Numerous physiological changes in the body are accompanied by any emotional state. Throughout the history of the development of this area of psychological knowledge, attempts have been made more than once to link physiological changes in the body with certain emotions and to show that the complexes of organic signs accompanying various emotional processes are indeed different.
In 1872, C. Darwin published the book Expression of Emotions in Man and Animals, which was a turning point in understanding the relationship between biological and psychological phenomena, in particular, the organism and emotions. It proved that the evolutionary principle is applicable not only to the biophysical , but also to the psychological and behavioral development of the living, that there is no impassable abyss between the behavior of an animal and a person. Darwin showed that in the external expression of different emotional states, in expressive bodily movements, there is much in common between anthropoids and blind children. These observations formed the basis of the theory of emotion, which is called evolutionary. Emotions, according to this theory, appeared in the process of evolution of living beings as vital adaptive mechanisms that contribute to the adaptation of the organism to the conditions and situations of its life.
Charles Darwin's ideas were accepted and developed in another theory, which became widely known in psychology. Its authors were W. James and K. Lange. James believed that certain physical states are characteristic of different emotions - curiosity, delight, fear, anger and excitement. The corresponding bodily changes were called organic manifestations of emotion. According to the James-Lange theory, it is organic changes that are the root causes of emotion. Being reflected in a person's head through a feedback system, they generate an emotional experience of the corresponding modality. First, under the influence of external stimuli, changes in the body that are characteristic of emotions occur, and only then, as a result of them, does the emotion itself arise.
An alternative point of view on the correlation of organic and emotional processes was proposed by W. Kennon. He was one of the first to note the fact that the bodily changes observed during the occurrence of different emotional states are very similar to each other and are not sufficient in diversity to completely satisfactorily explain the qualitative differences in the highest emotional experiences of a person.
Cannon's strongest counterargument to the James-Lange theory was the following: an artificially induced cessation of the flow of organic signals to the brain does not prevent the emergence of emotions.
The psycho-organic theory of emotions (this is how the concepts of James-Lange and Cannon-Bard can be conditionally called) was further developed under the influence of electrophysiological studies of the brain. On its basis, the activation theory of Lindsay-Hebb arose. According to this theory, emotional states are determined by the influence of the reticular formation of the lower part of the brain stem. Emotions arise as a result of disturbance and restoration of balance in the corresponding structures of the central nervous system.
The activation theory is based on the following main provisions:
· · The electroencephalographic picture of the brain functioning, arising from emotions, is an expression of the so-called “activation complex”, associated with the activity of the reticular formation.
· · The work of the reticular formation determines many dynamic parameters of emotional states: their strength, duration, variability, and a number of others.
In a person, in the dynamics of emotional processes and states, cognitive-psychological factors (cognitive means related to knowledge) play no less a role than organic and physical influences. In this regard, new concepts have been proposed that explain human emotions by the dynamic features of cognitive processes.
One of the first such theories was L. Festinger's theory of cognitive dissonance. According to it, a person has a positive emotional experience when his expectations are confirmed, and cognitive ideas are realized, i.e. when the actual results of the activity correspond to the intended ones, are consistent with them, or, what is the same, are in consonance. Negative emotions arise and intensify in cases where there is a discrepancy, inconsistency or dissonance between the expected and actual results of the activity.
Subjectively, the state of cognitive dissonance is usually experienced by a person as discomfort, and he seeks to get rid of it as soon as possible. The way out of the state of cognitive dissonance can be twofold: either change cognitive expectations and plans in such a way that they correspond to the actual result obtained, or try to get a new result that would be consistent with previous expectations.
In modern psychology, the theory of cognitive dissonance is often used to explain the actions of a person, his actions in various social situations. Emotions are considered as the main motive for the corresponding actions and deeds. The underlying cognitive factors are given a much greater role in determining human behavior than organic changes.
S. Shekhter. He showed that a person's memory and motivation make a significant contribution to emotional processes. The concept of emotions proposed by S. Schechter is called cognitive-physiological.
According to this theory, in addition to the perceived stimuli and the bodily changes generated by them, the emerging emotional state is influenced by a person’s past experience and his assessment of the current situation from the point of view of his interests and needs.
Emotion and personality
Emotions, no matter how different they may seem, are inseparable from personality.
