Evolutionary Psychology - Essay Example

Emotions and Behavior According to Haselton and Ketelaar (2005), “emotions affect the way that we think and behave in a variety of personal and social contexts” (p. 3). Evolutionary psychology tends to support the position of Haselton and Ketelaar by insisting that emotions play a significant role in shaping the behavior of individuals. According to Baumeister, DeWall, Vohs and Alquist (2007), the study of emotions, thoughts and feelings are justified in psychology since they provide a basis for the understanding of human behavior (p.2). There are two theories that attempt to draw a relationship between human behavior and emotions. The first theory, the standard theory, holds that behavior is a direct consequence of emotions. According to this theory, the evolving function and purpose of emotions elicit certain behavior (Baumeister et. al., 2007).For instance, a child might decide to be ill-tempered because he is angry or fear causes a child to run. In this situation, the grumpy behavior is as a result of the angry emotions. The second theory that tries to establish a relationship between emotions and behavior states that conscious emotion comes after behavior (Baumeister et al., 2007).This implies that emotion operates a system of inner feedback, which stimulates one to reflect on the behavior’s consequences. It, therefore, holds that emotion indirectly influences behavior. For instance, a child will desist from stealing from the parent because they know that they will feel guilty afterwards. Of the two theories, the first one holds a lot of water. This explains why it is widely accepted within psychology. Other than the wide acceptance, the first theory is superior to the second one since it reaps from the benefits of parsimony and tradition. The second theory should only be applicable if the first one is inadequate given the available evidence (Baumeister et. al., 2007). For all the accolades and support of the direct causation theory, it has received its fair share of criticism. The comparison of the two theories confirms that emotions affect human behavior. The incentive of performance is carried in the emotion. It is important to understand the chain of events that lead to behavior as a result of emotions. Outcomes and actions will arouse an emotion. The elicited emotion will consequently inspire reappraisal, cognitive processing and simulations. These three will collectively act on creation of behavior. According to Malfaz and Salichs (2004), emotion plays an integral role in shaping the social interaction and human behavior (p. 1). Emotions have the effect of blocking perception in certain instances. When these perceptions are blocked, stimuli cannot be transmitted thus leading to certain behavior. According to Clore, Schwarz and Conway (2007), “emotions affect the way that we think and behave in a variety of personal and social contexts” (Clore & Conway, 2007). The evolutionary approaches to behavior and emotions are useful in drawing a relationship between two. Theoretical approaches assume emotions to be superordinate cognitive processes that harmonize opinions and behaviors in order to respond to specific adaptive challenges. These theories help to describe emotions as commitment devices. The super ordinate coordination theory is one of the evolutionary theories that help explain emotions in the context of human behavior. According to Haselton and Ketelaar (2005), emotions orchestrate the systems of perception, goal pursuit, attention, and energy (p.5). This eventually leads to activation of decision weighting thus regulating behavior. The two evolutionary theories that tend to construct a relationship between behavior and emotions focus on mating and fear. The first evolutionary theory fear illustrates the close connection between emotions and behavior. These theories tend to explain that emotions show an adaptive fit in relation to the situations that stimulate them because they tend to lead to adaptive outcomes ancestrally (Haselton and Ketelaar, 2005). Due to the fear one has after hearing chuckles from a bush in the darkness, they are able to do certain protective responses such as flight. In this case, fear is the emotion while the response, flight, is the behavior. This explains that most human races exist because fear prompted their ancestors to assume certain protective behaviors thus enabling them to pass their genes. The behaviors such as fighting, hiding, or flight are because of the fear in the ancestors (Haselton and Ketelaar, 2005). Mating is the other aspect of evolutionary theories that explain emotions with respect to behavior. Sexual desire refers to the emotional disposition that enables one to enter the activity of seeking a sexual partner. Mating is, therefore, a behavior that comes after the emotion of sexual desire. Loewenstein, Weber, Hsee, and Welch (2001) claimed, “The idea that emotions exert a direct and powerful influence on behavior receives ample support in the psychological literature” (p. 272). The evidence of the destructive and self-destructive behavior that people exhibited due to emotion is overwhelming. However, this has grown into a stereotype that emotions lead to irrational behavior. In psychology, such self-defeating behaviors have been credited to emotional distress (Baumeister & Scher, 1988). The theories that revolve around