convert

In T. Dalgleish and M. Power (Eds.).

Handbook of Cognition and Emotion.

Sussex, U.K.: John

Wiley & Sons, Ltd., 1999.

Chapter 3

Basic Emotions

Paul Ekman

University of California, San Francisco, CA, USA

INTRODUCTION

In this chapter I consolidate my previous writings about basic emotions (Ekman, 1984, 1992a,

1992b) and introduce a few changes in my thinking. My views over the past 40 years have

changed radically from my initial view (Ekman, 1957) that: (a) a pleasant—unpleasant and

active—passive scale were sufficient to capture the differences among emotions; and (b) the

relationship between a facial configuration and what it signified is socially learned and culturally

variable. I was forced to adopt the opposite view by findings from my own and others’ cross-

cultural studies of facial expressions. There are some who have challenged this by now quite

large body of evidence: I describe those challenges and the answers to them in Chapter 16.

The framework I describe below is most influenced by Darwin (1872/1997) and Tomkins

(1962), although I do not accept in total what either said. There are three meanings of the term

“basic” (see also Ortony & Turner, 1990). First, it distinguishes those who maintain that there are

a number of separate emotions, that differ one from another in important ways. From this

perspective, fear, anger, disgust, sadness and contempt, all negative emotions, differ in their ap-

praisal, antecedent events, probable behavioral response, physiology and other characteristics

described below. So, too, amusement, pride in achievement, satisfaction, relief and contentment,

all positive emotions, differ from each other. This basic emotions perspective is in contrast to

those who treat emotions as fundamentally the same, differing only in terms of intensity or

pleasantness.

To identify separate discrete emotions does not necessarily require that one also take an

evolutionary view of emotions. A social constructionist could allow for separate emotions

without embracing the second meaning of the adjective “basic”. Even the discovery of universals

in expression or in antecedent events does not require giving a major role to evolution. Instead,

one can attribute universals to species-constant learning—social learning which will usually

occur for all members of the species, regardless of culture (cf. Allport, 1924). In this view it is

ontogeny, not phylogeny, which is responsible for any commonalities in emotion; universals in

expression are due to what ethologists call “conventionalization”, not “ritualization” (see Ekman,

1979 for a discussion of these distinctions as applied to emotion).

The second meaning of the adjective “basic” is to indicate instead the view that emotions

evolved for their adaptive value in dealing with

fundamental life tasks.

Innate factors play a role

in accounting for the characteristics they share, not species-constant or species-variable learning.

There are a number of ways to describe these fundamental life tasks. Johnson-Laird & Oatley

(1992) say they are universal human predicaments, such as achievements, losses, frustrations,

etc. Each emotion thus prompts us in a direction which, in the course of evolution, has done

better than other solutions in recurring circumstances that are relevant to goals. Lazarus (1991)

talks of “common adaptational tasks as these are appraised and configured into core relational

themes” (p. 202) and gives examples of facing an immediate danger, experiencing an irrevocable

loss, progressing towards the realization of a goal, etc. Stein & Trabasso (1992) say that in

happiness a goal is attained or maintained, in sadness there is a failure to attain or maintain a

goal, in anger an agent causes a loss of a goal, and in fear there is an expectation of failure to

achieve a goal. Tooby & Cosmides (1990) tell us that emotions impose on the present world an

interpretative landscape derived from the covariant structure of the past . . .”. Emotions, they say,

deal with recurrent ". . . adaptive situations . . . fighting, falling in love, escaping predators,

confronting sexual infidelity, and so on, each [of which] recurred innumerable times in

evolutionary history . . .” (pp. 407—408). Tooby & Cosmides emphasize what I consider the

crucial element which distinguishes the emotions: our appraisal of a current event is influenced

by our ancestral past.

These different descriptions are quite compatible, each emphasizing another aspect of the

phenomenon. Common to all these views is the presumption that emotions are designed to deal

with inter-organismic encounters, between people or between people and other animals.

Nevertheless, it is important to note that emotions can and do occur when we are not in the

presence of others, and are not imagining other people. We can have emotional reactions to

thunder, music, loss of physical support, auto-erotic activity, etc. Yet I believe the primary

function of emotion is to mobilize the organism to deal quickly with important interpersonal

encounters, prepared to do so by what types of activity have been adaptive in the past. The past

refers in part to what has been adaptive in the past history of our species, and the past refers also

to what has been adaptive in our own individual life history.

