Michael F. Mascolo

What develops in emotional development

Introduction: On the Nature, Development, and Function of Emotions S. Griffin, M.F. Mascolo. The Development and Structure of Emotions M. Lewis. Biological and Differential Emotions Perspectives: Toward a Neuroscience of Emotion: The Epigenetic Foundations of Emotional Development J. Pankseep, et al. Differential Emotions Theory and Emotional Development: Mindful of Modularity B.P. Ackerman, et al. Functionalist Perspectives. A Functionalist Perspective to the Development of Emotions K.C. Barrett. Emotion and the Possibility of Psychologists Entering into Heaven T. Brown, A. Kozak. Systems Perspectives: A Dynamic Systems Approach to Cognition-Emotion Interactions in Development M.D. Lewis, L. Douglas. Toward a Component Systems Approach to Emotional Development M.F. Mascolo, D. Harkins. Alternative Trajectories in the Development of Anger-Related Appraisals M.F. Mascolo, S. Griffin. Social and Cultural Perspectives: The Development of Emotion from a Social Process View K.L. Dickson, et al. The Analysis of Emotions: Dimensions of Variation N.H. Frijda, B. Mesquita. The Narrative Construction of Emotional Life: Developmental Aspects J.C. Mancuso, T.R. Sarbin. Conclusion and Integration: Alternative Conceptions of Emotional Development: Controversy and Consensus M.F. Mascolo, S. Griffin. Index.

Emotion, Development, and Self-Organization: The Dynamic Construction of Emotion: Varieties in Anger

Within psychology and other disciplines, discussions of emotion have traditionally drawn upon a series of dualisms. Theorists and researchers debate the extent to which emotions are best understood as universal or context-dependent, innate or acquired, dependent or independent of cognition, and so on. Current systems approaches in the social and physical sciences provide innovative frameworks that may enable theorists to break out of such polarizing dichotomies (Barton, 1994; Fischer and Bidell, 1998; Fogel, Lyra, and Valsiner, 1997; Fogel and Thelen, 1987; M. D. Lewis, 1996; Thelen and Smith, 1994; van Geert, 1994). In what follows, we outline a component systems approach to emotional development (Mascolo and Harkins, 1998; Mascolo, Pollack, and Fischer, 1997). At its most basic level, a component systems view holds that although individuals are composed of multiple distinct subsystems (e.g., affective, cognitive, overt action), component systems necessarily modulate each other in the production of emotional action and experience. An analysis of how component systems coregulate each other within social contexts can reveal both striking order and emergent variability in the production of emotional states. Contemporary Approaches to Emotion In recent decades, models that depict basic emotions as discrete and innate neuromuscular responses have been highly influential (Ekman, 1984; Izard, 1977, 1991; Tomkins, 1962). In their differential emotions theory , Izard and Malatesta (1987) define emotions as “a particular set of neural processes that lead to a specific expression and a corresponding specific feeling” (p. 496).

Keeping the constructor in development: An epigenetic systems approach

Abstract Constructivism refers to the idea that individuals actively create meaning by structuring and restructuring experience through self-regulated mental activity. Recently, this position has been criticized from the standpoints of diametrically opposed theoretical frameworks. On the one hand, nativists maintain that basic mental structures are inherited rather than constructed by individuals; on the other hand, sociocultural psychologists argue that meaning is a product of social and cultural activity. The present article presents an epigenetic systems approach to human development. This view conceptualizes individual action and meaning as the emergent products of coactions among multiple levels of a hierarchically organized organism-environment system. The epigenetic view provides a framework for analyzing the role of biogenetic and sociocultural processes in human development, but in a way that maintains the idea that the person functions as an active constructor in the process of development.

Functioning of Epigenetically Evolved Emotion Systems: A Constructive Analysis

Abstract The theory of emotions outlined in this paper follows a general theory that psychological processes maintain an adaptive equilibrium between ones construction system and sensory input from ones world. Persons build constructions to match any class of sensory data, and also build standards for (construe) varied levels of input which accompany the arousal-related activity associated with standard/input mismatch. Conscious identification of different emotional states reflects the use of constructions assigned to different standard/input relations. A constructivist may regard different emotional states or experiences as idealized configurations of attributes; and these configurations can be treated as prototypes, applying the same analyses which have been developed by cognitive scientists who have offered models for discussions of categorization processes. A model for discussing emotional development is provided, and directions of future constructivist investigations are suggested

