Cognition and Emotion Review

According to Meyers (2013), emotion is the combination of bodily arousal, expressive behaviors, and conscious experience (p. 460). The question of whether cognition comes before emotion or vice versa has been an important area of inquiry for psychological research.

First, there are two main theories that address the relationship between arousal and emotion. According to the James-Lange theory, humans are aroused by an emotion-provoking stimulus before they experience emotion (Meyers, 2013, p. 460). However, the Cannon-Bard theory asserts that arousal and emotion occur simultaneously because the brain processes the stimulus and the response to the stimulus at the same time (Meyers, 2013, p. 460). Neurology also factors into inquiries on the relationship between emotion and cognition.

Meyers describes two main views on the connection between cognition and emotion. First, Stanley Schlachter and Jerome Singer asserted that cognition precedes emotion because emotions require conscious interpretation in order for humans to experience emotion (Meyers, 2013, p. 461). Second, Robert Zajonc and Richard Lazarus presented the views that emotion is experienced before it is cognitively processed because emotional stimulus registers with the brain before human intellect can intervene (Meyers, 2013, p. 462). Current research attempts to reconcile these different views on the relationship between emotion and cognition.

In a review of the literature, Luiz Pessoa (2012) asserts that the network perspective can improve the understanding of the cognition-emotion, or body versus mind, relationship. From this standpoint, traditional distinctions can’t be made between regions that are “cognitive” or “emotional” (Pessoa, 2012, p. 158). Thus, from a network perspective, it may be determined by future research that the interconnection between cognition and emotion makes it unfeasible to determine the order of the two phenomena.

References

Meyers, D.G. (2013). Psychology (10th ed.). New York: Worth Publishers.

Pessoa, L. (2012). Beyond brain regions: Network perspective of cognition-emotion interactions. Behavioral and Brain Sciences,35(3), 158-9. doi:http://dx.doi.org/10.1017/S0140525X11001567