The term “basic” has been used also to describe elements that combine to form more complex

or compound emotions. So, for example, smugness might be considered to be a blend of the two

elemental emotions, happiness and contempt. Earlier we (Ekman & Friesen, 1975) made just

such a proposal about facial expressions. I am less certain now about whether or not two basic

emotions can occur simultaneously, although that may well depend upon what aspect of emotion

is considered. In any case, I will not consider further this meaning of the term “basic”, since no

one (other than Plutchik, 1962), who currently works from a basic emotion framework, has been

much concerned with this meaning.

THE CHARACTERISTICS THAT DISTINGUISH BASIC EMOTIONS

I will describe a number of characteristics which are useful in distinguishing one emotion from

another. I will also describe other characteristics shared by all emotions, but which are helpful in

distinguishing emotions from other affective phenomena, such as moods or emotional traits.

Distinctive Universal Signals

I have gone back and forth on the question of whether or not a universal signal is the

sine qua

non

for emotion (Ekman, 1984; 1992a, 1992b). Once again I will set out that claim, as a

challenge for someone to identify states which have all the other characteristics I describe below

but which have no signal. To date there is no such evidence, and I doubt it will be found. I

believe it was central to the evolution of emotions that they inform conspecifics, without choice

or consideration, about what is occurring: inside the person (plans, memories, physiological

changes), what most likely occurred before to bring about that expression (antecedents), and

what is most likely to occur next (immediate consequences. regulatory attempts, coping). For

example, when we see a person with a disgust expression, we know that the person is responding

to something offensive to taste or smell, literally or metaphorically, that the person is likely to

make sounds such as “yuck” rather than “yum”, and is likely to turn away from the source of

stimulation. Elsewhere (Ekman, 1993; 1997) I have described seven classes of information that

emotional signals may provide, and the research necessary to establish that this is so.
Emotional expressions are crucial to the development and regulation of interpersonal
relationships. To mention just three examples, facial expressions should be involved in the
formation of attachments (in infancy as well as in courtship), and in the regulation, acceleration
or deceleration of aggression. People I have studied who have congenital facial paralysis
(Mobius syndrome) report great difficulty in developing and maintaining even casual
relationships, since they have no capability for facial expressiveness. Ross (1981) also found that
stroke patients who can not properly identify the prosody that accompanies speech, or who
cannot generate the prosody that accompanies emotion utterances, have severe interpersonal
difficulties.

Moods and emotional traits do not own their own distinctive signals, but instead we infer

these affective phenomena, in part at least, from the fact that they are saturated with the signals

of one or another emotion. A high incidence of anger-related signals can suggest an irritable

mood or a hostile trait, for example.

To say that it was crucial to the evolution of emotions that they inform conspecifics about

matters of import, does not mean that in each and every instance in which emotions occur a

signal will be present. Emotions obviously do occur without any evident signal, because we can,

to a very large extent, inhibit the appearance of a signal. Also, a threshold may need to be

crossed to bring about an expressive signal, and that threshold may vary across individuals. If we

could measure the brain areas which send information to the facial nucleus during spontaneous

emotional experience, I expect we would find that there is some distinctive activity, even in low

threshold states or when an individual is attempting to inhibit emotion. This remains an empirical

question.

Not only can there be emotion without expression, there can be what appears to be expression

without emotion. Humans can deliberately or habitually fabricate a facsimile of an emotional

expression, facially and vocally. This may happen for many reasons; for example, to mislead or

to refer to an emotion that is not currently experienced. There is quite robust evidence (for a

summary, see Ekman & Davidson, 1990) that facial expressions differ in subtle ways when a

smile occurs involuntarily as part of one or another enjoyment experiences, as compared to either

social smiling or deliberately made false smiles. If the research was done I expect it would also

be possible to distinguish fabricated signs of emotion from actual emotional expressions for

other emotions, and in the voice as well as the face (for a further discussion of when there is

emotion without expression and expression without emotion, see Ekman 1993; 1997).

Emotion-specific Physiology

If basic emotions evolved to deal with fundamental life tasks, they should not only provide

information through expressions to conspecifics about what is occurring, but there should also be

physiological changes preparing the organism to respond differently in different emotional states.

