There are different theories exists regarding how and why people experience emotion. One beauty of psychology is that there is multiple perspectives available in any phenomena of psychology, which add diversity of knowledge. Emotion well has multiple theories.
There is common sense in layman people that we experience emotion and then we see changes in our physiological, behavior and cognitive changes. Partially it’s true but different psychologist believe in another way around. Whatever the perspective is to experience emotion, there first and foremost should be emotion generating stimulus.
In general we experience emotion in three different ways.
James-Lange Theory
The James-Lange theory of emotion was proposed by psychologists William James and Carl Lange independently.
They believe that as we experience different events, our nervous system develops reactions to these events and then we feel emtoion. The reaction differs according to stimulus. Heart rate, trembling, upset stomach, change in facial expression are some example. These physical reactions in turn create emotional reactions such as anger, fear and happy. For example lets imagine we are in Jungle walk, suddenly we heard a sound of animals. Our heart rate increases and we start to tremble. We then interpret these physical responses as you are scared and then we experience fear.
“I am afraid because my heart is beating”
Cannon-Bard theory
The Cannon-Bard theory of emotion was developed by physiologists Walter Cannon and Philip Bard independently as well. The merge theories are collectively known as Cannon-Bard theory.
According to this theory, we feel the emotions and experience the physiological reactions such as sweating, trembling and muscle tension simultaneously. For example lets imagine we are into a Jungle Walk, suddenly we heard a sound of animals. Our heart rate increases tremble and fears at the same time.
I am trembling and afraid.
Schachter-Singer theory
The Schachter-Singer theory of emotion was collectively developed by Stanley Schachter and Jerome E. Singer.
The Schachter-Singer theory differs from above mention theories. They suggest that when an event causes physiological arousal, we try to find a reason for this arousal. Then we experience and label the emotion. For example lets imagine we are in Jungle Walk, suddenly we heard a sound of animals. Our brain interpret the noise and analyze the noise is of Tiger and then we fear. This theory suggests that we may experience similarly emotion in different occasion and our brain analyze and interpret.
This sound of animals is dangerous which is making me afraid
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