Chapter 7

THE EMOTIONS

What are the emotions? (cont.)

Of the different phenomena in our lives, we are most amazed by those that are the result of the swift changes between the two main modes of activation of our life systems - the automatic mode and the voluntary mode. The way our respiration is regulated is a good example of this: usually our breathing is automatic and out of the focus of awareness.

Most of the time we do not pay it more than passing attention. Sometimes we pay attention to the sensations that result from the automatic functioning of the respiratory processes. Only on special occasions and mostly for very short periods of time, do we exercise a limited amount of will power over the different characteristics of the breathing process-stopping it, deepening it, regulating it, etc.

The relations between the emotional processes, and the automatic versus the non-automatic mode, are not static. In infancy and in early childhood, the influence of the automatic innate mode is overwhelmingly dominant, and more so with regard to the emotional processes.

During growing and maturation, new components join and integrate with the original ones (and with acquired ones that joined the original ones before them). Part of these new components tend more to the automatic mode but a growing part involves awareness and will. In young adults, the components involving will and awareness have already reached dominance in daily behavior.

In the system of mature adults, most of the subjective experience of emotion and nearly all its verbal and nonverbal expressions are subject to the supervision of the "advanced" non-automatic processes and programs. Very often, especially with intensities that are not extremely high or low, the influence of the "mature and advanced" components is decisive.

It is heredity itself that decides, during each level of maturation and experience, which processes can be released from the absolute control of the innate (and acquired) routines of the automatic mode of operation. Usually, even will combined with focused awareness, cannot claim the right to access (and thereby directly influence) basic maintenance processes.

The short indirect influence we can have on the basic chemistry of the body (like that of the hormones), and on basic maintenance functions (like breathing and digesting), are "the exceptions that prove the rule". In most of these processes the direct influence of the average person is negligible.

In some of the processes that "change their affinity and loyalty", heredity itself is responsible for their extraction from the automatic mode. This is mainly "the fate" of the processes that are responsible for purposeful behavior, that manage the satisfaction of needs and desires directly or closely pertinent to them. For instance, grownups usually refrain from crying as opposed to babies and very young children. Instead, when circumstance allow it, they try to do something.

For many of the other ex-tractable processes, the extracting itself and the measure of extraction from the automatic mode are due to many influences. The most common influences are those resulting from education, learning, and socialization (11).

For instance, as a result of learning, informal influences and socialization pressures - differently applied to male and female - the sexes do not react in the same way when in intense pain or sorrow. In these circumstances, the overwhelming majority of adult males do not cry, while for females, the opposite is true. Because of this difference in socialization, there is rarely an adult female who will never cry, but within the male population there are many who will not, or cannot, even when willing.

Usually, following this in the same trend, any serious discussion of emotion as a main subject arouses automatic opposition: "what can really be known about emotion that is valuable" or "this is not the most important thing". However, the subsystem of emotions is the most important component of the brain and mind of mammals (animals who suckle their young). Moreover, the higher a species of this family is on the of evolutionary scale, the more central and essential is its emotional system.

In contradiction to the assumptions of most modern people, and the wishful thinking of those biased towards rational thinking, the emotional system is more of "the humane in the animal" than "the animal in man". It seems that it is more appropriate to call the human beings of our time "Homo Emotionalis" than Homo Sapiens".

Even at birth, the function of emotions differs entirely from that of the reflexes* - which are the basic (and nearly automatic) mode of operation in creatures which are "lower" on the evolutionary scale (like insects etc.).

*The reflex arc is activated automatically whenever a specific stimulus is applied to the right receptor of a creature with enough intensity. In man, one of the small number of reflexes active even in grownups is that which makes the eye blink when objects approach swiftly; another is the one that causes the lower part of the leg to jump when the neurologist taps below the knee.

Even at the very beginning of life, when the emotional processes are activated nearly automatically, they differ widely from the reflexes. We can see, even at this early stage, that the relationship between stimuli and responses is not on a one to one basis. Even at this early stage, it is not the case that a certain stimulus, and only it, causes a certain response. From the beginning, a few stimuli can, together or each by itself, cause a certain individual response or a group of responses.

For instance, even when the newborn baby is only a few hours old, different patterns of strong stimuli like loud noise, intense light or an unexpected and swift change in the position of the body, cause a complex pattern of responses of the "classic" or innate fear. This pattern includes various components such as facial expression, typical voices, quickening of the pulse rate and increase in blood pressure.

top | chapter 7 cont. | table of contents | definitions |