There is evidence (Ekman, Levenson & Friesen, 1983; Levenson, Ekman & Friesen, 1990) for

distinctive patterns of autonomic nervous system (ANS) activity for anger, fear and disgust, and

it appears that there may also be a distinctive pattern for sadness (Levenson et al., 1991). These

findings have now been replicated in four separate experiments, in two different age groups.

Although there are some inconsistencies between the ANS patterns they found and the findings

of other investigators, there are many consistencies with the results of Schwartz, Weinberger &

Singer (1981), Ax (1953),

Roberts & Weerts (1982) and Graham (1962).

The only recent challenge to our findings was Stemmler’s (1989) report that ANS patterning

was specific to how the emotion was elicited. However, this may be due to a number of

methodological problems, including measuring physiology a considerable period after the

induction was over, studying very low emotional intensities, and including a substantial number

of subjects who reported not experiencing the emotion. We have preliminary evidence in two

different studies (Levenson et al., 1991; Ekman & Davidson, 1991) of the same emotion-specific

pattern when emotion was elicited in very different ways.

Boiten (1996) also claims to have disproved our findings of emotion-specific ANS changes as

a result of assembling different patterns of facial muscular movement. We (Levenson & Ekman,

in preparation) believe he did not produce such evidence, but instead that his data further

supports our findings. However, we acknowledge that the matter is far from being completely

settled. Noting that qualification, I will further consider what the implications are if further

research strengthens and supports our findings to date of emotion-specific physiology.

Such evidence would be a challenge to those who view emotion as a social construction with

no important biological contribution. Social constructionists might dismiss our findings by

claiming that these different patterns of ANS activity were socially learned, not the product of

evolution. Their argument would be that people are taught to engage in different types of

behavior when experiencing different emotions. Over time this will establish different patterns of

ANS activity, subserving these different actions patterns. If people show the same emotion-

specific ANS activity, that may simply reflect common, culturally-based socialization practices.

Presumably those who advocate such a view should expect different behavioral patterns to be

taught for each emotion, and therefore different patterns of ANS activity should come to be

established with each emotion in cultures which are known to differ in their attitudes about

emotion.

Most simply put, the social constructionist emphasizes the past history of the individual, while

the evolutionary theorist emphasizes the past history of the species in explaining why there is

emotion-specific ANS activity. If it is only ontogeny, then to the extent to which different people

learn different ways of behaving when experiencing one or another emotion, there should be

different patterns of ANS activity observed for the emotions we have studied. Levenson et al.

(1992) recently repeated their experiments in a non-Western culture. They studied the

Minangkabau of Western Sumatra, a fundamentalist Moslem, matrilineal society. They

replicated Ekman, Levenson & Friesen’s (1983) original findings of emotion-specific ANS

activity in this very different culture. This provides important support consistent with an

evolutionary view that these are basic emotions.
Does the failure to find emotion-specific ANS activity for enjoyment and surprise mean that
these are not basic emotions? Kemper (1978) would make that argument, for he views
differentiated ANS activity as the

sine qua non

for basic emotions. But consider why we expect

emotion-specific ANS activity in the first place. Our presumption is that these ANS patterns
evolved because they subserve patterns of motor behavior which were adaptive for each of these
emotions, preparing the organism for quite different actions. For example, fighting might well
have been the adaptive action in anger, which is consistent with the finding that blood goes to the
hands in anger. Fleeing from a predator might well have been the adaptive action in fear, which
is consistent with the finding that blood goes to large skeletal muscles (for a more elaborate
discussion of this reasoning, see Levenson, Ekman & Friesen, 1990).

Freezing in fear might seem to create a problem for this line of reasoning, but not if freezing is

interpreted as a fearful state in which the organism is nevertheless still prepared, autonomically,

for fast flight if the freezing action does not provide concealment. Not every fearful experience

involves a threat from which one can flee. The doctor’s report, that more tests are necessary to

confirm whether the preliminary results are correct in indicating a terminal illness, arouses fear

but the event is not one the person can flee from. The ANS pattern of activity which subserves

flight might still occur in this example, if the evolved motor program for this emotion is flight. It

is a question which awaits research.

Öhman’s (1986) analysis of fear is relevant to these complexities. He distinguishes fear of

animals, fear of people, and fear of inanimate objects, suggesting that different actions may have

evolved for fear of a predator as compared to social fears. It is not clear whether he views

predator fear as including fear of other aggressive humans, or whether it is strictly limited to fear

of other animals. Neither is it certain from his writings whether he would consider the fear of the

doctor’s news about terminal illness to be a predator or social fear.

