Emotion and Rationality: A Critical Review and Interpretation of Empirical Evidence

2007 ◽  
Vol 11 (2) ◽  
pp. 155-178 ◽  
Author(s):  
Michel Tuan Pham
Keyword(s):  
Empirical Evidence ◽  
Risk Taking ◽  
Critical Review ◽  
Emotional Responses ◽  
Self Control ◽  
Reference Dependence ◽  
Emotional States ◽  
Design Features ◽  
Increase Risk ◽  
Affective System

The relation between emotion and rationality is assessed by reviewing empirical findings from multiple disciplines. Two types of emotional phenomena are examined—incidental emotional states and integral emotional responses—and three conceptions of rationality are considered—logical, material, and ecological. Emotional states influence reasoning processes, are often misattributed to focal objects, distort beliefs in an assimilative fashion, disrupt self-control when intensely negative, but do not necessarily increase risk-taking. Integral emotional responses are often used as proxies for values, and valuations based on these responses exhibit distinct properties: efficiency, consistency, polarization, myopia, scale- insensitivity, and reference-dependence. Emotions seem to promote social and moral behavior. Conjectures about the design features of the affective system that give rise to seeming sources of rationality or irrationality are proposed. It is concluded that any categorical statement about the overall rationality or irrationality of emotion would be misleading.

Changes in Emotional States Before and After Risk Taking in Scuba Diving

2008 ◽  
Vol 2 (1) ◽  
pp. 25-40 ◽  
Author(s):  
Agnès Bonnet ◽  
Lydia Fernandez ◽  
Annie Piolat ◽  
Jean-Louis Pedinielli
Keyword(s):  
Risk Taking ◽  
Perceived Risk ◽  
Cognitive Process ◽  
Emotional Responses ◽  
Scuba Diving ◽  
Emotional States ◽  
Diving Accident ◽  
Risk Appraisal ◽  
Before And After ◽  
Risk Takers

The notion of risk-taking implies a cognitive process that determines the level of risk involved in a particular activity or task. This risk appraisal process gives rise to emotional responses, including anxious arousal and changes in mood, which may play a significant role in risk-related decision making. This study examines how emotional responses to the perceived risk of a scuba-diving injury contribute to divers’ behavior, as well as the ways that risk taking or non-risk taking behavior, in turn, affects emotional states. The study sample consisted of 131 divers (risk takers and non-risk takers), who either had or had not been in a previous diving accident. Divers’ emotional states were assessed immediately prior to diving, as well as immediately following a dive. Results indicated presence of subjective emotional experiences that are specific to whether a risk has been perceived and whether a risk has been taken. Important differences in emotion regulation were also found between divers who typically take risks and those who do not.

scholarly journals Age Differences in Discrete Emotional States During Risk Taking

2020 ◽  
Vol 4 (Supplement_1) ◽  
pp. 557-557
Author(s):  
Nathaniel Young ◽  
Joseph Mikels
Keyword(s):  
Older Adults ◽  
Age Differences ◽  
Risk Taking ◽  
Positive Emotions ◽  
Emotional Experience ◽  
Emotional Responses ◽  
Emotional States ◽  
Younger Adults ◽  
Balloon Analogue Risk Task ◽  
Increased Risk

Abstract Emotions often guide risk-taking. For example, anger tends to lead to increased risk-taking. However, older and younger adults differ in their emotional experiences: older adults tend to report more positive emotions, fewer experiences of anger, and relatively similar or increased experiences of sadness relative to younger adults. As such, differences in emotional experience may manifest in the integral emotional responses of older and younger adults as they take risks. The current work examined the discrete integral emotional responses of older and younger adults as they completed the Balloon Analogue Risk Task (BART). For the BART, participants completed 40 trials. Prior to each trial, participants reported how much anger, sadness, contentment, and excitement they felt. The results indicate that younger adults experienced more anger and less contentment than older adults in response to the BART. Importantly though, age differences also emerged in how discrete emotions predicted subsequent risk-taking.

Adolescents’ Future Negative Time Perspective and Risk-Taking Behaviors: The Roles of Coping Styles and Self-Control

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Kai Dou ◽  
Ming-Chen Zhang ◽  
Yue Liang
Keyword(s):  
Risk Taking ◽  
Time Perspective ◽  
Longitudinal Design ◽  
Coping Styles ◽  
Future Time Perspective ◽  
Self Control ◽  
Total N ◽  
Negative Coping ◽  
Risk Taking Behaviors ◽  
Negative Time

The association between future time perspective and risk-taking behaviors has received extensive empirical attention. However, the underlying mechanism that links future negative time perspective to risk-taking behaviors are complex and not well-understood. To address this gap, we adopted a longitudinal design examined the association between FNTP and risk-taking behaviors, and the roles of coping styles and self-control in this association among Chinese adolescents (total N = 581, 46.3% females). Results showed that FNTP at wave 1 predicted risk-taking behavior at wave 3 via positive and negative coping styles at wave 2. Furthermore, adolescents with low self-control and used negative coping strategies prefer to engage in risk-taking behaviors as compared to their high self-control counterparts. Taken together, these research findings underscore the importance of considering influence of the future negative time perspective on adolescents’ risk-taking behaviors, and provided important implications for developing the preventions and interventions for reducing adolescents’ risk-taking behaviors.

scholarly journals Recognising the Role of the Emotion of Fear in Offences and Defences

2019 ◽  
Vol 83 (6) ◽  
pp. 450-472
Author(s):  
Susan SM Edwards
Keyword(s):  
Criminal Responsibility ◽  
Self Control ◽  
Mens Rea ◽  
Emotional States ◽  
Loss Of Self ◽  
Human Conduct ◽  
Privileged Status ◽  
Actus Reus ◽  
Male Experience

Anger, its part in human conduct and in crime commission has been much discussed and accorded a privileged status within the law, while the role of fear has been less considered. Notwithstanding, fear and related emotional states have received some recognition as intrinsic elements of the perpetrator’s object integral to the actus reus of certain offences and relevant to the defendant’s mens rea of some defences. The harm caused by deliberately or negligently instilling fear in another is inconsistently considered in law as is its impact on criminal responsibility and mens rea. Fear has been recently acknowledged as a permissible cause of loss of self-control in a partial defence to murder (Coroners and Justice Act 2009 s 55(3)). It remains a contested emotion and as with anger the male experience of what circumstances trigger fear predominates.

scholarly journals Structural Home Environment Effects on Developmental Trajectories of Self-Control and Adolescent Risk Taking

2018 ◽  
Vol 48 (1) ◽  
pp. 43-55 ◽  
Author(s):  
Christopher Holmes ◽  
Alexis Brieant ◽  
Rachel Kahn ◽  
Kirby Deater-Deckard ◽  
Jungmeen Kim-Spoon
Keyword(s):  
Home Environment ◽  
Risk Taking ◽  
Developmental Trajectories ◽  
Self Control ◽  
Environment Effects ◽  
Adolescent Risk
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