PSY 311 Study Guide - Midterm Guide: Multidimensional Scaling, The Emotions, Psychological Abuse
Document Summary
Zimbardo (1979) tested the schachter and singer theory by assessing how strongly a person"s interpretation of his or her situation influence specific emotional feelings (anger for example). The results of these studies provide convincing evidence that support the schachter and singer theory: the three criteria for a basic emotion are: 1. It must be universal among humans, and perhaps in other species too; 2. There must be a distinct built-in way of expressing the emotion, including a facial expression (to communicate the emotions to others); 3. A number of investigators have found a strong positive relationship between the strength of a person"s emotional response and the level of activity in the sympathetic nervous system of that person. The same people who showed the strongest response of the sympathetic nervous system were the ones who reported the strongest emotion. Emotion requires the process of appraisal, but a mood does not.
