Emotion Research

It is widely agreed that one of the functions of self-harm by cutting or burning the body is to regulate emotion. There is an apparent paradox in the emotion-regulative function of self-harm: some people are using self-harm to both increase and decrease affect. The aim of this study, which followed the principles of the grounded theory approach, was to generate a paradox-free theory of the functions of self-harm that is of immediate relevance to the participants themselves, who are often confused about the behavior and the experiences preceding it. We found that "feeling too little" and "feeling too much" share characteristics in three categories of experience: emotional awareness, sense of self/reality, and body-based experience. We explain the functions of self-harm in terms of body-based experience: Self-harm resolves a state of psychosomatic suspension and increases the extent to which the body is involved in the experience of emotion.

In broad terms, this paper strives to unpack the relational dynamic between Israel, God, and the Psalmist represented in this collection. More specifically, our study explores the Asaphite psalms within a collective, literary, and narrative context. This narrative architecture provides a helpful framework for illustrating the relationships among the three primary characters: the Psalmist, Israel, and God. To explore the relationships between these characters, we applied a coding method developed for qualitative research in the social sciences known as dramaturgical coding.

Актуальность исследования обусловлена растущей популярностью теории эмоционального интеллекта, которая постепенно становится предметом научного интереса религиозных мыслителей и психологов. В связи с этим, данная статья направлена на выявление некоторых узких мест в попытках синтезировать психологические и теологические знания в области эмоционального интеллекта. Критический и сравнительный метод позволил провести некоторую грань между психологическим и теологическим восприятием данной модели. Автор пришёл к выводу, что в некоторых случаях нецелесообразно проводить терминологическую и методологическую диффузию, чтобы снизить риск субъективации. Исследователь выражает мысль о необходимости баланса научных интересов в подобных работах. /
The relevance of the research is due to the growing popularity of the theory of emotional intelligence, which is gradually becoming the subject of scientific interest of religious thinkers and psychologists. In this regard, this article is aimed at identifying some bottlenecks in attempts to synthesize psychological and theological knowledge in the field of emotional intelligence. The critical and comparative method allowed us to draw a certain line between the psychological and theological perception of this model. The author came to the conclusion that in some cases it is impractical to carry out terminological and methodological diffusion in order to reduce the risk of subjectivation. The researcher expresses the idea of the need for a balance of scientific interests in such works.

Language teacher emotion labor has recently gained traction as more educators recognize the importance of addressing institutional power dynamics. The present contribution is a review of poststructuralist-discursive research on language teacher emotion labor. The rationale behind a particular focus on poststructuralist-discursive perspective lies behind the recent proliferation of studies framed within this framework. Following the Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analyses (PRISMA) guidelines (Page et al., 2021), the content of 57 studies published from 2018 to November 2024 was analyzed for their themes, methods, and implications. The findings revealed that emotion labor experienced by language teachers in online and face-to-face instruction, the interplay of emotion labor, identity, and motivation, emotion labor caused by top-down assessment policies, and emotion labor due to institutional expectations in transnational and EMI/EAP/ESP contexts were among the most frequently investigated themes in the relevant body of literature. It was also observed that language teacher emotion labor has predominantly been examined through qualitative research paradigms, including case studies and (auto)ethnographies. Semi-structured interviews, document analysis, narrative frames, short stories reconstructed based on narrative data, vignettes, and visuals comprised the most prevailing data collection instruments deployed in this area of research. Furthermore, the implications of the existing literature mainly signified the need for institutional reform and raising language teachers' awareness of the complexities of emotion labor through teacher education programs. The current review calls for more longitudinal, observational, cross-cultural, and mixed-methods explorations of language teacher emotion labor in the future.

A γ-aminobutyric acid (GABA)-ergic theory of mood disorders was proposed by Emrich and colleagues (1980) following observations of the efficacy of the GABAergic anticonvulsant, valproate, in the treatment of mania. Since then, increasing biochemical and pharmacological evidence from animal and human studies has supported the hypothesis that mood disorders are associated with abnormalities in brain GABA function.

Selective attention is a mechanism used to allocate resources to information processing. Both mood states and emotionally salient stimuli can influence which information is selectively attended. This information is subsequently processed in a more elaborative manner and affects task performance. The experiments presented in this thesis explore the influence of mood and emotional stimuli on selective attention and consequently task performance. Mood induction procedures were used to induce transient neutral, sad, and happy mood states in healthy volunteers. A systematic review and meta-analysis of 41 studies using sad mood induction procedures showed cognitive impairments in performance in the context of task neutral stimuli. In contrast biases in attention towards mood-congruent negative stimuli led to improved task performance. A series of three behavioural experiments with 197 participants demonstrated that participants made decisions on the basis of less information when that information was preceded by emotional but not neutral stimuli. Induced mood state did not affect performance. The behavioural and neural correlates of visual attentional processing to emotional stimuli were explored using magnetoencephalography in 24 healthy participants following sad, happy, and neutral mood induction procedures. The M300, a component associated with selective attention, had greater amplitude following presentation of negative compared with positive stimuli, which was associated with improved task performance. Reduced M300 amplitude and impairments in performance occurred following sad mood induction procedures. The experiments presented in this thesis demonstrate prioritized processing of emotional information and provide some evidence for impaired performance following sad mood induction procedures. This thesis contains approximately 50,000 words. A thesis submitted in partial fulfilment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy in the University of Oxford, Trinity Term 2011.

Emotion and reward have been proposed to be closely linked to conscious experience, but empirical data are lacking. The anterior cingulate cortex (ACC) plays a central role in the hedonic dimension of conscious experience; thus potentially a key region in interactions between emotion and consciousness. Here we tested the impact of emotion on conscious experience, and directly investigated the role of the ACC. We used a masked paradigm that measures conscious reportability in terms of subjective confidence and objective accuracy in identifying the briefly presented stimulus in a forced-choice test. By manipulating the emotional valence (positive, neutral, negative) and the presentation time (16 ms, 32 ms, 80 ms) we measured the impact of these variables on conscious and subliminal (i.e. below threshold) processing. First, we tested normal participants using face and word stimuli. Results showed that participants were more confident and accurate when consciously seeing happy versus sad/neutral faces and words. When stimuli were presented subliminally, we found no effect of emotion. To investigate the neural basis of this impact of emotion, we recorded local field potentials (LFPs) directly in the ACC in a chronic pain patient. Behavioural findings were replicated: the patient was more confident and accurate when (consciously) seeing happy versus sad faces, while no effect was seen in subliminal trials. Mirroring behavioural findings, we found significant differences in the LFPs after around 500 ms (lasting 30 ms) in conscious trials between happy and sad faces, while no effect was found in subliminal trials. We thus demonstrate a striking impact of emotion on conscious experience, with positive emotional stimuli enhancing conscious reportability. In line with previous studies, the data indicate a key role of the ACC, but goes beyond earlier work by providing the first direct evidence of interaction between emotion and conscious experience in the human ACC.