H no specific pattern of motor activity had survival value for an emotion, then there would be

no reason to expect a specific pattern of ANS activity to have been established for that emotion.

That is why I think we have not found an emotion-specific pattern, a pattern which differs from

each of the other emotions, for either surprise or enjoyment.

However, it is necessary to posit emotion-specific central nervous system (CNS) activity in

my account of basic emotions. The distinctive features of each emotion, including the changes

not just in expression but in memories, imagery, expectations and other cognitive activities,

could not occur without central nervous system organization and direction. There must be

unique

physiological patterns for each emotion, and these CNS patterns should be specific to these

emotions not found in other mental activity. Here I am reaching far beyond the data, but not far

beyond what the new techniques for measuring brain activity may allow us to discover in this

decade of the brain.
My contention is consistent with the findings of those who have used EEG measures of regional
brain activity to study emotion (for reviews of this literature, see Davidson, 1984, 1987).
Davidson et al.’s (1990) recent findings of different patterns of regional brain activity coincident
with enjoyment and disgust facial expressions can be explained as reflecting

either

differences in

approach vs. withdrawal, or positive vs. negative emotions. More critical for my argument are
new findings of LeDoux (1992).

Automatic Appraisal Mechanism

Many years ago I (Ekman, 1977) proposed two appraisal mechanisms, one automatic and the

other extended:

There must be an appraiser mechanism which selectively attends to those stimuli (external or internal) which are
the occasion for . . . [one or another emotion]. Since the interval between stimulus and emotional response is
sometimes extraordinarily short, the appraisal mechanism must be capable of operating with great speed. Often
the appraisal is not only quick but it happens without awareness, so I must postulate that the appraisal mechanism
is able to operate automatically. It must be constructed so that it quickly attends to some stimuli, determining not
only that they pertain to emotion, but to which emotion . . . Appraisal is not always automatic. Sometimes the
evaluation of what is happening is slow, deliberate and conscious. With such a more extended appraisal there
may be some autonomic arousal, but perhaps not of a kind which is differentiated. The person could be said to be
aroused or alerted, but no specific emotion is operative. Cognition plays the important role in determining what
will transpire. During such extended appraisal the evaluation may match to the selective filters of the automatic
appraiser . . . . It need not be, however; the experience may be diffuse rather than specific to one emotion” (pp.
58—59).

Similar views have since been described by Zajonc (1985), Öhman (1986). Leventhal & Scherer

(1987) and Buck (1985). LeDoux’s (1991) study of the anatomy of emotion has led him also to

take a view nearly identical to what I proposed:

Emotional processing systems . . . tend to use the minimal stimulus representation possible to activate emotional
response control systems, which characteristically involve relatively hard-wired, species-typical behaviors and
physiological reactions. Emotional reactions . . . need to be executed with speed, and the use of the highest level
of stimulus processing is maladaptive when a lower level will do . . . However, not all emotional reactions can be
mediated by primitive sensory events and subcortical neural circuits (p. 50).

In a major shift in his own position to incorporate the evidence on basic emotions, Lazarus

(1991) recently adopted my position on this issue: “I distinguish between two modes of

appraisal: one automatic, unreflective, and unconscious or preconscious, the other deliberate and

conscious” (p. 3, Chapter 5). Lazarus succinctly described what he called a “psychobiological

principle” which, he said, “provides for universals in the emotion process. Once the appraisals

have been made, the emotional response is a foregone conclusion, a consequence of biology”

(pp. 191—192). Lazarus here goes further than I do, as I believe that the responses reflect not

just biology but social learning as well. Stein & Trabasso’s (1992) analysis of appraisal, while

based on very different data, is very similar, as they point out, to Lazarus’s position.

It is not known exactly how a biological contribution to appraisal operates; what it is that is

given, which is then operated on automatically. It seems reasonable to presume that that which is

biologically given must be related to the universal antecedents of emotion described below. How

does this occur, by what mechanism?

