Emotions are psychophysiological reactions inherent to human beings. We all have emotions; However, these states are difficult to understand and classify. In fact, we believe that they do not follow any rules, and that each person expresses their emotions in different ways.
Nico Frijda was a well-known German psychologist and researcher, who dedicated much of his life to the study of emotions. Thus, in 2006, he published a work on what he considered the laws of emotions. In which he tried to establish fixed patterns in the way people interact emotionally.
In The laws of emotionNico Frijda expanded his theory of emotions presented in his previous publications. The book reviews many recent studies on emotions and addresses some of the basic, still unanswered questions about emotion theory and its hypotheses.
Professor Nico Frijda establishes twelve laws of emotions in his work. Although there are, of course, exceptions to these laws, they are valid most of the time and establish precise patterns for how we react to events. In this article We review the 12 emotional laws proposed by Nico Frijda, which can be grouped into 9 points.
1. The law of situational meaning
Frijda’s first law states that emotions derive from situations. A person does not choose a new emotion based on the experiential situation, it has already been internalized. People respond depending on our previous experiences and our learned responses..
Different situations will provoke different emotions in people, but these responses are similar between individuals. Scary things usually scare us, a loss, on the other hand, can make us cry, a gain usually makes us happy. As we see if there are similar responses depending on the situations.
Human beings worry by nature. Born into the world with a predetermined lifespan, we know that we will die one day, which is a great source of distress. While they are alive, we have many things to worry about: family, friends, work, money, health, etc.
The law of worry states that Emotions arise from having goals, concerns, or interests in what happens to ourselves, or to other people.. When we have no interests, we feel nothing. In fact, one of the symptoms of depression is loss of interest in doing different activities.
3. The law of apparent reality
Apparent reality is a law that states that things that seem real can trigger an emotional response, just like the real thing. The way we experience a situation determines the emotion we experience. If something seems real to us, it can trigger a response, good or bad. Movies, plays, and books affect us emotionally because we perceive them as part of reality.
It’s also hard to get excited about things that aren’t obvious yet; even if they are real. In the case of grief, for example, the corresponding emotion may not arise immediately after learning that a loved one has died, but only when we realize that they are not here in some way, for example, when we pick up the phone to call them. and we remember that he has passed away. It is at that moment where emotions arise.
4. The laws of change, habituation and comparative feeling
These laws explain why we react more significantly to changes than to the experiences we are accustomed to, even though these may be harder or more difficult to bear.
Laws 4,5 and 6 state that we become accustomed to the experiences of our lives and, as a result, our emotions react more easily to changes (compared to things that stay the same). We are always comparing what we experience with what we are used to, so our emotions respond more easily to things that are different from our frame of reference.
The law of hedonic asymmetry states that We do not enjoy gains as much as we suffer losses.. No matter how much we love someone, or how big the winning prize is, positive emotions always dissipate over time. But there are certain terrible circumstances that we cannot get used to.
If a situation is bad enough to cause a person to feel an extreme level of fear or anxiety, they will never get used to those emotions. These emotions can remain for a long time, even throughout life if they are not addressed, for example, therapeutically.
6. The law of conservation of emotional impulse
Although the proverb is wise, time does not heal all wounds, and if it does, it does so indirectly, it simply keeps it in a place where we do not have access, but it continues to affect us. This law states that emotional energy does not dissipate. Events can maintain their emotional impact for years, unless experienced again or resignified. somehow.
If we re-experience the event or address it, that is when we can change our definition of it and lessen the impact it had on us. This law explains why some failures in life, rejection or breakups, can still have a psychological and emotional impact after many years.
7. The closure law
Intense emotional states usually lead to immediate and absolute actions. In these cases, we are not open to other goals or opinions that would change the emotion, although this has some nuances.
When an emotion takes control of us – invades us -, It directs us down a single path until another emotion takes control of us and sends us in the opposite direction.. This state prevents decision making, and is reversed by decreasing the emotional response.
We are aware that our emotions have consequences and affect other people, so we are able to change them accordingly. For example, anger can make a person feel like hurting someone, but people generally don’t act on those violent feelings. We have other resources to vent the emotion, for example, shouting or simply being angry in silence, or in the best cases we find a way to release the tension, for example by playing sports or chatting with a friend. People often control how big their reaction is to an emotion.
9. Laws of lightest load and greatest gain
Numbers 11 and 12 of Nico Frijda’s laws are the so-called laws of the lightest load and the highest profit. They establish that the emotional impact of a situation or event is based on how it is interpreted. If we change the way we see a situation, it can affect how we feel, and this tendency to reinterpret is usually positive.
The law of the lightest load specifically explains that People try harder to change their perception of a situation if it is negative like the fear of a possible global crisis thinking that we are not going to be affected.
The law of greatest gain explains the tendency to reinterpret negative emotional states as positive. Anger, pain and fear are not always bad. Anger can push people away, pain can attract people, and fear can stop us from doing things that we might not do correctly or that could hurt us.
Finally, these laws of emotions refer to the individual and forget the social framework. Although they are spoken of as laws, due to their search for patterns, it is worth mentioning that they have not been recognized as such by the different psychological schools. However, they provide a great framework for thinking about emotions and can be a good starting point for a deeper discussion of individual emotions.
