidence against the traditional account, and provide an alternative explanation of infants' behaviors toward each stimulus. Specifically, we propose that behaviors typically interpreted as "fearful" really reflect an array of stimulus-specific responses that are highly dependent on context, learning, and the perceptual features of the stimuli. We speculate about why researchers so commonly misinterpret these behaviors, and conclude with future directions for studying the development of fear in infants and young children. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2019 APA, all rights reserved).

Emotion dysregulation as a dynamic process

In this article we adopt the view that emotion dysregulation is characterized by emotion regulation dynamics that are defined as dysfunctional based on contextual criteria. We regard the construct of emotion regulation as valuable because it permits the integration of the classic view of emotions as interfering with human functioning and contemporary views of emotion as adaptive and beneficial. To define patterns that reflect emotion dysregulation, we explain our views of emotion as a dynamic process, and emotion regulation as the bidirectional interplay between emotions and actions/thoughts (extrinsic factors) and the contextual factors that constitute the criteria for that interplay reflecting dysregulation. This conceptualization of emotion regulation and dysregulation leads to methods for studying the intrinsic dynamics of emotion, extrinsic factors that change the intrinsic dynamics of emotion, and how emotion regulation changes over time at multiple time scales. We then apply this thinking to several emotion dysregulation patterns. Emotion regulation is a complex construct, embracing emotion as regulator and as regulated, as self- and other-regulated, and as incorporating both top-down and bottom-up regulatory processes. We highlight an emerging line of research on the development of emotion regulation in early childhood and indicate how this work can inform understanding of emotion dysregulation and the emergence of psychopathology.

A Model for Basic Emotions Using Observations of Behavior in Drosophila

Emotion plays a crucial role, both in general human experience and in psychiatric illnesses. Despite the importance of emotion, the relative lack of objective methodologies to scientifically studying emotional phenomena limits our current understanding and thereby calls for the development of novel methodologies, such us the study of illustrative animal models. Analysis of Drosophila and other insects has unlocked new opportunities to elucidate the behavioral phenotypes of fundamentally emotional phenomena. Here we propose an integrative model of basic emotions based on observations of this animal model. The basic emotions are internal states that are modulated by neuromodulators, and these internal states are externally expressed as certain stereotypical behaviors, such as instinct, which is proposed as ancient mechanisms of survival. There are four kinds of basic emotions: happiness, sadness, fear, and anger, which are differentially associated with three core affects: reward (happiness), punishment (sadness), and stress (fear and anger). These core affects are analogous to the three primary colors (red, yellow, and blue) in that they are combined in various proportions to result in more complex “higher order” emotions, such as love and aesthetic emotion. We refer to our proposed model of emotions as called the “Three Primary Color Model of Basic Emotions.”

Do Not Neglect the Body and Action: The Emergence of Embodiment Approaches to Understanding Human Development

It is becoming clear that to truly understand what it is to be human, focusing scientific efforts on the mind alone is insufficient. We are embodied minds, living and acting in a world full of meaningful things. In this article, we discuss how science has been informed by important research insights into the close relationship between the body, the mind, and the world. These interactions can be translated into embodied perspectives of human development. We provide evidence that perception, cognition, emotion, human relations, and behavior are grounded in our bodies from the beginning of our lives. From this perspective, the body cannot be assumed to be simply an effector for cognition or an instrument for collecting information for the brain. This comprehensive review and debate of embodied-related literature is accompanied by the identification of theoretical challenges and practical applications that will shape research for years to come.

Historical pitfalls and new directions in the neuroscience of emotion

In this article, we offer a brief history summarizing the last century of neuroscientific study of emotion, highlighting dominant themes that run through various schools of thought. We then summarize the current state of the field, followed by six key points for scientific progress that are inspired by a multi-level constructivist theory of emotion.

A film set for the elicitation of emotion in research: A comprehensive catalog derived from four decades of investigation

Emotions are highly influential to many psychological processes. Indeed, research employing emotional stimuli is rapidly escalating across the field of psychology. However, challenges remain regarding discrete evocation of frequently co-elicited emotions such as amusement and happiness, or anger and disgust. Further, as much contemporary work in emotion employs college students, we sought to additionally evaluate the efficacy of film clips to discretely elicit these more challenging emotions in a young adult population using an online medium. The internet is an important tool for investigating responses to emotional stimuli, but validations of emotionally evocative film clips across laboratory and web-based settings are limited in the literature. An additional obstacle is identifying stimuli amidst the numerous film clip validation studies. During our investigation, we recognized the lack of a categorical database to facilitate rapid identification of useful film clips for individual researchers' unique investigations. Consequently, here we also sought to produce the first compilation of such stimuli into an accessible and comprehensive catalog. We based our catalog upon prior work as well as our own, and identified 24 articles and 295 film clips from four decades of research. We present information on the validation of these clips in addition to our own research validating six clips using online administration settings. The results of our search in the literature and our own study are presented in tables designed to facilitate and improve a selection of highly valid film stimuli for future research.

