style="font-size:15px;"> – negative emotions (such as anger and fear) arouse automatic nervous responses by pumping extra adrenalin into our system
– positive emotions (such as happiness and contentment) seem to do the opposite.
The latter can ‘undo’ the physiological changes produced by the former, and bring the body back to a position of stable homoeostasis.
WHAT ROLE DOES ‘NURTURE’ PLAY IN SHAPING OUR EMOTIONAL RESPONSES?
Once again we are in a difficult area if we are searching for proven facts and scientific laws. There is still much disagreement, between both psychologists themselves and between psychologists and other experts in this field. From my own practical involvement I am firmly convinced that the impact of our life experiences (i.e. ‘nurture’) does have a very great bearing on our emotional selves.
There are four main areas where nurture seems to play a significant part in shaping our emotional experiences:
1. Nurture Helps Set the Threshold Point at Which Emotions Are Habitually Aroused
For example:
– how many times you need to be let down before you will tend to feel despair
– how loud someone has to shout to make you feel frightened – how little needs to be happening before you will usually begin to feel bored.
As noted already, our individual threshold points will in part be fixed by our biological and genetic make-up but, as we know already, our emotional responses are also heavily influenced by the personal meaning we give to the triggers which send the signals to our brain.
So although some of our judgements concerning what is good or bad for our well-being are instinctively made (most animals will immediately feel fear when they are physically attacked), the vast majority have been formed by our life experiences.
To illustrate this factor let’s look at the reactions of two people from different countries to a rainy day. As an English person I might not even notice the weather until the afternoon; then I might shrug my shoulders and feel mildly disappointed. On the other hand, one of my friends from the parched land of southern Spain might instantly become excited and feel constant pleasure throughout the day as his ears pick up the sound of raindrops.
The point at which emotion is triggered in each of us by the rain would be determined partly by our cultural temperaments but partly by the significance we have learned from our experience of life to attribute to rainy days according to their potential impact on our well-being.
There is yet another factor which can have a bearing on our emotional threshold: the sense of personal power we have regarding the rainy day. Let’s imagine the rain was preventing us both from doing something special which we had planned for the day. I might feel instantly frustrated by my powerlessness against the elements. My friend’s response might be to stay calm and pray for sunshine. Because he has been taught to believe that he can do something about changing the weather, his threshold for emotional arousal on this occasion would be much lower than mine.
Instant Exercise
Think of another example. Recall (or imagine) a time when you have been working with a friend or colleague from a different cultural background and your progress towards a certain goal has been blocked. Note the different points at which your feelings were aroused.
2. Nurture Defines What We Expect from Emotions
Our expectations about what emotions can or cannot do must primarily be learned by our experience of life. For example:
– someone whose mother cried freely and always recovered well from loss is less likely to feel frightened when hit by grief than someone whose mother locked in her feelings and, as a result, remained bitter and lonely all her life
– someone who attended a school where the head teacher used excitement about future career options to induce motivation will have a positive view of its power; another may view it much more sceptically because, throughout her life, she has been continually let down by experiences which initially seemed exciting.
Instant Exercise
Choose two contrasting emotions and think whether your life experience has left you with any positive or negative expectations about each.
3. Nurture Helps Shape the Style We Use to Express Emotion
Nowadays it is fairly generally accepted that our parents have a major impact on the development of our personality. Our emotional style is also significantly influenced by many other factors in our formative years. For example, the cultural habits of the country in which we live or the religion which we prac-tise will play their part in influencing the manner in which we express our feelings. Most countries and religions develop rituals, customs and ceremonies which they use for expressing emotion. Some stereotypical examples:
– the Irish will express some of their grief through singing and dancing at ‘wakes’ for the dead
– the people of Saudi Arabia express their collective disgust for serious crimes of theft by watching the offender’s limb being amputated in public
– in Italy one way mothers have historically learned to express their love for their families is through providing them with sumptuous, extended meals
– in Britain traditionally fathers often express their love to their sons by taking them to football matches.
So children learn to pick up a style of expressing emotion by watching the habits of the majority of people around them as well as through the role-models of important parent-figures. Even more importantly, they reinforce that learning by copying this behaviour and trying it out for themselves.
Of course, even with the same national culture each individual can have differing opportunities to practise their emotional skills, and this will also affect their style. For example:
– in many countries girls do not get as much encouragement to demonstrate anger or even to take part in situations (e.g. fighting, the stock exchange) where you would normally find triggers to this emotion. So, even if it is normal in their country to shout and bellow out frustration, women will be much less likely to do so than men
– although pride might be nationally regarded with disdain, in some families it will be considered more of a ‘sin’ than in others. The children of these families will be even less likely to share their pride in their successes
– in some school gangs where showing fear meets with disapproval, its members may not be as open as other children in expressing their anxieties about exams or punishments
– in some professions drinking alcohol is the normal way to deal with frustration, so its members are less likely to develop the skill of expressing anger openly but safely.
Instant Exercise
Think of two emotions and then consider