Automatic appraisal does not simply and solely operate on what is given biologically, dealing

only with stimulus events that exactly fit what is given. In all likelihood, not enough is given for

automatic appraisal to ever operate without considerable amplification and detailing through

social learning (see, especially, Öhman, 1986 on this point). An exception might be the appraisal

which occurs to a sudden loss of support, or when an object is perceived to be moving very

quickly directly into one’s visual field. But such examples are probably rare. Perhaps they act as

metaphors for many other events to become associated through experience with emotion.

Automatic appraisal operates also on a variety of stimulus events that we have repeatedly

encountered or with events which though rare were extraordinarily intense. Lazarus notes how

differences in our experience allows for enormous variations in the specifics of what calls forth

emotion which are attributable to personality, family and culture. And yet it is not totally

malleable. There are some commonalities in what calls forth an emotion for anyone:

The ancestrally recurrent structured situation that the organism categorizes itself as being in is the “meaning” of
the situation for that organism. It “sees”, i.e. is organized to respond to, previous fitness contingencies, not
present ones... Emotions

...

lead organisms to act as if certain things were true about the present circumstances,

whether or not they are, because they were true of past circumstances . .

In this lies their strength and their

weakness . . . [The automatic appraisal] cannot detect when the invariances that held true ancestrally no longer
obtain (Tooby & Cosmides, 1990, pp. 418—419).

Often in civilized life, our emotions occur in response to words, not actions, to events which

are complex and indirect, and it is an extended appraisal process which operates with

consciousness and deliberation. Then the person is quite aware of what Lazarus calls the

“meaning analysis” which occurs. Here is another entry place for social learning to generate

large differences between cultural groups, and major individual differences within a culture.

A number of theorists (see reviews by Ellsworth, 1991; Scherer, 1991) have developed

models of how appraisal processes may operate. Reading their descriptions and considering most
of their data sources, it appears that they are considering only extended appraisal, but I think that
they believe their models to characterize automatic appraisal as well. Their models are not
contradictory with a basic emotions position, but they apparently do see a contradiction. Lazarus,
I believe, is the only appraisal theorist who also incorporates basic emotions in his framework.
Lazarus differs from the other appraisal theorists in not offering a model of how the appraisal
process works. Instead, he more abstractly describes the relevant principal and the prototypic
events (core relational themes) for each emotion.

Universal Antecedent Events

If emotions are viewed as having evolved to deal with fundamental life tasks in ways which have

been adaptive phylogenetically, then it is logically consistent to expect that there will be some

common elements in the contexts in which emotions are found to occur. This is not to presume

that every social context which calls forth an emotion will be the same for all people within or

across cultures. Clearly, there must be major differences attributable to social learning

experiences. Öhman (1986) describes how both evolution and social learning contribute to the

establishment of those events which call forth one or another emotion.

. . . evolutionary economy has left to environmental influences to inscribe the exact characteristics of dangerous
predators . . . learning is critically involved in selecting which stimuli activate the predatory defense system. But
this learning is likely to be biologically primed or constrained in the sense that the responses are much more
easily attached to some types of stimuli than to others. In other words, it is appropriate to speak about
biologically prepared learning. Thus

is likely to require only minimal input in terms of training, and to result in

very persistent responses that are not easily extinguished (pp. 128—129).

Öhman cites research by Mineka et al. (1984) showing that limited exposure is sufficient for

establishing snake fears in monkeys which are very difficult to extinguish. Lazarus (1991) cites

this same study to argue his rather similar view. Although he emphasizes what he calls “meaning

analysis”, Lazarus also describes common antecedent events. Johnson-Laird & Oatley’s (1992)

view is also similar.

My view on this matter, which is in agreement with Öhman, Lazarus, Johnson-Laird &

Oatley, and Stein and her colleagues, developed in the 1970s when I learned of the findings of

Boucher & Brant, which they did not publish until some years later (1981). They found

commonalities in emotion antecedents in the many non-Western cultures they examined. It was

not in the specific details but on a more abstract level that universality in antecedent events was

found. The loss of a significant other, they found, is “. . . an antecedent to sadness in many,

perhaps all, cultures. But who a significant other is or can be will differ from culture to culture”

(Boucher, 1983, p. 407).

On the basis of Boucher & Brant’s findings, Ekman & Friesen (1975) formulated prototypic

interpersonal events which would universally call forth each of this set of emotions. For

example, the antecedent event for fear is physical or psychological harm. Lazarus (1991), has a

similar but in some ways different account, describing what he calls the “core relational theme”

unique to the appraisal of each emotion. Neither of us has evidence, but what we each have

proposed is consistent with Boucher & Brant’s findings, and with those of Scherer and his group

(Scherer, Summerfield & Wallbott, 1983) in their study of the antecedents of emotion in Western

cultures.

