PSYC18H3 Chapter Notes - Chapter 1: In Essence, Bradycardia, Emotional And Behavioral Disorders
Document Summary
Epicureans and stoics thought emotions are irrational and damaging. In his time, accepted theory was that god gave humans facial muscles that allowed them to express uniquely human sentiments unknown to animals. Central tenet of his theory was that we are descendent from animals and we are animals. Concluded that emotions stem from things that were adaptive in our evolutionary upbringing. Thought emotional expressions were like vestigial parts of our bodies. Sneering is a vestige of snarling (vestigial mean useless but were useful before) Crying a vestige of screaming in infancy. Not so in adults but tears still secreted. Basically emotions are linked to the past our ancestors and us as infants argued for universality of expressions. Theorized that, upon encountering an exciting fact, the emotion is the perception of the bodily sensations we are experiencing. Emotions = set of changes in the autonomic nervous system. Inner organs, heart, blood vessels, sweat glands, stomach.