the self-defeating behavior and the impact of emotions of such conduct have helped clarify that emotion does not always lead to constructive behavior. For instance, studies have revealed that people who experience rejection and social exclusion tend to exhibit aggressive behavior (Baumeister et. al., 2007).In this instance, the emotional distress directly causes the aggressive behavior. While the above literature and theories tend to state that emotions directly influence behavior, other researchers tend to disagree. For instance, Baumeister et. al. (2007) concluded that emotions have an impact on the cognition of humans rather than their behavior. The outcome was counterproductive and below optimal in the few instances that emotion actually affected behavior. There is enough evidence to support the fact that behavior is not exclusively the result of emotions. In comparing previous research findings at the prestigious and competitive Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, Baumeister et al. finds various gaps. Only 17% of the articles in the journal showed that there was a meaningful relationship between emotion and behavior (Baumeister et al., 2007). The fact that this journal is dedicated to these areas of psychological study draws a lot of questions on the validity of claims that emotion influences behavior. While these studies failed to compute the relationship between emotions and behavior, none disputed the existence of such link. According to Baumeister et al. (2007), Isen (1984, 1987) come close to discussing the ambiguity between emotions and behavior (p. 11). In her explanation of the effects of negative emotions on behavior, Isen gave two possible scenarios. In the first instance, she explained that emotion leads to one acting in a specific way i.e. direct causation. In the second case, an upset individual can behave in a certain way with the expectation that their emotional state will change due to their action; mood regulation. Mood regulation tends to explain why some depressed people drink alcohol with the hope of getting better after the drink. The difficulty in separating these two means that studying negative emotions is often marred with inconsistencies and ambiguity. This does not mean that negative emotion studies have been abolished for the positive emotions. The Mood-Freezing Pill is the ingenious method that was crafted to solve the inadequacies in the interpretation between direct causation and mood regulation in negative emotions. The mood-freezing pill analogy by Manucia, Baumann, and Cialdini (1984)insists that one’s emotional disposition should be constant regardless of the changes that happen within a particular period(Baumeister et. al., 2007). For instance, say sadness causes people to offer a helping hand to others. However, the sad only help other because they believe that this will help cheer them up. In the event that they take the mood-freeze pill, they will realize that helping the other or leaving them alone will cheer them up. The mood-freeze pill is, therefore, a theory that tends to emphasize the notion that emotion does not directly lead to behavior. People only help because they intend to get the feeling of satisfaction or escape from their own sadness (Baumeister et al., 2007). The same applies to the aggressive behavior of angry people. Angry people only act aggressively because they believe that their behavior will change their emotional state. In this case, it describes the emotion as the outcome of a behavior rather than its direct causative agent. Despite the significant role played by the emotions in determining and influencing human behavior, it is inaccurate to discard the other factors that shape behavior. The studies on the two psychological areas have yielded mixed findings with none empirically proven. While some suggest that the behavior is a consequence of emotions, others view emotions as feedbacks that come in the aftermath of behavior. Despite the numerous theories, the feedback approach to integrating emotion holds more water than the direct causation theory i.e. behavior pursues emotion (Baumeister et. al., 2007). Environmental influences and biological factors play a vital role in determining the human behavior. The paradox of emotions is a major stumbling block in ascertaining the extent of its relationship with behavior. References Baumeister, R. F., & Scher, S. J. (1988). Self-defeating behavior patterns among normal individuals: Review and analysis of common self-destructive tendencies. Psychological Bulletin, 104, 3-22. Baumeister, R.F., Vohs, K.D., DeWall, C.N., &Alquist, L. (2007). Does Emotion Cause Behavior: Apart from Making People Do Stupid, Destructive Things, pp. 1-30. Haselton, M.G., & Ketelaar, T. (2005). Irrational Emotions or Emotional Wisdom: The Evolutionary Psychology of Emotions and Behavior. Evolutionary Psychology of Emotions, 2 (1-21). Loewenstein, G. F., Weber, E. U., Hsee, C. K., & Welch, N. (2001). Risk as feelings.Psychological Bulletin, 127, 267-286. Schwarz, N., & Clore, G.L. (2007).Feelings and phenomenal experiences. In E.T. Higgins & A. Kruglanski (Eds.), Social psychology: Handbook of basic principles (2nd Edition), pp. 385-407. New York: Guilford. Malfaz, M. and Salichs, M.A. (2004). A new architecture for autonomous robots based on emotions. IFAC Symposium on Intelligent Autonomous Vehicles. Lisbon. Read More