S.L. Rubinstein believed that three spheres can be distinguished in the emotional manifestations of a personality: its organic life, its material interests, and its spiritual, moral needs. He designated them respectively as organic (affective-emotional) sensitivity, objective feelings and generalized ideological feelings. In his opinion, elementary pleasures and displeasures, mainly associated with the satisfaction of organic needs, belong to affective-emotional sensitivity. Object feelings are associated with the possession of certain objects and the pursuit of certain types of activity. These feelings, according to their objects, are divided into material, intellectual and aesthetic. They manifest themselves in admiration for some objects, people and activities and in disgust for others. Worldview feelings are associated with morality and human relations to the world, people, social events, moral categories and values.
Human emotions are primarily related to his needs. They reflect the state, process and result of meeting the need. This idea has been repeatedly emphasized by almost without exception researchers of emotions, regardless of what theories they adhere to. By emotions, they believed, one can definitely judge what a person is worried about at a given moment in time, i.e. about what needs and interests are relevant to him.
People as individuals emotionally differ from each other in many ways: emotional excitability, duration and stability of their emotional experiences, dominance of positive (sthenic) or negative (asthenic) emotions. But most of all, the emotional sphere of developed personalities differs in the strength and depth of feelings, as well as in their content and subject relatedness. This circumstance, in particular, is used by psychologists when designing tests designed to study personality. By the nature of the emotions that the situations and objects presented in the tests, events and people evoke in a person, their personal qualities are judged.
The question of the connection between emotions and motivation (emotional experiences and the system of actual human needs) is not as simple as it might seem at first glance. On the one hand, the simplest types of emotional experiences are unlikely to have a pronounced motivating power for a person. They either do not directly affect behavior, do not make it purposeful, or completely disorganize it (affects and stresses). On the other hand, emotions such as feelings, moods, passions motivate behavior, not only activating it, but guiding and supporting it. Emotion, expressed in a feeling, desire, attraction or passion, undoubtedly contains an impulse to activity.
The second significant point related to the personal aspect of emotions is that the system itself and the dynamics of typical emotions characterize a person as a person. Of particular importance for such a characteristic is the description of feelings typical of a person. Feelings simultaneously contain and express the attitude and motivation of a person, and both are usually merged in a deep human feeling. Higher feelings, in addition, carry a moral principle.
Human emotions are manifested in all types of human activity and especially in artistic creation. The artist's own emotional sphere is reflected in the choice of subjects, in the manner of writing, in the way of developing selected themes and subjects. All this taken together makes up the individual originality of the artist.
Emotions are included in many psychologically complex states of a person, acting as their organic part. Such complex states, including thinking, attitude and emotions, are humor, irony, satire and sarcasm, which can also be interpreted as types of creativity if they take on an artistic form. Humor - this is an emotional manifestation of such an attitude towards something or someone, which carries a combination of funny and kind. This is a laugh at what you love, a way of showing sympathy, attracting attention, creating a good mood. irony - it is a combination of laughter and disrespect, most often dismissive. Such an attitude, however, cannot yet be called unkind or evil. Satire is a denunciation that specifically contains a condemnation of the object. In satire, he is usually presented in an unattractive way. Evil, evil is most manifested in sarcasm which is a direct mockery, a mockery of the object.
In addition to the listed complex states and feelings, tragedy should also be mentioned. This is an emotional state that occurs when the forces of good and evil clash and the victory of evil over good.
The last special human feeling that characterizes him as a person is love. F. Frankl spoke well about the meaning of this feeling in its highest, spiritual understanding. True love, in his opinion, is the entry into a relationship with another person as a spiritual being. Love is an entry into a direct relationship with the personality of the beloved, with his originality and uniqueness.
A person who truly loves, least of all, thinks about some mental or physical characteristics of a loved one. He thinks mainly about what this person is for him in his individual uniqueness. This person for a lover cannot be replaced by anyone, no matter how perfect this “duplicate” may be in itself.
True love is the spiritual connection of one person with another similar being. It is not limited to physical sexuality and psychological sensuality. For someone who truly loves, psycho-organic connections remain only a form of expression of the spiritual principle, a form of expression of precisely love with human dignity inherent in man.
