Prior to the conceptualization and differentiation between these entities, it will be good to clarify that sensation, emotion and feeling are terms that can be easily confused because, colloquially, they are often used interchangeably, especially the words emotion and feeling.
Sensation
The word sensation (from the Latin sensatio), although it has several meanings, interests us in the meaning that refers to the impression produced by something and that is captured by the senses. In Gestalt Therapy, sensation has to do with the initial contact that is established between the organism and the environment, and are the different types of reactions that we describe in bodily terms, that is, it is the physiological reaction that leaves its mark at the bodily level.
Thought
Thinking (or cognition) is a rational and complex psychological phenomenon that expresses the mental capacity that all human beings have to order, make sense of, and interpret the information available in our mind about perceived reality, and from there create our concepts. Depending on the interpretation or meaning given to the thoughts, they may conceptualize our experience or reality in one way or another, and even activate certain feelings.
Emotion
The word emotion comes from the Latin emotio, which in turn derives from the verb emovere. It has the meanings of moving, removing, as well as disturbance and agitation of the spirit. Emotions are the result of the organism’s evaluation of a situation. Both emotions and all the bodily reactions associated with them serve as the basis for the basic mechanisms of life regulation, that is, they are fundamentally at the service of survival. Emotions are intense and short-lived, they precede the feeling and depend on sensations and perceptions.
For Gestalt Therapy, emotion is:
If you value articles like this, consider supporting us by becoming a Pro subscriber. Subscribers enjoy access to members-only articles, materials, and webinars.
“the immediate and integrative awareness of the relationship between the organism and the environment. (It is the figure in the foreground of various combinations of proprioceptions and perceptions). By immediate consciousness we understand the experientially felt experience of what happens in the interaction between the person and their environment. As such, it is a function of the field.”
Perls, Hefferline and Goodman
“Emotion is a unification, or unifying tendency, of certain physiological tensions with the situations of the environment. It gives, therefore, information about what is already here, and about the objects appropriate to the needs.”
Jean-Marie Robine
The idea introduced by Jean-Marie Robine is important that emotion does not arise simply as a reaction to something, but rather has an intentionality, that is, it seeks the satisfaction of a need.
Feeling
The feeling is a state of mind produced by certain causes (happy and happy, or painful and sad) that impress it.
The feeling arises as a result of an emotion that allows the subject to be aware of their emotional state.
Feeling is the representation and cognitive elaboration of certain experiences such as: emotions, perceptions, the state of the body, memories and thoughts of the state of the body in a reactive process.
.