Running Head: EMOTION AND MOTIVATION

Emotion and Motivation Ashlen Saunders Duke Dr. Marci Campbell Psychology 1010 10 July 2013

EMOTION AND MOTIVATION

Introduction When was the last time you felt motivated? Yesterday? Last week? Or has it been years? Well actually, something is motivating you to read this right now! And as you read,

pay attention to the emotion you feel. It could be anger, joy, sadness, hope or a combination of emotions. Emotion and motivation affect everyone. People can feel emotion anywhere from driving to work to watching TV. Emotion is defined as a positive or negative experience that is associated with a particular pattern of psychological activity. It is important to understand it because it can drive the best and worst human behavior. Emotion also has a great affect on motivation, which is the purpose for a cause of an action. Nothing would ever happen without motivation. This paper will discuss the effect of positive and negative emotion on overall wellness, the regulation of emotion and the different types of motivation. Literature Review In a recent study conducted by Dr. Richard J. Davidson a link was discovered between positive and negative emotion and physical wellbeing. 52 women, ages 57 to 60, were asked to write about extremely positive and extremely negative events in their life. They were instructed to spend one minute thinking about the event and five minutes writing about it. An electroencephalogram recorded electrical activity in the brains prefrontal cortex while the women were thinking about the experience and then after the writing ended. They were then given a flu vaccine. Six months later the researchers found that the women who showed the most activity in the brains right prefrontal cortex had the lowest antibodies. However, brain activation during the positive-emotions condition was not linked to differences in antibody levels. In earlier work Dr. Davidson found that the right prefrontal cortex is more active during response to anger, fear and sadness while the left is more active during response to upbeat and positive emotions. After his research Dr.

EMOTION AND MOTIVATION

Davidson stated that the finding offered hints on how a persons mood might ultimately affect susceptibility to illness. The right prefrontal cortex, for example, communicates with certain types of immune cells, and stress appears to alter the functioning of a chemical messenger, dopamine, in the region. In addition, the right prefrontal cortex interacts with the hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenal axis, a major player in the body's stress system, which in turn is linked to the immune system (Goode, 2003). With the understanding that it is very possible for your emotional status to affect your physical body, the question is, can we control our emotions? Or in other words regulate them? Emotional regulation is the use of cognitive and behavioral strategies to influence ones emotional experience. Nine out of 10 people report that they attempt to regulate their emotional experience at least once a day (Gross, 1998). Some people use behavioral strategies like avoiding situations, distracting themselves, or using substances, while others use cognitive strategies like trying not to thinking about the cause of the

unwanted emotion. One of the most effective ways of regulating emotions is reappraisal, or changing ones emotional experience by changing the meaning of the emotion-exciting stimulus. For example, participants who watched a circumcision that was described as a joyous religious ritual had slower heart rates, had lower skin conductance levels, and reported less distress than did participants who watched the circumcision but did not hear the same description (Lazarus & Alfert, 1964). The inability to reappraise events lies at the heart of psychiatric disorders, such as depression (Gross & Munoz, 1995). So we know what we feel directly affects our brains message to our body but how do our feelings motivate what we do? Does your emotion motivate you to take your medicine, hit the gym or watch TV for hours? There are many different types of motivation. Intrinsic motivation is a motivation to take actions that are themselves rewarding, such as eating sweets because they taste good or listening to music because it sounds good. These