Do emotions and feelings develop during a person's life? There are two different points of view on this issue. One argues that emotions cannot develop because they are related to the functioning of the organism and to its characteristics that are innate. Another point of view expresses the opposite opinion - that the emotional sphere of a person, like many other psychological phenomena inherent in him, develops.
In fact, these positions are quite compatible with each other and there are no insoluble contradictions between them. In order to be convinced of this, it is enough to connect each of the presented points of view with different classes of emotional phenomena. Elementary emotions, acting as subjective manifestations of organic states, really change little. It is no coincidence that emotionality is considered to be one of the innate and vitally stable personal characteristics of a person.
But already with respect to affects, and even more so feelings, such an assertion is not true. All the qualities associated with them indicate that these emotions are developing. A person, moreover, is able to restrain the natural manifestations of affects and, therefore, is quite teachable in this respect too. An affect, for example, can be suppressed by a conscious effort of the will, its energy can be switched to another, more useful thing.
The improvement of higher emotions and feelings means the personal development of their owner. This development can go in several directions. Firstly, in the direction associated with the inclusion of new objects, objects, events, people into the sphere of human emotional experiences. Secondly, along the line of increasing the level of conscious, volitional control and control of one's feelings by a person. Thirdly, in the direction of gradual inclusion in the moral regulation of higher values and norms: conscience, decency, duty, responsibility, etc.
test questions
1. 1. Types and role of emotions in human life.
2. 2. Psychological theories of emotions.
3. 3. Emotions and personality.
The first scientific ideas about emotions as adaptive reactions of the body were formulated by Charles Darwin, who showed the evolutionary path of the development of emotions and explained the origin of their physiological manifestations.
The evolutionary theory of emotions by Ch. Darwin. The main idea of Darwin's ideas is that the majority of human emotional reactions are either useful (contributing to adaptation) or are remnants (rudiments) of expedient reactions developed in the process of evolution in the struggle for survival. According to Darwin, three basic principles guided the evolutionary development of emotions:
1) association principle: combination of emotions with the corresponding
mi, useful for the body adaptive reactions
lo in the process of evolution to the formation of certain associations,
due to which these reactions during the experience of these emotions
began to appear automatically, even if they do not contain any
necessity. So, an angry person blushes, breathes heavily
and clenching his fists because in its primitive history all
cue anger was associated with a fight or attack, and this required
energetic muscle contractions and, consequently, enhanced
respiration and circulation, providing muscle work.
Sweaty hands in fear means that ape pred
for a person, this reaction in case of danger facilitated the grasping of
tree branches, etc.;
2) antithesis principle: emotions opposite in sign
produce opposite behavioral responses. For example, race
weakening of the muscles of the face - a smile expressing friendliness, jav
is the opposite of muscle tension characteristic of
hostile feelings;
3) principle of direct expression of emotional arousal:
Trembling is a consequence of muscle tension during organ mobilization.
nism ^ (for example, to attack). This theory was the first
who paid attention to the possibility of characterizing emotions by their
somatic expression.
Psychoevolutionary theory of emotions by R. Plutchik. According to the Fundamental provisions of the theory proposed by R. Plutchik, emotions: 1) are the mechanisms of communication and survival;
Chapter 13
13.2. Evolutionary theories of emotion
 |
studies based on evolutionary adaptation; 2) have a genetic basis; 3) are hypothetical constructions based on obvious phenomena of various classes; 4) are chains of events with stabilizing feedbacks that create some type of behavioral homeostasis; 5) correlate with each other in three main dimensions - intensity, similarity and polarity; 6) correlate with a number of derived conceptual areas.
According to the first proposition, emotions are a means of adaptation and play an important role in survival at all evolutionary levels. However, the problems of survival imply a differentiated response to prey and predator, food and an individual of one's own species, and so on. Consequently, emotions will differ depending on the prototypes of adaptive responses associated with them. Eight such basic adaptive complexes and their corresponding emotions were identified (Table 13.1).
The first scientific ideas about emotions as adaptive reactions of the body were formulated by Charles Darwin in 1872 in his work “The Expression of Emotions in Man and Animals”. It showed the evolutionary path of the development of emotions and explained the origin of their physiological manifestations.
