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. 2011 Jan;3(1):8-16.
doi: 10.1177/1754073910380974.

Emotion Generation and Emotion Regulation: One or Two Depends on Your Point of View

James J Gross  1 , Lisa Feldman Barrett
Affiliations

Emotion Generation and Emotion Regulation: One or Two Depends on Your Point of View

James J Gross et al. Emot Rev. 2011 Jan.

Abstract

Emotion regulation has the odd distinction of being a wildly popular construct whose scientific existence is in considerable doubt. In this article, we discuss the confusion about whether emotion generation and emotion regulation can and should be distinguished from one another. We describe a continuum of perspectives on emotion, and highlight how different (often mutually incompatible) perspectives on emotion lead to different views about whether emotion generation and emotion regulation can be usefully distinguished. We argue that making differences in perspective explicit serves the function of allowing researchers with different theoretical commitments to collaborate productively despite seemingly insurmountable differences in terminology and methods.

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Figures

Figure 1
Figure 1
Perspectives on emotion can be loosely arranged along a continuum. We have populated this continuum with representative theorists/researchers drawn from the field of psychology. We distinguish four “zones”: (1) basic emotion, in red, e.g., Panksepp (1998), MacDougall (1908/1921), Buck (1999), Davis (1992), LeDoux (2000), Watson (1919), Tomkins (1962, , Ekman (1972), Izard, (1993), Levenson (1994), and Damasio (1999); (2) appraisal, in yellow, e.g., Arnold (1960a, , Roseman (1991), Lazarus (1991), Frijda (1986), Scherer (1984), Smith and Ellsworth (1985), Leventhal, (1984), and Clore and Ortony (2008); (3) psychological construction, in green, e.g., Wundt (1897/1998), Barrett (2009), Harlow & Stagner (1933), Mandler (1975), Schachter and Singer (1962), Duffy (1941); Russell (2003), Davidson (1992), Lang (2010), and James (1884); (4) social construction, in blue, e.g., Solomon (2003), Mesquita (2010), Averill (1980), and Harre (1986). Given space constraints, as well as the goals of this article, we have limited ourselves to a subset of the many theorists/researchers who might have been included on this continuum (e.g., those who only study one aspect of emotion were not included in this figure).
Figure 2
Figure 2
Schematic representations of four different perspectives on emotion generation and emotion regulation. Panels A and B: red represents emotion generation and blue represents emotion regulation. Panel C: different colors represent distributed networks for basic ingredients of the mind. Arrows depict the flow of information.
Figure 3
Figure 3
An appraisal perspective on emotion and emotion regulation. Panel A: The “modal model” of emotion with a situation-attention-appraisal-response sequence and the organismal “black box” interposed between situation and response) (from Gross & Thompson, 2007). Panel B: A process model of emotion regulation that highlights five families of emotion regulation strategies (from Gross & Thompson, 2007).
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