Unfortunately there is little ethological description of the commonalities in the naturally

occurring antecedent events for emotions within and across cultures. There is questionnaire and

also interview data in which subjects are asked to describe emotional events. However, we do

not yet know the extent to which such data resembles what actually occurs during emotion, how

much idealization, and stereotyping may occur when subjects coldly describe what they think

about their emotional experience.

So far I have discussed a number of characteristics which distinguish one emotion from

another—universal signals, distinctive physiology, automatic appraisal influenced by both

ontogenetic and phylogenetic past, and commonalities in the antecedents events which call forth

the emotion. Now I will much more briefly describe a number of other characteristics.

I do

not

maintain that if biology has played an important role in emotion, then emotions must

appear, fully differentiated, at birth or early in life before much opportunity for learning has

occurred. Izard (1977) disagrees and has reported evidence which he believes shows the early

appearance of each emotion. His position and evidence has been convincingly challenged by

Camras (1992) and also by Oster, Hegley & Nagel (1992). When this matter is settled,

regularities in the first appearance of each emotion may be useful in differentiating one emotion

from another.

Emotions are likely to be observable in other primates. Darwin considered that to be crucial,

and it was the chief focus of his book

The Expression of the Emotions in Man and Animals

(1872/1998). In modern times, Plutchik was the first (1962) to make this a defining characteristic

of emotions. A number of those studying animal behavior have resisted emotion terminology,

much like the Skinnerians of times past, but some (Chevalier-Skolnikoff, 1973; Redican, 1982)

have pointed to similarities in expression between humans and other primates. It is possible that

there might be some emotions which are unique to humans, but there is no convincing evidence

that is so. Of course, the capacity to represent emotional experience in words changes many

aspects of emotional experience in ways which I can not describe here.

Emotions can have a very fast onset, beginning so quickly that they can happen before one is

aware that they have begun. Quick onset is central to the adaptive value of emotions, mobilizing

us quickly to respond to important events. It is also adaptive for the response changes which can

occur so quickly not to last very long unless the emotion is evoked again. Here is not the place to

argue about just how long an emotion typically lasts, but certainly it is not hours or days, but

more in the realm of minutes and seconds. I believe those who claim that emotions endure for

much longer time periods are summating what is actually a series of briefer emotion episodes.

Because emotions can occur with a very rapid onset, through automatic appraisal, with little

awareness, and with involuntary changes in expression and physiology, we often experience

emotions as happening to us. Emotions are unbidden, not chosen by us.

I expect that specific emotions regulate the way in which we think, and that this will be

evident in memories, imagery and expectations. I suspect that the relationship between emotions

and thoughts is not solely a function of social learning because of biological constraints put on

the cognitive system as well as the emotion system.

The subjective experience of emotion, how each emotion feels, is for some at the center of

what an emotion is. This presumably includes physical sensations, and other feelings which are

the consequence of feedback from the various response changes which occur uniquely for each

emotion. Regrettably, most of what we know about subjective experience comes from

questionnaires, filled out by people who are not having an emotion, trying to remember what it

feels like. It is no easy matter to assess subjective experience, especially if what is wanted is

something more than simply the amount of positive or negative emotion (see Rosenberg &

Ekman, 1994).

Before turning to the question of how many emotions there are, let me mention the concept of

emotion families, which may help to clear away some of the confusion and argument about this

matter. Each emotion is not a single affective state but a family of related states. Each member of

an emotion family shares the characteristics I have described. These shared characteristics within

a family differ between emotion families, distinguishing one family from another. Put in other

terms, each emotion family can be considered to constitute a theme and variations. The theme is

composed of the characteristics unique to that family, the variations on that theme are the

product of individual differences, and differences in the specific occasion in which an emotion

occurs. The themes are the product of evolution, while the variations reflect learning.