The evolutionary theory of emotions by Ch. Darwin. The main idea of Darwin's ideas is that the majority of human emotional reactions are either useful (facilitating adaptation) or are remnants (rudiments) of expedient reactions developed in the course of evolution in the struggle for survival. According to Darwin, three basic principles guided the evolutionary development of emotions:
1) association principle- the combination of emotions with appropriate adaptive reactions useful for the body led in the process of evolution to the formation of certain associations, due to which these reactions began to appear automatically when experiencing these emotions, even if they were not necessary. Thus, an angry person blushes, breathes heavily and clenches his fists because in his primitive history all anger was associated with a fight or attack, and this required vigorous muscle contractions and, consequently, increased breathing and blood circulation, ensuring muscle work. The sweating of the hands in fear means that in the ape-like ancestors of man this reaction in danger made it easier to grasp tree branches, etc.;
2) principle of antithesis- Emotions that are opposite in sign cause opposite behavioral reactions;
3) the principle of the direct influence of nervous excitation on the body. This theory was the first to draw attention to the possibility of characterizing emotions by their somatic expression.
Psychoevolutionary theory of emotions by R. Plutchik(1958). According to the fundamental provisions of the theory proposed by the American psychologist R. Plutchik, emotions: 1) are communication and survival mechanisms based on evolutionary adaptation; 2) have a genetic basis; 3) are hypothetical constructions based on obvious phenomena of various classes; 4) are chains of events with stabilizing feedbacks that create some type of behavioral homeostasis; 5) correlate with each other in three main dimensions - intensity, similarity and polarity; 6) correlate with a number of derived conceptual areas.
Table 2.2
Basic prototypes of adaptive behavior and their corresponding emotions
(according to R. Plutchik).
| Prototypical adaptive complex | Primary emotion |
| 1. Union- absorption of food and water | Adoption |
| 2. rejection- reaction of rejection, ridding the body of something perceived earlier (excretion, vomiting) | Disgust |
| 3. Destruction- removal of obstacles to meeting the need | Anger |
| 4. Protection- avoidance of threat or harm by increasing the distance between the organism and the source of danger | Fear |
| 5. reproductive behavior- reactions accompanying sexual behavior and characterized by a tendency to approach and maintain contact | Joy |
| 6. Deprivation- loss of an object that brings pleasure | Woe |
| 7. Orientation- reaction to contact with a new, unfamiliar object | Astonishment |
| 8. Study- voluntary activity aimed at studying the environment | Expectation |
According to the first proposition, emotions are a means of adaptation and play an important role in survival at all evolutionary levels. However, the problems of survival imply a differentiated response to prey and predator, food and an individual of one's own species, and so on. Consequently, emotions will differ depending on the prototypes of adaptive responses associated with them. Eight such basic adaptive complexes and their corresponding emotions were identified (see Table 2.2).
The fourth position of the theory explains the sequence of the flow of the emotional process (see Fig. 2.2): emotions are caused by various events that must be cognitively assessed in terms of their significance for the well-being of the individual. The result of the assessment are various experiences, as well as certain physiological changes. Physiological changes are in the nature of anticipation reactions associated with various stresses or impulses (an impulse to explore, attack, etc.). Depending on the strength of heterogeneous impulses, a resultant appears in the form of observable behavior, which is designed to have an effect on the original stimuli. In this case, the effectiveness of this complex feedback system is to reduce the threat or change the dangerous situation in such a way that a temporary behavioral homeostatic balance is achieved.
Rice. 2.2. Emotional process according to R. Plutchik
The fifth position suggests that the relationship between emotions can be represented as a three-dimensional structural model: intensity - similarity - polarity. This provision also includes the idea of the existence of primary and derivative or mixed emotions. For example, pride = anger + joy; love = joy + acceptance; curiosity = surprise + acceptance; hatred = anger + surprise; contempt = anger + disgust; disappointment = surprise + grief; pity = grief + disgust, etc.
The last position of the theory follows logically from the previous one. According to R. Plutchik, his theory of emotions can be useful in the study of personality and in psychotherapy, since emotional components are identified in many personality traits, psychological defenses, etc. For example, sociability is associated with a combination of joy and acceptance, and "substitution" is a way to deal with anger that cannot be expressed directly and with impunity. Social regulators (Super-Ego phenomena) of human behavior can be understood as a combination of fear and other emotions (for example, modesty = fear + acceptance), and anxiety as a combination of fear and expectation. Therefore, analyzing situations that generate fear in a person and identifying the person's expectations in relation to such situations helps to understand the dynamics of anxiety.
