Discrete Emotion and Motivation: Relative Activation in the Appetitive and Aversive Motivational Systems as a Function of Anger, Sadness, Fear, and Joy During Televised Information Campaigns

This study investigated whether predictable motivational activation in the appetitive and aversive systems underlies the production and experience of discrete emotions (anger, sadness, joy, and fear) experienced while viewing televised public service announcements. This study used both self-reports and physiological measures to index motivational activation and emotional experience. In the joy condition, physiological data provided moderate support for the prediction that strong appetitive motivational activation underlies the experience of joy but did not support the concurrent prediction of aversive motivational inhibition. However, the self-report data provided good evidence for both. In the fear condition, the self-report data supported the prediction of strong aversive and inhibited appetitive activation. The physiological data provide strong support for a highly activated aversive system but no support for an inhibited appetitive system. In the sadness condition, the self-report and physiological data supported the prediction that sadness is a moderately activated aversive condition. In the anger condition, the physiological data supported the prediction that anger is a coactive state with both aversive and appetitive activation. This study suggests that research on cognition, emotion, and motivation can benefit by blending findings and insights from both discrete and dimensional approaches to the study of emotion.