Issue related to Culture and emotion.

There are two Views of Culture and Emotion:

Universality Emotions are part of human nature and in all cultures universally the same set of basic emotions. Based on his cross-cultural research, Ekman (1999) has found six emotions which are universally recognized and applicable. They are as follows.

1. Anger

2. Fear 3. Sadness 4. Happiness 5. Disgust 6. Surprise 1. Anger:- It is an emotional state that may range from minor irritation to intense rage. The physical effects of anger include increased heart rate, blood pressure, and levels of adrenaline and noradrenaline. Some view anger as part of the fight or flight brain response to the perceived threat of pain. Anger becomes the predominant feeling behaviorally, cognitively and physiologically when a person makes the conscious choice to take action to immediately stop the threatening behavior of another outside force. The English term originally comes from the term angr of Old Norse language. Anger can lead to many things physically and mentally. 2. Fear :- It is an emotional response to threats and danger. It is a basic survival mechanism occurring in response to a specific stimulus, such as pain or the threat of pain. Psychologists John B. Watson, Robert Plutchik, and Paul Ekman have suggested that fear is one of a small set of basic or innate emotions. This set also includes such emotions as joy, sadness, and anger. Fear should be distinguished from the related emotional state of anxiety, which typically occurs without any external threat. Additionally, fear is related to the specific behaviors of escape and avoidance, whereas anxiety is the result of threats which are perceived to be uncontrollable or unavoidable. 3. Sadness:- It is an emotion characterized by feelings of disadvantage, loss, and helplessness. When sad, people often become quiet, less energetic, and withdrawn. Sadness is considered to be the opposite of happiness, and is similar to the emotions of sorrow, grief, misery, and melancholy. The philosopher Baruch Spinoza defined sadness as the "transfer of a person from a large perfection to a smaller one." Sadness can be viewed as a temporary lowering of mood, whereas depression is characterized by a persistent and intense lowered mood, as well as disruption to one's ability to function in day to day matters. 4. Happiness:- It is a state of mind or feeling such as contentment, satisfaction, pleasure, or joy. A variety of philosophical, religious, psychological and biological approaches have been taken to defining happiness and identifying its sources. Philosophers and religious thinkers have often defined happiness in terms of living a good life, or flourishing, rather than simply as an emotion. Happiness in this older sense was used to translate the Greek Eudaimonia, and is still used in virtue ethics. In everyday speech today, however, terms such as well-beingor quality of life are usually used to signify the classical meaning, and happiness is reserved for the felt experience or experiences that philosophers historically called pleasure. 5. Disgust:- It is an emotion that is typically associated with things that are perceived as unclean, inedible, infectious, or in some way offending. For example; "I am disgusted with the hurtful things that you are saying." or "I am disgusted with your behavior." In The Expression of the Emotions in Man and Animals, Charles Darwin wrote that disgust refers to something revolting. Disgust is experienced primarily in relation to the sense of taste (either perceived or imagined), and secondarily to anything which causes a similar feeling by sense of smell, touch, or vision. Disgust is one of the basic emotions of Robert Plutchik's theory of emotions. It invokes a characteristic facial expression, one of Paul Ekman's six universal facial expressions of emotion. Unlike the emotions of fear, anger, and sadness, disgust is associated with a decrease in heart rate Disgust may be further subdivided into physical disgust, associated with physical or metaphorical uncleanliness, and moral disgust, a similar feeling related to courses of action. 6. Surprise:- It is a brief emotional state that is the result of experiencing an unexpected relevant event. Surprise can have any valence; that is, it can be neutral, pleasant, or unpleasant accordingly, some would not categorize surprise in itself as an emotion. Surprise is expressed in the face by the following features: * Eyebrows that are raised so they become curved and high. * Stretched skin below the eyebrows. * Horizontal wrinkles across the forehead. * Open eyelids: the upper lid is raised and the lower lid is drawn down, often exposing the white sclera above and below the iris. * Dropped jaw so that the lips and teeth are parted, with no tension around the mouth. Spontaneous, involuntary surprise is often expressed for only a fraction of a second. It may be followed immediately by the emotion of fear, joy or confusion. The intensity of the surprise is associated with how much the jaw drops, but the mouth may not open at all in some cases. The raising of the eyebrows, at least momentarily, is the most distinctive and predictable sign of surprise. Cultural specificity - Human beings are like a tabula rasa (clean tablet) on which society writes its script. In other words, culture and traditions, normative patterns and value orientations are responsible for not only our personality development, but also appropriate social and emotional development. This makes us functional entities in society. Each culture has a unique set of emotions and emotional responses; the emotions shown in a particular culture reflects the norms, values, practices, and language of that culture . Alexithymia - emotional disorderSome people have difficulty in expressing their emotions and understanding the emotions of others. Psychologists call this alexithymia. People who suffer from alexithymia rarely cry and are often seen by others as bland and cold. Their own feelings make them uncomfortable, and they are not able to discriminate among their different emotions. People, suffering from alexithymia, may be effective performers in jobs where little or no emotional labor. Alexithymic symptoms may be seen in people who experience: 1. Posttraumatic stress disorder 2. Certain brain injuries 3. Eating disorders (i.e., bulimia, anorexia, or binge-eating disorder) 4. Substance use dependence 5. Depression 6. Other mental health conditions Relationship of gender with emotion A number of research findings supports the view that women are more emotional than men (e.g., Broverman, Vogel, Broverman, Clarkson, & Rosenkrantz, 1972; Widiger & Settle, 1987). Women are assumed to experience more frequent and intense emotions, whereas men are assumed to be emotionally inexpressive and to have less intense emotional experiences. However, researchers have argued that the stereotype of men as unemotional is more accurate for adult targets than for child targets because males learn to control their emotions as they get older (Fabes and Martin, 1991). Likewise, women and men may experience happiness in a similar way, but women have been taught that they can strongly express the emotion of happiness, whereas men have been taught to control it. The impact of socialization practices accumulate over time, and, thus, these stereotypes are likely to apply more strongly to adult populations (Geer and Shields, 1996). By Rahul Shah

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