Music Communicates Affects, Not Basic Emotions - A Constructionist Account of Attribution of Emotional Meanings to Music

Basic Emotion theory has had a tremendous influence on the affective sciences, including music psychology, where most researchers have assumed that music expressivity is constrained to a limited set of basic emotions. Several scholars suggested that these constrains to musical expressivity are explained by the existence of a shared acoustic code to the expression of emotions in music and speech prosody. In this article we advocate for a shift from this focus on basic emotions to a constructionist account. This approach proposes that the phenomenon of perception of emotions in music arises from the interaction of music's ability to express core affects and the influence of top-down and contextual information in the listener's mind. We start by reviewing the problems with the concept of Basic Emotions, and the inconsistent evidence that supports it. We also demonstrate how decades of developmental and cross-cultural research on music and emotional speech have failed to produce convincing findings to conclude that music expressivity is built upon a set of biologically pre-determined basic emotions. We then examine the cue-emotion consistencies between music and speech, and show how they support a parsimonious explanation, where musical expressivity is grounded on two dimensions of core affect (arousal and valence). Next, we explain how the fact that listeners reliably identify basic emotions in music does not arise from the existence of categorical boundaries in the stimuli, but from processes that facilitate categorical perception, such as using stereotyped stimuli and close-ended response formats, psychological processes of construction of mental prototypes, and contextual information. Finally, we outline our proposal of a constructionist account of perception of emotions in music, and spell out the ways in which this approach is able to make solve past conflicting findings. We conclude by providing explicit pointers about the methodological choices that will be vital to move beyond the popular Basic Emotion paradigm and start untangling the emergence of emotional experiences with music in the actual contexts in which they occur.

Embodied Cognition and the Direct Induction of Affect as a Compliment to Cognitive Behavioural Therapy

We make the case for the possible integration of affect experience induced via embodiment techniques with CBT for the treatment of emotional disorders in clinical settings. Theoretically we propose a possible integration of cognitive behavioural theory, neuroscience, embodied cognition and important processes of client change outcomes such as the therapeutic alliance to enhance client outcomes. We draw from evidence of bidirectional effects between embodiment modes of bottom-up (sensory-motor simulations giving rise to important basis of knowledge) and top-down (abstract mental representations of knowledge) processes such as CBT in psychotherapy. The paper first describes the dominance and success of CBT for the treatment of a wide range of clinical disorders. Some limitations of CBT, particularly for depression are also outlined. There is a growing body of evidence for the added value of experiential affect-focused interventions combined with CBT. Evidence for the embodied model of cognition and emotion is reviewed. Advantages of embodiment is highlighted as a complimentary process model to deepen the intensity and valence of affective experience. It is suggested that an integrated embodiment approach with CBT enhances outcomes across a wide range of emotional disorders. A description of our embodiment method integrated with CBT for inducing affective experience, emotional regulation, acceptance of unwanted emotions and emotional mastery is given. Finally, the paper highlights the importance of the therapeutic alliance as a critical component of the change process. The paper ends with a case study highlighting some clinical strategies that may aid the therapist to integrate embodiment techniques in CBT that can further explore in future research on affective experience in CBT for a wider range of clinical disorders.

On the Communicative Function of Body Odors

Humans use multiple senses to navigate the social world, and the sense of smell is arguably the most underestimated one. An intriguing aspect of the sense of smell is its social communicative function. Research has shown that human odors convey information about a range of states (e.g., emotions, sickness) and traits (e.g., individuality, gender). Yet, what underlies the communicability of these states and traits via smell? We fill this explanatory gap with a framework that highlights the dynamic and flexible aspects of human olfactory communication. In particular, we explain how chemical profiles, associative learning (i.e., the systematic co-occurrence of chemical profiles with state- or trait-related information), and top-down contextual influences could interact to shape human odor perception. Our model not only helps to integrate past research on human olfactory communication but it also opens new avenues for future research on this fascinating, yet to date poorly understood, field.