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Commentary
Charles Starkey
Clemson University, South Carolina, USA
Starkey, Charles. 2021. “Perceptual Emotions and Emotional Virtue.”
Journal of Philosophy of Emotion 3, no. 1: 10-15. https://doi.org/10.33497/2021.summer.3.
Abstract: In this essay I focus on two areas discussed in Michael Brady’s Emotion: The Basics, namely perceptual models of emotion and the relation between emotion and virtue. Brady raises two concerns about perceptual theories: that they arguably collapse into feeling or cognitive theories of emotion; and that the analogy between emotion and perception is questionable at best, and is thus not an adequate way of characterizing emotion. I argue that a close look at perception and emotional experience reveals a structure of emotion that avoids these problems. I then explore other ways in which emotions can be operative in virtuous acts and virtue traits outside of their relation to motivation. The patterns of emotional response that we have can affect virtue because they affect the way in which we see and take-in information about the world, and the gravity that such perceptions have for us. In addition, emotions are critical to virtue because they maintain the level of importance that values have for us, and in doing so forestall axiological entropy, namely the fading of the importance that values have for us, and thus the virtues that are dependent on those values.
Keywords: emotion, perception, virtue, and binding
Michael Brady’s book Emotion, The Basics (2019) is a work that surveys a number of issues within philosophical emotion theory and critically assesses traditions and strains of literature in each of these areas. The book does an admirable job of describing each topic in a way that is accessible to non-specialists, but also provides illuminating analyses and criticisms that stimulate the thoughts of specialists in the philosophy of emotion and that bring into the discussion a variety of sources and traditions. This paper will focus on two areas: perceptual models of emotion and the relation between emotion and virtue.
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BINDING AND PERCEPTUAL MODELS OF EMOTION
In chapter one, Brady considers various kinds of theories of emotion, including feeling, cognitive, and perceptual theories. Perceptual theories liken emotions to perceptual states. Brady distinguishes between literal and non-literal versions of perceptual theory. Literal versions hold that emotional experience is a form of perceptual experience of value. Non-literal versions hold that emotions are not literally sense perceptions but are something like evaluative construals (Brady 2019, 29-30). Brady raises two concerns about perceptual theories. One is that they arguably collapse into feeling or cognitive theories of emotion, and the other that the analogy between emotion and perception is questionable at best, and is thus not an adequate way of characterizing emotion (Brady 2019, 30-32).
These appear to be serious problems for perceptual theories of emotion, but I believe that a close look at the nuts and bolts of perception and emotional experience reveals a structure of emotion that avoids these problems. In what follows, I’ll provide a sketch of a perceptual theory of emotion that avoids these problems. On this model, emotions are distinct, unified psychological states that incorporate cognitive and affective elements, but are akin to states described by perceptual theories of emotion. Unlike so-called “hybrid” theories of emotion that include cognition and affective states (Lyons 1980), it provides an explanation of their relation through the concept of psychological binding.
Emotional Elements and Phenomenal Binding
An alternative that can resolve the problems of these approaches is the idea that emotions consist of a particular association of affective arousal, cognition, and relational theme information that are bound together in an emotional state. Emotions are characterized by affective arousal, namely coordinated physiological changes, which can include changes in skin conductance, heart rate, facial expression, visceral responses, and feelings of the experience of these changes (Ekman 1977; Prinz 2004). Paradigm emotions involve cognitive recognition of objects (including physical objects, events, and states of affairs) at which the emotion is directed: the object of the emotion (Nussbaum 2001; Solomon 1993). Relational theme information is the product of the activation of a psychological mechanism that is attuned to detecting relations to the environment that bear upon fundamental concerns and which trigger emotional responses when such relations are present. Such basic types of concerns have been categorized by Richard Larzarus as core relational themes. For example, Lazarus identifies “a demeaning offense against me and mine” as the core relational theme of the emotion anger: it is such a relation between self and environment that constitutes the most general content of anger (Lazarus 1991, 122).