J. Dewey (1895) considers the origin of emotions somewhat differently in line with the problems of adaptation. In his opinion, emotion arises only when the implementation of instinctive actions, habitual or arbitrary forms of behavior encounters an obstacle. Fight, save - in themselves, these actions do not entail emotions if they are carried out under normal conditions. But, as soon as a difficulty arises, a person, trying to adapt to new conditions of life, experiences an emotion. “Psychologically, emotion is an adaptation or tension of habits and an ideal, and organic changes ... are a manifestation of this struggle for adaptation” (J. Dewey, 1895). These ideas were subsequently developed in "conflict" theories of emotion (A. Pieron, 1928; Hodge, 1935; Andreani, 1968).
Emotions, according to this theory, appeared in the process of evolution of living beings as vital adaptive mechanisms that contribute to the adaptation of the organism to the conditions and situations of its life. In simple words, living beings adapted to the conditions in which they existed.
Psychoorganic theory of James-Lange
Lange (1890), James (1892) put forward the theory that emotions are the perception of sensations caused by changes in the body due to external stimulation. External irritation, which is the cause of the affect, causes reflex changes in the activity of the heart, respiration, blood circulation, and muscle tone. As a result, different sensations are experienced in the whole body during emotions, from which the experience of emotions is composed.
According to the James-Lange theory, the order of events is formulated as follows: we are saddened because we cry; we are afraid because we tremble; are enraged, because we are thumping. If bodily manifestations did not immediately follow perception, then, in their opinion, there would be no emotion. If we imagine some emotion and mentally subtract from it, one by one, all the bodily sensations associated with it, then, in the end, nothing will remain of it. Thus, if fear is eliminated from the emotion of heartbeat, shortness of breath, trembling in the arms and legs, weakness in the body, etc., then there will be no fear. Those. human emotion, devoid of any bodily lining, is nothing but an empty sound.
They argued that emotions can arise without any impact on the psyche, under the influence of purely chemical and medicinal influences. It is known that wine "rejoices the heart of a person", wine can "fill in melancholy", thanks to wine, fear disappears - "a drunken sea is knee-deep".
Fly agaric causes fits of rabies and a tendency to violence. Infusion of fly agaric in the old days was given to warriors to bring them into a "bloodthirsty state". Hashish can cause violent fits.
Emotions also arise under the influence of internal causes in pathological cases. With diseases of the heart and aorta, longing appears. In many diseases, fear or joy appear without the direct objects of these emotions: the patient is afraid, himself, not knowing what, or happy for no reason.
Motivation of moods, its nature and depth in different people is very different. The "generalization" of an emotional impression in the mood takes on a different, and even opposite, character, depending on the structure of the personality. As the relationship of the individual with the outside world develops and takes shape, and in connection with this, certain areas of special significance and stability are distinguished in the personality itself, and in connection with this, certain areas of special significance and stability are distinguished in the personality itself. Not every impression turns out to be powerful to change the general mood of the individual; for this, it must be related to a sphere that is especially significant for the individual. Penetrating into the personality, impressions are subjected to a certain filtering, the area in which the mood is formed, i.e. limited, a person becomes less dependent on random impressions, his mood becomes more stable.
K. Izard identified the following basic, "fundamental emotions":
1. Joy is a positive emotional state associated with the ability to sufficiently fully satisfy an urgent need, the probability of which up to this point was small or uncertain.
2. Surprise - not having a clearly expressed positive or negative sign, an emotional reaction to sudden circumstances. Surprise slows down previous reactions, directing attention to the object that caused it and can arouse interest.
3. Suffering - a negative emotional state associated with received reliable or seemingly such information about the impossibility of meeting vital needs, which earlier seemed more likely, most often occurs in the form of emotional stress.
4. Anger - an emotional state, negative in sign, proceeding in the form of affect and caused by the sudden appearance of an obstacle on the way to the goal to satisfy an extremely important need for the subject.
