What is an emotional hangover and how does it influence the way we deal with subsequent situations? Find out the answer.
In this closer Enric, we will address how memories constitute our way of conceiving ourselves in the present. We are not the result of our history, but of our way of saving and codifying it, which is closely related to our emotional states.
In this video, Curro Aguilar shares what emotions are, how they work and how feelings arise. He explains the difference between both processes and some strategies to be able to influence them.
Many times we remember moments or situations without really knowing why. Other times, we do not know that we remember a specific moment until something or someone awakens that memory in us.
What is an emotional hangover?
It’s called an “emotional hangover.” to brain states caused by emotional activity that persists for about 20 to 30 minutes after the experience. These affect the way in which subjects relate to and remember non-emotional events that followed soon after.
The research confirms that there is a kind of emotional inertia that persists after an impact and that influences the memory capacity of subsequent events.
“When a man is in the grip of his emotions, he is not his own master.”
Benedictus of Spinoza
We usually understand by “hangover” the effects that alcohol or another toxic substance leaves on our body in the hours or days after consumption. However, as with these substances, another possible form of hangover is emotional.
certain experiences and emotions they can also leave a remnant in us that we continue to feel long after having lived it.
The impact of emotions
We all experience an unforeseen event at some point, a situation for which we were not prepared and that can provoke very intense emotions fear, anger and sadness, among others.
Once the stimulus is over, the most intense emotions are over, but we are left with an emotional state that lasts until we finally overcome and assume the situation.
These later emotions constitute the emotional hangover and are stored in memory, being able to influence the way in which we face future situations.
The emotional hangover persists over time
Many times we remember moments or situations without really knowing why. Other times, we do not know that we remember a specific moment until something or someone awakens us from that memory.
On other occasions we would like to forget a fact and we can’t and, conversely, we want to remember something and we remain ‘blank’.
Our memory works like a system of neural interconnections that “they have a relationship with our external and internal world”.
Lila Davachi eShe is an Associate Professor in the Department of Psychology at New York University and the Center for Neural Science. She is also the principal investigator of the study featured in the article ‘The emotional states of the brain maintain and improve the formation of future memory‘, published in the journal Nature Neuroscience in December 2016.
The research results indicate that “neural measures of an emotional experience can persist over time and influence how new information is encoded and collected”.
The emotional hangover and the memory of experiences
«How we remember events is not only a consequence of the external world we experience, but is also strongly influenced by our internal states, and these internal states can persist and change future experiences.», explains Davachi in his .
According to the author, “Emotion is a state of mind”and adds that “These findings show that our cognition is highly influenced by past experiences and, specifically, that emotional brain states can persist for long periods of time.”.
“I’ve learned that people will forget what you said, people will forget what you did, but people will never forget how you made them feel.”
Furthermore, the study shows that “even non-emotional experiences that happen immediately after emotional events are remembered better”.
Not only that, but the way we remember the situations we have experienced is strongly influenced by our internal states that remain over time and color future experiences.
Research on emotions and memory
To carry out the investigation, two groups of individuals were taken and they were shown two sets of images.
The first group was first shown a series of images with emotional content, followed by images of ordinary scenes. While the other group watched the non-emotional scenes first followed by the emotional ones.
Six hours later, the subjects were given a memory test on the previously viewed images, which resulted in a clear relationship between memory and emotional charge since “subjects who were exposed to the evocative stimuli first had better long-term recall”.
Participants were monitored to measure physiological arousal, skin conductance, and brain activity. That is, to obtain specific data from that the emotional impact had existed and that it remained latent until about 30 minutes after it happened.
Emotions and BioneuroemotionⓇ
From the we suggest that emotion is a link that allows us to enter the maze of our lives. Through the emotions lived we can dive into our experience and reinterpret specific situations to achieve emotional well-being.
We could say that without emotion there is no experience, there is no experimentation, there is no memory; emotion relates our unconscious to the conscious, unites both aspects of the psyche; in the field of time, it unites the past with the present and impels us to experience the future.
“The responsibility of my actions will live as long as their consequences live.”
Alvaro Obregon
TheThey are a mechanism of adaptation to the environment, against which we generally react unconsciously and automatically. Understanding that our emotional interpretation conditions our past, present and future is essential to regain control of our well-being.
Becoming aware of our emotions implies knowing and being responsible for how we relate to the world. At the same time, it allows us to evolve as individuals.
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