In instances of emotion, affective arousal and cognitions are co-present, but they are clearly linked in a unique way, as only specific cognitions are associated with physiological changes and vice versa. We may hear other sounds and see other things when afraid of a dog, but it is the dog and only the dog that is the object of the emotion, and that is linked to the physiological changes; we do not associate the changes with a visual percept of a person who is walking behind the dog, or with an auditory percept of a car horn that sounds. In addition, we associate the affective arousal and the cognition with information about our relation to our natural or social environment, i.e., a core relational theme. The cognition of the dog is not merely associated with the arousal, as the event is experienced as a dangerous event, not merely as an arousing event. The core relational theme of threat is associated with the cognition.
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Perceptual binding occurs because various types of perceptual information are processed independently in separate regions of the brain and binding is necessary for the information to be unified into a coherent representation of the object. Binding is necessary for visual information coming from different streams to be unified, such as the unified perceptual representation of colors and shapes. Cross-modal binding is necessary to associate the visual percept of a bell ringing with the sound (auditory percept) of the bell. Binding mechanisms have been routinely discussed in the literature on the “binding problem” in psychology and cognitive science (Treisman 1999), and there are competing explanations of their nature, but regardless of this, binding is a central feature of perception. For reasons given above, it seems clear that in addition to perceptual binding, there is a type of binding consisting of the psychological binding of affective arousal with specific cognitions and with relational theme information. This is emotional binding, and it is akin to the psychological binding that occurs in perception, and, as in the case of perceptual binding, there is an experiential unity which suggests that the brain binds together information in a coherent way.
Binding and Concerns about Perceptual Theories
This binding model of emotion resolves the two concerns regarding perceptual theories of emotion. The first is, once again, that the literal version of such a view collapses into a feeling or cognitive theory of emotion. In response, this binding model is both more elaborate and distinct from a feeling theory, as the informationally robust cognition of an emotional object is part of a normal emotional event, even if the elicitor of the emotion is a product of robust cognitive perception. Conversely, this model does not collapse into a cognitive theory of emotion because the affective element of emotion is an integral part of the perception, as it is bound-up with the cognition of the object of the emotion. One might claim that such a perception is nevertheless a cognitive event, but such a claim arguably broadens cognition to the degree that it refers to any robust perception. And such a broad conception both obscures what is distinct about emotional states and overlooks important differences between this account and other cognitive theories of emotion in the traditional judgmentalist camp. There is evidence that emotional states differ from similar unemotional states in various ways related to perception, which will be discussed shortly, and for this reason emotional states are importantly different from nonemotional cognitive states, and it is reasonable to believe that such differences are related to the unique binding involved in such states.
The second concern about perceptual theories is that the analogy between emotional and perceptual experience is questionable. This is principally because emotions themselves provide far from sufficient reason to believe what they represent, such as a feeling of untrustworthiness, and because emotions can be considered irrational in a way that perceptions are not. Brady identifies some important differences between emotion and perception, and I want to suggest that the difference is scalar rather than categorical. First, there are reasons to believe that emotions may be more flexible perceptual responses (and thus more prone to error) than other kinds of perception. The psychologist Phoebe Ellsworth (2007) has noted that just as we are well served by having fairly rigid perceptual systems for constructing representations from our various sense modalities, we are also served by having emotional responses that are not rigidly coupled with and only with particular perceptual stimuli. For this reason, emotions are not domain-specific modules, but general evaluations that can be activated in a wide variety of contexts. Relational theme information can be paired with a wide variety of objects in our physical and social environments. Insofar as they are perceptions of value, it makes sense that they are not tied to a narrow set of stimuli. And because emotions are looser and capable of some cognitive penetration/modification, we rightfully hold them to be more appropriate items of rational assessment.