5. Disgust - a negative emotional state caused by objects, objects, people, circumstances, contact with which (physical interaction, communication in communication) comes into sharp conflict with ideological, moral or aesthetic principles and attitudes of the subject
6. Contempt - a negative emotional state that occurs in interpersonal relationships and is generated by a mismatch of life positions, views and behavior of the subject with life positions, views, views and behavior of the object of feeling. The latter are presented to the subject as base, not corresponding to accepted moral standards and aesthetic criteria.
The main function of emotions is that we can, without using speech, judge each other's states and better prepare ourselves for joint activities and communication. There are 6 fundamental emotions: joy, anger, sadness, fear, disgust, surprise.
Emotions are relatively weakly manifested in external behavior, but all behavior is associated with emotions, since it is aimed at satisfying a need.
Human feelings, on the contrary, are outwardly very noticeable. Allocate moral, aesthetic, intellectual, practical feelings. Emotions give rise to feelings, which, in turn, are the sources of emotions.
Unlike emotions and feelings, affects proceed violently, quickly, and are accompanied by pronounced organic changes and motor reactions.
Some of the emotions can act extremely destructively on a person's behavior in society, so each person needs to learn how to manage emotions, not to allow them to destroy a person's interpersonal relationships in society.
Thus, summing up some results, it should be noted that the class of emotions includes a division into so-called "pure emotions" - these are moods, feelings, affects, passions, stresses.
The main function of emotions is that we can, without using speech, judge each other's states and better prepare ourselves for joint activities and communication. There are 6 fundamental emotions: joy, anger, sadness, fear, disgust, surprise.
The main emotional states that a person experiences are divided into emotions, feelings and affects.
Emotions are relatively weakly manifested in external behavior, but all behavior is associated with emotions, since it is aimed at satisfying a need. Human feelings, on the contrary, are outwardly very noticeable. Allocate moral, aesthetic, intellectual, practical feelings. Emotions give rise to feelings, which, in turn, are the sources of emotions. Unlike emotions and feelings, affects proceed violently, quickly, and are accompanied by pronounced organic changes and motor reactions.
Passion is a fusion of emotions, motives and feelings, concentrated around a certain type of activity or subject.
Stress is one of the most common types of affects today, which is a state of excessively strong and prolonged psychological stress that occurs in a person when his nervous system receives an emotional overload.
Some of the emotions can act extremely destructively on a person's behavior in society, so each person needs to learn how to manage emotions, not to allow them to destroy a person's interpersonal relationships in society.
Chapter 2. Study of this issue in the works of various authors.
2.1. The evolutionary theory of emotions by Charles Darwin
Charles Darwin's evolutionary theory of the origin of emotions, published in The Expression of the Emotions in Man and Animals in 1872. It applies the evolutionary principle to the psychological development of a living organism and proves that there is no impassable chasm between animal and human behavior. As Darwin showed, in the external expression of different emotional states, in expressive bodily movements, there is much in common between anthropoids and blind children. These observations formed the basis of his theory. Emotions, according to this theory, appeared in the process of evolution of living beings as vital adaptive mechanisms that contribute to the adaptation of the organism to the conditions and situations of its life. According to Darwin, bodily changes accompanying various emotional states, in particular those associated with the corresponding emotions of movement, are nothing but the rudiments of the body's real adaptive reactions. Indeed, the commonality of the emotional expressions of man and, in any case, of the higher animals that stand closest to man is so obvious that it cannot be disputed.
2.2. Rudimentary Theory of Emotions Herbert Spencer, Théodule Ribot
Develops an evolutionary idea about the origin of emotions, evaluating them from the behavioral sphere. After the publication of the works of Charles Darwin, a number of psychologists (partly Herbert Spencer and his students, partly French positivists - Théodule Ribot and his school, partly German biologically oriented psychology) began to develop ideas about the biological origin of human emotions from the affective and instinctive reactions of animals. It is assumed that emotions are residual manifestations of affects that once accompanied full-fledged biological reactions. According to this concept, the expressive movements that accompany our fear are seen as rudimentary responses in flight and defense, and the expressive movements that accompany our anger are seen as rudimentary remnants of the movements that once accompanied the attack response in our animal ancestors. Fear has come to be seen as a "slowed down flight", and anger as a "slowed down fight", that is, emotions are positioned as a "fading echo" of elementary behavior programs. The logic of this theory leads to somewhat controversial conclusions about the withering away of emotions as such and does not explain the diversity of the human emotional world.