Although the evidence is certainly not available now. I propose that the following list of

emotions will be found to share the characteristics listed in Table 3.1, and to be distinguishable

one from another: amusement, anger, contempt, contentment, disgust, embarrassment,

excitement, fear, guilt, pride in achievement, relief, sadness/distress, satisfaction, sensory

pleasure, and shame. When it is remembered that each of these words denotes a family of related

emotions, then this list of 15 emotions is quite expanded. Clearly, it omits some affective

phenomena which others have considered to be emotions. Guilt is a likely candidate, and I have

no reason to make a guess one way or another. Interest, which Tomkins & Izard considered an

emotion, I think may be better regarded as a cognitive state rather than an emotion, but see

Reeve’s (1993) relevant study. The decisions are not mine; they instead should be resolved by

research, which will establish whether or not these candidates evidence the characteristics listed

in Table 3.1.

More irksome to some may be my omission of romantic or parental love and hate, which are

clearly affective, as is grief, and jealousy. Elsewhere (Ekman. 1984; 1992a, 1992b) I have more

fully explained my view that these are emotional

plots,

more specific, more enduring than the

basic emotions, specific contexts in which a number but not all of the basic emotions can be

expected to occur. There is another set of affective phenomena, the moods, which have different

causes and last much longer, and are highly saturated with emotions. And still another set of

affective phenomena are the affective personality traits, such as hostility.

Before leaving the struggle over the question as to how many emotions there are, it is worth

considering the possibility that there are probably more emotional words than there are emotions,

terms which refer not only to the emotion but features of the eliciting situation, of differential

response to that situation, etc. Oatley & Johnson-Laird (1987) and Stein & Trabasso (1992)

elaborate how this occurs, and how such variations in emotion terms can be dealt with from a

basic emotions viewpoint.

Table 3.1

Characteristics which distinguish basic emotions from one another and from other

affective phenomena

1.  Distinctive universal signals
2.  Distinctive physiology
3.  Automatic appraisal, tuned to:
4.  Distinctive universals in antecedent events
5.  Distinctive appearance developmentally
6.  Presence in other primates
7.  Quick onset
8.  Brief duration
9.  Unbidden occurrence
10. Distinctive thoughts, memories images
11. Distinctive subjective experience

DOES ANY ONE CHARACTERISTIC DISTINGUISH THE BASIC EMOTIONS?

I do not think any of the characteristics should be regarded as the

sine qua non

for emotions, the

hallmark which distinguishes emotions from other affective phenomena. What is unique is that

when an emotion occurs we are dealing with current fundamental life tasks in ways which were

adaptive in our evolutionary past. This is not to deny that our own individual past experience will

also influence how we deal with these fundamental life tasks, but that is not what is unique to

emotions. It is our past as a species in dealing with fundamental life tasks and how that organizes

and at least initially influences how we appraise and respond to a current event which marks the

emotions. I would add also the high probability that at least some of the time the occurrence of

that emotion is signaled to others involuntarily.

THE VALUE OF THE BASIC EMOTIONS POSITION

The basic emotions position which I have described does not dismiss the variety of affective

phenomena, it attempts to organize those phenomena, highlighting possible differences between

basic emotions and other affective phenomena which can only be determined by further research.

It should be clear by now that I do not allow for “non-basic” emotions. All the emotions which

share the characteristics I have described are basic.

If all emotions are basic, what then is the value of using that term? It underlines the

differences between this and other viewpoints and approaches to emotion, which do not consider

emotions to be separate one from another and/or do not take an evolutionary viewpoint. It

captures what is unique about emotion, and what emotions have in common which distinguish

them from other phenomena. The basic emotions framework allows us to distinguish emotions

from other affective phenomena in terms of the characteristics I have described. This framework

serves us well in raising for empirical study a number of questions about other affective states

which further research might show are also basic emotions. The adjective “basic” should not be

the issue, however, but instead what questions this stance raises for research about emotion. The

characteristics I have described are meant as challenges for more research. They point us to what

we still need to learn about the emotions. They highlight the gaps in our knowledge. The utility

of this approach will be evident 10 years from now by what research it generates to confirm or

disconfirm the possibilities I have suggested, and new possibilities I have not conceived of.

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

I thank Richard Davidson, Phoebe Ellsworth, Wallace V. Friesen, Dacher Keltner, Richard

Lazarus, Robert Levenson, Nancy Stein, Keith Oatley, Harriet Oster and Erika Rosenberg for

their helpful criticisms and suggestions on earlier versions of this paper. Preparation was

supported, by a Research Scientist Award from the National Institute of

Mental Health (MH06091).

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