It is generally recognized that there is a profound interaction between emotion and cognition. Emotional states, what we feel and the intensity behind what we feel, can enhance and impair judgment and performance; cognitions, what we think, typically play a major role in the generation and maintenance of emotional states. Nevertheless, relatively little is still known about the specific way in which cognition affects emotions. This research will test new hypotheses about how cognitive processes trigger emotions and amplify their intensity. The goal of this research is to develop a systematic account of the way in which cognition contributes to emotion. A subsidiary goal is to determine the distinct emotions that such an account should cover. Preliminary research will be aimed at classifying different specific emotional states into those of the same emotion type. Initial indications are that the result will be a set of about twenty different emotion states, many of which have large numbers of closely allied states associated with them. Experiments using these distinct emotion types will determine whether the conclusions of experiments already reported in the literature need qualification when the stimuli used are known to represent genuine emotions. Once these distinct emotion types are identified, they will be used for examining the influence of cognition on emotion. A number of studies will examine this issue, most designed to test specific hypotheses derived from a particular theory that specifies both the cognitive conditions necessary to elicit each distinct emotion and the factors that make each emotion mild or intense (their intensity variables). A number of experiments will study emotions and their intensity variables using several different methods, including the manipulation of information about characters in stories (hypothetical emotions), the assessment of reactions to recent personal experiences (retrospective emotions), and the direct induction of emotions through hypnosis, computer games, and televised sports events (concurrent emotions). Though this research is basic and non-clinical in nature, it has implications for clinical work with patients in which emotions impair people's functioning in the world. It also has implications for such non-clinical issues as crowd control, for example, British soccer fans, and control of emotional input to important political decisions.
