End-year special: How emotions can function as message bearers (1)

Emotions are our responses to internal or external events. A woman having a headache demonstrates it by either touching her hands to her head or saying it out that she has a headache. When we see a crime being committed on the street, our faces register signs of dismay and shock. On my face, your face, by body movements, by choice of words, by a silent whisper, a nod of the head, a smile of approval, a loving kiss, a hateful glance, emotions are expressed in countless ways that the senses can perceive and receive a message.

Some emotions are spontaneous. In my middle high school classes, it amazes me how the children sometimes begin drumming on the desks or exclaiming in alarm in reaction to some information in the lecture or to an answer to a question. Some are also premeditated.

Whatever the case may be, emotions are message bearers in that they convey to the observer the feelings, goals, needs, desires and social intentions of the creator of the emotion. Whether love at first sight exists or not, the reaction expressed by an observer to sex or other visual stimuli, was as a result of a emotion produced.

If happiness is appraised as a favorable and benign emotion that we all are attracted to, then what is anger? An expressive emotion that translates into a frustrated goal and taking the blame out on others.

Emotions surely convey messages and not just few, but lots of messages. Emotions then are worth studying and understanding if we want to build healthy social relationships.

The next blog article, Series 2: Why emotions can drive a second emotional response, describes the influential role of emotions in social life.

The rest of the series:

How to use emotions to Human Advantage (Introduction).

Series 1: How emotions can function as message bearers.

Series 2: Why emotions can drive a second emotional response.

Series 3: How emotions play a part in decision making.

Series 4: Information processing of emotional signals.

Series 5: The social context in responding and interpreting emotions.

Series 6: Implications of using emotions as social information tokens.

End-of-Year special: How to use emotions to Human Advantage (Introduction)

MJ captivated thousands with his emotional music.

Source:Wikimedia Commons.

If you watch any video of Michael Jackson, you’d be amazed at how he creatively uses his emotions – his voice, face, hands and body movements – to convey messages that are meant to influence you. Emotions are not only meant to influence others in social relations, it also determines our reactions and personal feelings. Take for example a man who sees a snake on his path. He feels the emotion of fear and decides either to run or look for a stick to kill it. Emotions regulate and coordinate humans and their relationship with others. Emotions could trigger a fight or a flight response.

A nation could go to war riding on the wave of emotions.

Understanding how our emotions determine our existence and using them to human advantage both at an intrapersonal and interpersonal level is then important. This end-of-year special series of blog articles will describe a model developed by Van Kleef that was developed towards this end, but on the interpersonal level. The model is named Emotions As Social Information (EASI) model.

The EASI describes human emotions as signals from one’s face, voice, bodily posture, choice of words etc that were expressed to influence the observer and trigger either an emotional response or trigger his brain to make deductions on what message(s) the emotion was meant to convey based on his information processing ability and social context.

The six series of blog articles that are focused on this theme are:

How to use emotions to Human Advantage (Introduction).

Series 1: How emotions can function as message bearers.

Series 2: Why emotions can drive a second emotional response.

Series 3: How emotions play a part in decision making.

Series 4: Information processing of emotional signals.

Series 5: The social context in responding and interpreting emotions.

Series 6: Implications of using emotions as social information tokens.

Puzzle: Can you make out what is X?

Can you solve the puzzle below, for x?

What is X?

Hint: You can change the angle of view - 90, 180 degrees, turn it upside down, whatever, to make out a different series.

I can't wait for the first correct answer!

How negative emotions like sadness could turn out to be a force for good

It is not always possible to suppress emotions like anger or sadness during a crisis. When corporate image is at stake, it is rather that conventional wisdom be rethought. For the sake of the public image, to motivate the workforce, and for so many other seemingly positive reasons, demonstrating negative emotions was perceived as against the corporate good. Does it mean that all negative emotions are bad? When angry employees voice their opinions are they rebels who should be shoved out the door? Positive management leads to positive leadership.

Sometimes, the prevailing attitudes do not reflect desired positive outcomes (pdf). Sometimes, the status quo could be wrong although there are exceptions to every rule.

Bereavement could build social connections. Source: Wikimedia Commons

When, could expressions of negative emotions at the corporate arena be a force for positive results or positive changes? Management should evaluate these facts when making a decision.

• Every situation is unique:

Sometimes, workers should be encouraged to express negative emotions. Managers should ensure that such negative demonstrations are constructive and for the “common good. Even positive emotions like compassion, a positive emotion, when taken to extremes, can lead to what is termed “compassion fatigue,” which has been shown to induce stress in perfectionists and overly conscientious individuals. No two situations can be the same.

• Political nature of the situation:

When workers perceive injustice or unfairness, they usually have channels for lodging complaints. When these channels become unfair or inefficient, employees organize themselves. The consequences for doing so could be grave or positive; the outcomes depend on the individuals involved, their corporate political ambitions, the genesis of the negative emotion as well as other factors.

• Organizational leadership style:

When management is ineffective, would it be wrong for workers to voice their complaints with a view of eliciting change? A company whose personnel department is inefficient could be recruiting workers who are unfit for the roles employed. It has been found that when followers in the organization highly agree with the top management leadership style, staff response to negative emotions turn out most times to be more positive than negative.

• How the emotion is directed:

Some emotions like sadness motivates the positive behavior of building social connections when motivated by social loss rather than status loss. Corporate workers want to appear in control of their emotions so they’d rather do away with negative emotions. Yet, when a loss is shared with others, whether positive or negative, it offers an opportunity for openness and intimacy, for expanding personal corporate social circles.

• Status associated with the job function:

Some workers like teachers and helpline workers are looked down upon in the society. These are negative emotions directed maybe to them as individuals and/or to their job functions. People do not want to be associated with those “kinds of jobs”. Helpline workers who deal with isolated, upset, abusive or suicidal individuals are perceived as carrying social “dirt” and they’d rather not be tainted with it.

• How the emotion is perceived:

Just as every situation is unique, the individuals to which the emotion is directed to are also unique. Everybody reacts differently to anger and happiness. Some show a strong sense of affection for emotions that are directed towards them while others tend to interpret extreme and moderate meanings to emotional situations, depending on their ilk.

Positive corporate leadership desires outcomes to positive and negative emotions that reflect the expected bottom line: motivated employees, agreeable follower-ship, emotionally healthy workforce and profits. It would be conventionally wise then for management to recognize the existence of negative emotions and their place in corporate life.

Creative musings with Venn diagrams on R software

These images look archived but I liked them that was why I'm having them on my blog. For sake of the memories. Actually, I was tinkering with R software after a little lull in the Probability and Statistics book I am presently reading: Probability and Statistics for Engineering and The Sciences by Jay L. Devore. Then I chanced on a Venn Diagram Package made for R Software.

Looks like four atoms juxtaposed. 4 sets intersecting actually.Venn Diagram Package, R Software

As the caption says, it looks like atoms falling on themselves like noodles. I just loved it. Hmmm! It is actually four sets intersecting. Very good work! Then the second one, like a spacecraft. Funny, right?

5 sets intersecting, a quintuple, but looks like a spacecraft. Venn Diagram Package, R Software

The graphics might not be state-of-the-art, but I love them.