Nicole Anderson
Dr. Preston
AP English 12B
29 January 2012
Emotion
Why do certain situations evoke such extreme differences in response? Some people
never shed a tear, and others absolutely love crying. Does it all have to do with how you were
raised or is it simply your own personality? Is the root of emotion psychological or genetic? I
hear all the time that the heart is deceitful and to listen to your head and not your emotions. Then
people say to follow your heart. These ideas are very contradictory.
The rationalist history of western thought portrays emotion as “ fundamentally flawed, and
something we must therefore control (Haidt, 2001).” However, there has been other talk that suggests
emotions are “ wise and not to be ignored (Buss, 2001; Clore, in press; Keltner & Haidt, 1999;
Ketelaar, 2004, 2005; Ketelaar & Clore, 1997).” Emotions are part of our human nature, which
makes it hard to believe that they came about just to disrupt judgment and decision making. If you
think about the phenomenology of emotion however, it suggests otherwise: “The effects of emotion
often seem objectively irrational and we feel the need to get them under control (Baumeister, Vohs,
& Tice, this volume; Varey & Kahneman, 1992; Kahneman, 1999; Forgas & Ciarrochi, 2002).”
Emotions can change the way we think and behave in different situations, whether its
personal or social. You can be emotionally extreme in either direction which has an affect on your
decision making. Which brings up my question; Can specific emotions be linked to specific adaptive
problems? Economists have argued that emotions will act as a way to sustain current commitments
that oppose the attractive immediate rewards. Frank summarized the logic of the theory as follows
(Frank, 1988, p. 82):
“The idea is that if the psychological reward mechanism is constrained to emphasize rewards in the
present moment, the simplest counter to a specious reward from cheating is to have a current feeling
that tugs in precisely the opposite direction. …because [the emotion] coincides with the moment of
choice...it can negate the spurious attraction of the imminent material reward.” An example is how
emotions such as love and guilt can influence social decision making. “When one experiences
feelings of love for a romantic partner, for example, the immediate positive reward the emotion
produces counteracts the pull of desire for an attractive other. Likewise, feelings of guilt immediately
punish thoughts of selfishly cheating an ally and thus prevent the individual from compromising a
cooperative relationship.” Though you might be giving up a smaller immediate gain, these emotions
allow for bigger rewards in the long run. “For example, if one were drawn away from every possible
romantic commitment by the prospect of finding a still more attractive mate, one could never reap the
fitness benefits of long-term mateship, including cooperative child rearing (Hurtado & Hill, 1992;
Marlowe, 2003; Pillsworth & Haselton, 2005) and assurance of mutual care in times of dire need
(e.g., Nesse, 2001).”
Psychologists have proposed that males and females have come up with different solutions to
a number of sex linked adaptive problems. Differences in parenting styles can create some of the
largest conflicts between the sexes. Men's reproductive investments are usually quite small, and the
maximum limit on a males reproductive success is usually based on how many fertile partners they
can access (Symons, 1979; Trivers, 1972). On the other hand, women have a much larger investment.
At least nine months of pregnancy, typically followed by years of breastfeeding. These conditions
usually means there is conflict waiting to happen. For most women, the quality of a man is much
more important than the number of men they can get, whereas for the men who go about a short term
mating strategy, quantity is usually more important than quality. “Men, on average, desire sex earlier
in relationships and they maintain a desire for sexual variety even after finding a long-term mate
(Schmitt et al., 2003; also see Buss, 2003, for a review).”
Since first time intercourse signals the possibility of pregnancy for a women, they feel the
need to secure the relationship and commitment of her partner. For men who are pursuing a short
term mating strategy, the first time signifies two things: that a goal has been achieved, and that they
may get entangled in an unwanted long term relationship. After the first time, women usually
experience increased feelings and desires for long term commitments with her partner, whereas the
men usually experience negative emotions marked by a drop in the level of physical attraction they
had towards their partner.
Males and females may also have differences in the feelings of regret after sex. “The
affective experience of regret is hypothesized to function to improve future decision making by
enabling people to avoid mistakes that have important consequences (Roese, 2005; Haselton, Poore,
von Hippel, Gonzaga, & Buss, 2005; Zeelenberg, 1999).” More often than not, the men regret a
missed opportunity (sexual omission) and the women regret what they did do (sexual commission).
There is growing evidence that suggests the emotions men and women experience are linked with
specific adaptive problems each sex faced as they were growing up.