As architects of our experiences, we do not have to be at the mercy of emotions, and we can learn to master them.
To be good at emotional design, we need to understand how emotions work on two levels: first, the psychological level, which helps us conceptually describe emotions through the first-hand experience.
Second, the biological level relates to neuroscience, helping us explain how emotions function in an incredibly insightful and precise way.
To understand the science behind emotional design and psychology, let's first look at the basic building blocks of emotions and feelings.
Emotions are mental states triggered by stimuli or feelings associated with thoughts, behaviors, and pleasure.
Our species has evolved from birth to have emotions, a clever mechanism that includes a complex set of biological mechanisms designed to protect us.
Emotions affect human behavior and decisions - in subtle ways that we may not always recognize. Because we have lived side by side with our emotions for millennia, it can be difficult to truly identify, understand, and control our emotions.
According to a study by the University of California, San Diego, it is easier to sell to consumers when they are excited, and emotional states trump rational thinking (as largely applied to selling techniques that use Neuroscience).
Excitement means that the sympathetic nervous system increases activity and the brain begins to signal increased production of hormones.
When a person is aroused, their emotions become stronger and can affect their decision-making ability.
Excited people are more likely to make decisions, including bad ones, according to research.
Emotions do not arise from willpower but are built up - in reactions, triggered by or in response to stimuli.
Emotions are constructed by giving meaning to sensations and making predictions based on past experiences and concepts.
How do we generate emotions, and how can we construct them to make a convincing case for constructing a theory around them?
Brain research shows that when children are exposed to a perceived threat, they trigger a series of chemical and neurological reactions known as stress reactions, activating their biological instincts to fight, freeze, and flee.
Chronic stress and anxiety increase cortisol and adrenaline levels, both of which can cause young children to be constantly on their guard. Trauma in the first few years can also cause stress reactions to become so intense that they end when there is no perceived threat.
High thinking skills can also be inhibited by constant anxiety, which can increase heart rate, blood pressure, and blood flow to the brain.
An actor working for a psychologist stepped in to ask for an urgent call, and researchers who wanted to know how positive feelings might affect helpfulness completed a study of mood manipulation that influences decision-making.
Light, casual emotions and decisions - the meeting can live side by side, as Andrade and Ariely (2009) have shown. When we make emotionally-fueled decisions, we tend to continue to use imperfect reasoning behind them.
A promising research study suggests that the activity of glial (existing) neurons can be reduced by the release of oxytocin, which in turn promotes synaptic plasticity.
As we now know, this activity can get largely out of control, but it can also rewire the brain itself. This is fundamental to learning, and one of the most important aspects of learning is to clean the nerve space during sleep, repair neurons, and resignal genes.
This network turns on dopamine - the brain regions involved in emotions, cognition, motivation, and reward.
Positive emotions expand our attention capacity and help us to use more mental resources, improve access to memory networks and semantic relationships, and motivate us to think flexibly and efficiently.
Instead of rejecting information as useless or irrelevant, positive emotions set us on the path to accepting information and recognizing how it makes sense. They help us to grow positively and build stronger relationships with our friends, family, colleagues, and other people in our lives.
Incorporating a simple mindfulness practice into your day can go a long way to keeping your blood pressure low, and also provide an amazing calming strategy that you can use anywhere, anytime.
In time, you will see the benefits of putting this piece of self-regulation into practice when things do not go as you would like. This is a great way to regulate your emotions and behavior by strengthening the parts of the brain that switch off when you're excited.
Gathering new experiences, whether through a journey, reading a book, watching a film, gaining a new perspective, trying new foods, learning a foreign language, or even learning new words in your mother tongue, offers the opportunity to construct experiences in a new way.
This stimulates the brain to develop new concepts and bind old ones, influencing future predictions and behaviors.
Expanded vocabulary can lead to new ideas and new concepts, which in turn can not only help us to deal better with different circumstances, but also improve our understanding of the world around us, such as our relationships with other people, and improve our negotiating skills.
Together, these theories have gathered a large amount of experimental evidence and are calling for them to be expanded and built on. The term "emotional" may evoke different images but it refers to the ability to induce the brain to construct an emotional response to a particular situation, such as a positive or negative feeling, as well as the emotional responses of others.
No comments:
Post a Comment