EMOTION AND MOTIVATION

activities dont have to payoff because they are a payoff. Extrinsic motivation is a motivation to take actions that lead to a reward. The person that chose their job just to make money is practicing extrinsic motivation because they believe it will pay off in the long run. The ability to engage in behaviors that are unrewarding in the present because we believe they will bring greater rewards in the future is one of our species most significant talents, not other species can do it like we can (Gilbert, 2006). Both kinds of motivation have their advantages, which is why many people try to build lives that include both. For example the rock star that makes the big bucks while enjoying what they do. There is also conscious and unconscious motivation. Conscious motivation is a motivation of which one is aware and unconscious motivation is a motivation of which one is not aware. A good example of unconscious motivation is a study done by the scientists at the University of Missouri in Columbia. In this study the scientists put adult male and female rats that generally embraced the opportunity to run in cages with running wheels. They logged the rats activity for six days and afterwards bred the rats that ran the most miles to each other and the rats with the least miles to each other, through 10 generations. At that point, the running rats tended to spontaneously exercise 10 times as much as the physically lazier animals. They considered different physique as a cause but determined that it did not drive differences in exercise behavior. They then considered genetics. The scientists compared the activity of thousands of genes and found that dozens of genes differed between the two groups. In other words, the rats decision to run was being driven, in part by the genetics of motivation (Reynolds, 2013). The rats decision was unconscious and was caused by their genetic make up. Other types of motivation are approach and avoidance motivation. Approach motivation is a motivation to experience positive outcome and avoidance motivation is a motivation not to experience negative outcomes. Research suggests that avoidance motivation is a more powerful approach. Most people will turn down a coin flip

EMOTION AND MOTIVATION

bet that would pay them $10 if it came up heads and require them to pay $8 if it came up tails because they believe the pain of loosing $8 will be more intense than the pleasure of winning $10 (Kahneman &Tversky, 1979). Application In my life I have tried over and over to detox, each time feeling crazier, sicker and

weaker the longer I did it. It wasnt until I reappraised my emotion that it actually worked. I read a book on detoxing and fasting that really changed my perspective on the whole thing and helped me finally detox successfully. I was able to regulate my emotions. I learned that headaches and cravings are a sign that the detox is working and when you give your body a break from heavy, processed food you are giving it the chance to sort out some of the toxic waste that has built up on a cellular level over time. Cravings and headaches are often a sign of working out remnants of whatever you are craving, such as sugar, salt, alcohol, etc. With this knowledge I took something so miserable and actually found it almost enjoyable because I knew then that it was worth it because it was working, which is also a great example of extrinsic motivation. I did something that is pretty uncomfortable only because I knew that after time the reward of feeling revitalized would be worth it. This also falls into the category of conscious motivation because it was a conscious choice to detox and avoidance motivation because I wanted to detox to avoid becoming bogged down by toxins and feel sick and weak as I age. Conclusion Writing this paper was a great experience! I loved learning about emotion and motivation because those are huge factors in human behavior. I enjoyed researching the effects of positive emotion on physical health because I have always believed those are linked and now I have a scientific study to refer back to. I also included a study about genetics affecting motivation and I would like to look into that more. It made me realize

EMOTION AND MOTIVATION

more could be out of our control that I had originally assumed. This topic could help me in many different ways in my life. I am a daughter; sister, mother, wife and friend so the main motivation for me to write about this topic was to help those around me sort out their

emotions. This is why I want to study psychology. I am one of those people that friends and family often call when they are distressed, even if we havent talked in months, and the more I understand the more insight and help I can offer. My feelings toward this topic are hopeful and excited. I want to understand as much as possible not just about emotions and motivation but many other topics of psychology. I hope to gain a great understanding of why people do what they do and why they feel what they feel so I can try to make a difference in the world. I am so full of love towards humanity I just want to find a way help people understand that what they may think is crazy is often normal human behavior and that no one is ever alone.

EMOTION AND MOTIVATION References Goode, E. (2003). Power of Positive Thinking May Have a Health Benefit, Study Says. New York Times. http://www.nytimes.com/2003/09/02/health/power-of-positivethinking-may-have-a-health-benefit-study-says.html Reynolds, G. (2013). Why Were Motivated to Exercise. Or Not. New York Times.

http://well.blogsnytimes.com/2013/04/17/why-were-motivated-toexercise-or-not/ Schacter, D., Gilbert, D., &Wegner, D., (2011). Introducing Psychology. New York, NY. Worth Publishers.