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In addition, there is another rather different way of explaining our assessment of emotions as rational or irrational. Rational assessment can be seen as part of our practices: it is important to hold people accountable for their emotions for practical reasons, loosely following Strawson’s argument regarding reactive attitudes (Strawson 1974). Such assessments can enter into a causal nexus, and at least in some cases change our reactions and behavior. The more plastic the emotional response and more related to social thriving and social good, the more likely we are to assess its rationality. For instance, I would speculate that people would be more reluctant to regard fear experience on a roller coaster as irrational than shame at one’s accent, because the former is less plastic and (presuming the roller coaster is appropriately safe) less relevant to social or personal good. Thus, the difference between rational assessment of perceptions and emotions is based primarily on practical rather than ontological differences between the two. For these reasons I believe that the binding model of emotion avoids the reservations about the perceptual analogy for emotions.
EMOTION AND VIRTUE
I’ll now turn to Brady’s discussion of emotion and virtue. He argues that without the right kinds of emotions, virtue would not be possible. Reasons provided in support of this include that emotions serve as a more effective motivating force than belief or desire alone. In addition, some emotions are particularly effective in gaining knowledge and understanding regarding situations involving values since emotions consume our attention and, again, motivate us to look for reasons.
These arguments are persuasive. Here I’ll explore some other ways in which emotions can be operative in virtue outside of their relation to motivation. The patterns of emotional response that we have, including both the episodes in which emotions occur and the types of emotions that occur, can affect virtue-relevant traits because they affect the way in which we see and take-in information about the world and the gravity that such perceptions have for us, both of which are prerequisites for decision-making and action in the world. In addition, emotions are critical to virtue because they maintain the level of importance that values have for us, and in doing so forestall axiological entropy, namely the fading of the importance that values have for us, and thus the virtues that are dependent on those values.
Emotion and Perception
There are reasons to believe that emotions affect virtue traits because of the effects that emotions have on perception, in a way that is distinct from the motivational role in gathering information and seeking reasons. Emotions can affect the breadth or narrowness of our attention. Long-standing psychological work on negative emotions and attention indicates that the field of awareness is narrowed or funneled when there is emotional arousal (Easterbrook 1959). Thus, being negatively emotionally aroused by a situation will make someone more likely to notice the situation. In addition, there has been a growing consensus that positive emotions broaden the scope of attention (Fredrickson 1998), which can also affect what one comes to notice.
There is also evidence that emotions affect both what we see in the sense of whether we see an object and the nature of the appearance of an object (Balcetis and Dunning 2006). Relatedly, additional processing of information after an initial emotional response towards an object that the arousal is associated with can occur, and this increases the information available about the object of the emotion (Le Doux 1996). Emotions can play
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a role in determining the significance or force that a perception has for us. A situation that is the object of an emotional perception will have more salience than it would otherwise. Emotions in this way collapse the distinction between the information conveyed by a statement and the statement’s force (Gunter 2004). Taken together, these perceptual effects caused by emotional responses steer both our understanding of situations and events that we encounter and the significance that such encounters have for us, and thus play a role in determining virtue-relevant responses and traits.
Emotion, Value, and Virtue
In addition to affecting virtue-relevant perception, emotions play a role in preventing axiological entropy, the fading over time of the sense of the importance of values that underlie virtue traits. In the absence of this function of emotions, this sense of importance would be minimized or lost. One line of support for this concept is research on psychological conditioning, as the association of emotional responses with values and the variable significance of values is symmetrical with the tenets of both classical and operant conditioning, including reinforcement and the extinction of learned responses (Miltenberger 2016).
The association of values and emotional responses serves as a reinforcer of the significance of these values, and these include broad sorts of values that underlie virtue relevant traits. Of course, value reinforcement, though critical, is not the only factor in virtuous action and associated traits: this also depends on the application of these values in individual circumstances, and the conflict of values in many cases requires practical wisdom in deciding which value will prevail in such cases.
Thus, there are several ways in which emotions may be necessary for virtue. What I have described above are not incompatible with Brady’s claims about emotion and virtue but explore other ways in which the two may be related. To return to my observations at the beginning, Emotion: The Basics is far from basic: it illuminates and spurs reflection on a number of different ways in which emotions relate to our lives.
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References
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Charles Starkey © 2021
Author email: cstarke[at]clemson.edu