2.3. Psychoanalytic concept of emotions Sigmund Freud
Psychoanalysis draws attention to the energy component of mental processes, considering the emotional sphere in this regard. Despite the fact that the proposed abstract version of the interpretation of emotions had little to do with the organization of the brain, it subsequently attracted the attention of many researchers who dealt with this problem. According to Sigmund Freud, the subconscious is a source of excess energy, which he defines as libido. The structural content of the libido is due to the conflict situation that took place in the past and is encrypted at the instinctive level. It should be noted that the facts that testify to the pronounced plasticity of the nervous system do not agree well with the idea of a “preserved” conflict, not to mention the fact that biological meaning is poorly visible in this hypothesis. Over time, psychoanalysis came to the conclusion that the energy of the “subconscious” is not stored in the structures of the brain as a “developmental defect”, but is a consequence of the appearance of an excess of energy in the nervous system, as a result of imperfect adaptation of the individual in society. For example, A. Adler believed that most children initially have a sense of their own imperfection, in comparison with "omnipotent adults", which leads to the formation of an inferiority complex. Personal development, according to Adler's views, depends on how this complex will be compensated. In pathological cases, a person may try to compensate for his inferiority complex by striving for power over others.
2.4. Peipets' structural theory of emotions
The concept of the American neurologist James Peipets, a classic example of a neuropsychological approach to considering emotions, was published in 1937. Studying emotional disorders in patients with lesions of the hippocampus and cingulate gyrus, Peipets put forward a hypothesis about the existence of a single system that combines a number of brain structures and forms a brain substrate for emotions. This system is a closed circuit and includes: the hypothalamus, the anteroventral nucleus of the thalamus, the cingulate gyrus, the hippocampus, and the mamillary nuclei of the hypothalamus. She received the name of the Peipets circle. Later, in 1952, the structure called the circle of Peipets was named by Paul McLean the limbic system (the name took into account that the cingulate gyrus borders the base of the forebrain). The source of excitation of the limbic system is the hypothalamus, the activity of which is modulated by the underlying structures of the midbrain and, through the thalamus, transmits excitation to the cingulate gyrus of the cerebral cortex. According to James Peipets, the cingulate gyrus is the substratum of conscious emotional experiences. Signals from the cingulate gyrus, through the hippocampus and mammillary bodies, again reach the hypothalamus, providing feedback to the limbic system. Thus, subjective experiences that arise at the level of the cortex control the visceral and motor manifestations of emotions. There are a number of objections to James Peipetz's theory. Thus, the experiment showed that stimulation of the human hippocampus by electric current is not accompanied by the appearance of emotions (fear, anger), and subjectively, patients experience only confusion.
2.5. James-Lange somatic theory of emotions
The somatic theory of emotions was put forward independently by the American philosopher and psychologist William James and the Danish physician Carl Georg Lange in 1880-1890. The basis for the theory was the analysis of the correspondence between the objective manifestation of the activity of the vegetative sphere and the subjective sensation of the experienced emotion. According to this theory, emotional sensation is a manifestation in the mind of functional rearrangements in the body that occur at the level of the autonomic nervous system. External irritation causes reflex changes in the activity of the heart, respiration, blood circulation, muscle tone, as a result of which various sensations are projected into consciousness, from which the experience of emotions is composed. That is, first, under the influence of external stimuli, changes in the body characteristic of emotions occur, and only then, as a result of them, does the emotion itself arise. If autonomic responses are cause and emotions are effects on a continuum of organism-environment interactions, then “we are sad because we cry, angry because we strike, afraid because we tremble.” In comparison with the rudimentary theory of emotions, which considers them in the context of elementary programs of behavior, the James-Lange theory affects the deeper mechanisms of behavior, evaluating emotions at the preparatory stage, as a set of vegetative reactions that ensure the implementation of the action plan. It should be noted that in both concepts, emotions are considered somewhat one-sidedly, as an attribute of a small set of innate behavior programs, therefore it seems that a number of processes of our consciousness are devoid of emotional accompaniment, and, accordingly, the richness of the emotional sphere inherent in a person becomes difficult to explain.
