Expression of Emotions – History and characteristics

Emotion is a global experienceaffective and all-encompassing, pleasant or unpleasant, which supposes a characteristic phenomenological quality and which involves three response systems: cognitive-subjective, behavioral-expressive and physiological-adaptive”: cognitive-subjective, behavioral-expressive, physiological-adaptive. With expression of emotions in animals and in man (Darwin, 1872), the study of emotions acquires a scientific dimension.

Expression of Emotions

The expression of emotions would correspond to one of the behavioral-expressive dimension. Any psychological process entails an emotional experience of greater or lesser intensity and of different hedonic quality. Emotion is an experience omnipresent in every psychological process. Like the rest of the dimensions of emotional experience, the behavioral-expressive dimension has a clear functional value. We can highlight the following functions:

1. It is a vehicle of communication to other people about the emotion that is being experienced, which allows us to predict to a certain extent the behaviors that will be most likely of the subject. It is the most important way of non-verbal communication.
2. It allows a certain degree of control of the behavior of others, since it serves as a discriminative stimulus (DI) of the appropriate responses in that situation on the part of others. Different emotional experiences will cause the subject who suffers from them to react differently to the behaviors of others, issuing different contingencies of reinforcement, punishment, or lack thereof, in a consistent manner.
3. The expression facilitates and increases said affective experience, making it more salient and even the functions it performs are carried out more effectively. Going back to James-Lange’s classic, expressing anger will make us feel even more furious, while laughing can be a good exercise to enhance good humor.
4. Furthermore, the manifestation of emotion optimizes the function of the affective reaction. The expression of anger itself, for example, mobilizes physiological and psychological resources to enhance an aggressive or defensive response so that it is executed with greater intensity and efficiency.

Historical-Conceptual Aspects

For Darwin, the external manifestations of affective reactions and the ability to recognize them are innate abilities. According to Darwin, the laws that explain the expression of emotions have a tangential relationship with the principle of natural selection and are the following:

1. Associated useful habits, habits that are useful to satisfy desires, eliminate unpleasant sensations… become so common that they occur in situations that do not require such a response pattern. These acquired habits can be inherited. Thus, certain moods will lead to habitual motor actions that may have been useful at the beginning, but do not have to be useful now.
2. Antithesis. If the habit is consolidated, when a mood appears that is contrary to the one generated by that behavioral pattern, the opposite motor response will be produced, even if it is of no use.
3. Direct action of the nervous system. A nervous force, in situations of great excitement, can give rise to expressive movements. The neural discharge can directly affect the expressive musculature associated with a particular emotion, the direction of the neuronal discharge is determined by the structure of the nervous system, independently of the habit, but the expressive actions depend on it: the nervous force is directed especially by the channels that have usually been used. This idea represents a precursor to the theories of Izard and Tomkins that there are innate subcortical programs for the expression of each of the basic emotions. It is a hydraulic conception: it assumes the existence of energy that accumulates and must be transmitted through the channels established for it. The frequent performance of habits establishes preferential channels for the release of nervous force.

The expression of emotions is phylogenetically derived from certain response patterns present in other animals and has the functional value of preparing for action, as well as communicating to other individuals the possible consequences of emotional reactions.

For Darwinas for the current Ekmaneither Izard, emotional expressive response patterns are innate and there are genetic programs that determine the form of the reaction to each emotional experience. Learning can determine whether or not a motor action occurs in certain situations, modifying the expressive response pattern.

Some innate expressions need practice before they can be performed correctly. Usually what is innate is the program that determines the emotional response, but this cannot occur if there is no necessary training or learning.

Certain expressive patterns can be used for a purpose other than the actions from which they come phylogenetically.

This is what happens with the “communication signals”, gestures used in relationships with other individuals, which do not have the meaning of specifically expressing any emotional reaction, but rather are gestures that serve to emphasize certain aspects of communication. One of the common methodological problems presented by numerous works that defend universality in the recognition of the facial expression of emotions is the fact that the format of the questions posed is closed (fixed response format) which conditions the type of answer that is going to be given.

Facial Expression and Emotional Reaction

In the somatosensory cortex The body surface is represented and the cortical extension corresponding to each area varies depending on the precision in perception (larger cortical areas indicate greater sensitivity than smaller ones). Likewise, all areas of the body are also represented in a similar way in the motor cortex. The graphic representation of both are the Penfield homunculi. In humans, it is the hands and the face that show a greater cortical overrepresentation, both in the sensory and motor areas, which indicates that the face is one of the parts of the body where perception is finer and its motor control more accurate. The nerves Most relevant involved in facial expression are:

1. He thirtieth (fifth cranial nerve) is the main general sensory cranial, responsible for the innervation of the lower face and the functions of chewing and jaw movement. It conducts sensations of pain, temperature, touch, and proprioception from deep regions of the face. The main motor functions are chewing, swallowing, articulation, movements of the soft palate, tympanic membrane and ear ossicles. It has three main branches: ophthalmic, maxillary and mandibular nerves.
2. Facial (seventh cranial nerve). Its special function is to produce characteristic gestures for expression and communication. It is divided into two large branches: – cervicofacial branch (subdivided into buccal, mandibular and cervical) responsible for the lower part of the face and receives all information from the contralateral hemisphere – temporofacial branch (subdivided into temporal and zygomatic) innervates the upper part of the face and receives information from both cerebral hemispheres. In both cases, the left tracts are independent of the right ones. The areas innervated completely by the contralateral hemisphere they can function independently of the symmetrical area (asymmetrical movements can be performed more accurately in the lower than in the upper part of the face).

Their muscles make finer and more controlled movements, the cortical representation is much greater. The cortical representation, both sensory and motor, of the face is greater than that of any other part of the body. While in those that are innervated both contralaterally and ipsilaterally, the movements of symmetrical areas are not independent (except in the hands). According to the musculature, The activity of facial muscles is the main variable in the expression of emotions; Over time, wrinkles occur that can affect expression recognition.

Of all the muscles involved, two are worth highlighting:

• he zygomatica muscle that inserts into the malar and stretches the corner of the mouth towards the cheeks, the activity of the zygomaticus is related to pleasant emotional experiences
• he corrugator, located above the eyebrows and responsible for their movement. corrugator activity are with unpleasant experiences.

This article is merely informative, at Psychology-Online we do not have the power to make a diagnosis or recommend a treatment. We invite you to go to a psychologist to treat your particular case.

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