All 4 Terms & Definitions
- Two-factor theory
- Schachter and Singer's proposal that emotion requires two necessary components: (1) undifferentiated physiological arousal, and (2) a cognitive label that attributes the arousal to a specific emotional cause based on situational cues. Without both, either the emotion will not occur or it will be mislabelled. The theory predicts that the same arousal state can be experienced as different emotions depending on the available cognitive explanation.
- Cognitive labelling
- The process by which a person attributes their undifferentiated arousal to a specific emotion based on situational cues, prior expectations, or social observation. On Schachter-Singer's account, the cognitive label transforms non-specific arousal into a specific emotional experience. When the environment provides an angry confederate, arousal becomes anger; when it provides a euphoric one, the same arousal becomes euphoria.
- Misattribution of arousal
- The phenomenon whereby arousal caused by one source (exercise, a drug, fear) is attributed to a different source in the environment, producing an emotional experience that is partially driven by mislabelled arousal. The effect was demonstrated by Dutton and Aron (1974), Zillmann's excitation transfer research, and Valins's false feedback studies. Misattribution effects tend to be small and context-dependent.
- Excitation transfer
- Dolf Zillmann's extension of Schachter-Singer: residual arousal from one context (e.g., vigorous exercise) can transfer to and intensify an emotional response in a subsequent context (e.g., mild provocation), if the person does not correctly attribute their elevated arousal to the prior activity. Excitation transfer has been used to explain why people feel angrier after exercise and why mildly arousing situations feel more emotionally charged when they follow other arousing events.