Alternative Trajectories in the Development of Anger-Related Appraisals

Looking at her mother with her eyebrows drawn, an 8-month-old protests loudly after being held tightly by an unfamiliar friend of the family. After being pushed by his sibling, a 7-year-old boy yells, “You can’t do that! I’m telling!” After a close friend reveals a secret to a disliked other, a 14-year-old boy confronts his friend, saying, “You broke your promise. I can’t trust you anymore!” After witnessing a televised report of a brutal beating of an illegal Mexican immigrant by American officers of the law, a woman writes a letter to the editor to declare her moral outrage. Each of these hypothetical incidents portrays an individual who can be considered angry. However, although one might apply a common label in each case, the episodes differ markedly in the angry behaviors displayed, the situations in which the behaviors occurred, and the ways in which the situations were interpreted. Whereas the infant’s angry display may have been precipitated by an impediment to her action, the anger of the older individuals involves appraisals that embody increasingly complex violations of beliefs about the ways events ought to be. In this chapter, we examine alternative trajectories in the development of appraisals involved in the experience of anger.

THE CONCEPT OF DOMAIN IN DEVELOPMENTAL ANALYSES OF HIERARCHICAL COMPLEXITY

Individuals do not operate “at a stage of development.” They operate at a range of different levels of hierarchical complexity depending on skill area, task, context, degree of support, and other variables. It is thus necessary to postulate the concept of domain to refer to the particular conceptual, behavioral, or affective area within which activity operates. The concept raises questions and implications for theory building and application. Such issues are elaborated by discussing a variety of domains and social contexts. A postformal case example of leadership in higher education illuminates the concept of domains and the interrelationships among domains.

Toward a Component Systems Approach to Emotional Development

During the past decades, theorists and researchers have offered a wide range of perspectives on the nature and development of emotion. Toward one end of a continuum, theorists define emotions in terms of specific patterns of feeling and behavior organized by innate neurological pathways and biological substrates (Ackerman, Abe, & Izard, Chapter 4, this volume; Ekman, 1984; Izard & Malatesta, 1987; Panksepp, Knutson, & Pruitt, Chapter 3, this volume; Tomkins, 1962, 1984). At the other end, theorists suggest that emotions consist of socially constructed syndromes of cognition, feeling, and action (Averill, 1982; Mancuso & Sarbin, Chapter 12, this volume; Oatley, 1992; Shweder, 1994). A component systems approach to emotions (Scherer, 1984, 1994) holds out the possibility of integrating these two diverse traditions. From this view, emotional episodes consist of multiple component processes and systems that mutually regulate each other at the biological, psychological, and sociocultural levels of functioning. In what follows, we elaborate on a component systems approach to emotional development, focusing specifically on the development of pride as a social, self-evaluative emotional experience. Thereafter, we report the results of a preliminary study assessing developmental changes in pride-relevant behavior of infants and toddlers as they interact with their caregivers in achievement-related tasks.

Self and modernity on trial: A reply to cergen's saturated self

Abstract In The Saturated Self: Dilemmas of Identity in Contemporary Life, Kenneth Gergen (1991) suggests that the rising uncertainty ushered in by the postmodern age has resulted in the collapse of traditional conceptions of self, truth, and social life. Although we agree that meaning is a product of social construction, we believe that Gergen has overextended his case. We argue that there is a need to maintain a notion of personal agency in constructionist models of human functioning and that an epigenetic-systems model of development (Gottlieb, 1991a, 1991b) provides a useful framework for doing so. We also suggest that even though social frameworks structure peoples observations, data from their worlds nevertheless constrain theory making and foster scientific progress. Finally, we question whether postmodernism has provided a convincing strategy for dealing with the conflicts that arise from competing value systems.

Social cognition as a mediator of adolescent development: A coactive systems approach

The study of social cognition often follows as an attempt to represent the structure and content of social knowledge assumed to be located within individual social actors. While we have learned much from the study of social cognition, traditional approaches maintain a sharp distinction between cognition and action. As such, they raise the question of how inner knowledge becomes translated into social action. An alternative approach proceeds by studying social cognition in medias res—in the middle of everything (Fischer & Bidell, 1998). From this view, social cognition functions as a form of acting and as a mediator of action and development. In what follows, we elaborate a coactive systems framework for understanding how social meanings develop as mediators of social action in adolescence.

Neo-Piagetian Theories of Cognitive Development

Abstract Neo-Piagetian theories of cognitive development emerged as attempts to preserve core theoretical and empirically supported aspects of Jean Piagets seminal theory of intellectual development while addressing criticisms leveled against the theory. Neo-Piagetian theories preserve three basic ideas from Piagets theory: (1) the unit of cognitive analysis is the scheme or psychological structure; (2) psychological structures undergo qualitative transformation over time; and (3) higher order structures develop through the differentiation and coordination of lower level structures. After a brief discussion of similarities and differences among prominent neo-Piagetian theories, one representative approach (dynamic skill theory) is discussed in depth. The discussion concludes with a description of recent advances in neo-Piagetian systems theory.