Chapter: Appendix A to F
 

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Appendix A

What is Emotion?

 The appendix starts off telling what emotion is mostly known by the people.  The Oxford English Dictionary defines emotion as ãany agitation or disturbance of mind, feeling, passion, and any vehement or excited mental state.ä  The author defines emotion to refer to a feeling and itâs distinctive thoughts, psychological, and biological states, and range of propensities to act.  Some of the components of emotions are ANGER, SADNESS, FEAR, ENJOYMENT, LOVE, SURPRISE, DIGUST, SHAME. These components can all be applied to us while driving on the road.  For example, you will become very angry when people drive pass you. Some people enjoyed while driving in their cars that enhance enjoyment.  Also, there are so many things that might happen in a sudden which make you feel surprise.  Of course the list of components does not resolve every question about how to categorize emotion.  Some of them may be combined by different kinds of emotion.  There is an example in the book of what jealousy may be combined with.  It may involved anger, but may also combined with sadness and fear.  Paul Ekman of University of California at San Francisco discovered four facial expressions that are recognized by people in cultures around the world.  The four expressions are fear, anger, sadness, and enjoyment.  These emotions need not to be taught by others just like basic instinct.

 In conclusion to what emotion really is, the author thinks of it as different dimensions.  In the outer ripples are moods, which are more muted and has longer duration that an emotion.    Beyond moods are temperaments, which is the readiness to evoke a given emotion or moods that makes people feel miserable or shy.  And beyond temperaments are considered prolonged disorders of emotion which include depression and continuous anxiety.
 

Appendix B

Hallmarks of the Emotional Mind

 The shortly emerged scientific model explains how much of what we do can be emotionally driven.  It makes responses of why a person is so reasonable at a moment and turns to be so irrational for a sudden.  And the sense that emotions have their own reasons and their own logic.  Paul Ekman, head of the Human Interaction Lab, which has been introduced in the previous Appendix, together with Seymour Epstein, a clinical psychologist at the University of Massachusetts offered a basic list of qualities that distinguish emotions from the rest of mental life.
 

A Quick But Sloppy Response

 The speed for the emotional mind to react is far quicker than the rational mind.  This immediate action precludes deliberation.  The emotional responses make us to decide and pay attention to quickly.  The appendix says that those organisms that had to pause too long to reflect on these answers were unlikely to have many offspring to pass on their slower-acting genes.  This emotional responses was so fast that it bewildered the rational mind and the person might have to use the rational mind to think back what they do the thing for.

 This rapid response sacrifices accuracy for speed and rely on first impression and react to it without the step of thinking.  The advantage is that this emotional mind can read emotional reality.  It tells us who to be wary of, who to trust.  For example, if somebody drive past you, he should probably angry of you being driving too slow.  The emotion mind also serves as a radar for danger.  Sometimes we do not have enough time to think what you have to do, and what you donât.  The book tells us how dangerous if we pause too long to reflect to these answers, it is not just a matter of doing something wrong, but we might be dead already.  But the fact is even though we react to the incident quick enough, we might still have the wrong result.  If the emotions caused by a single event continued to dominate us after it had passed, our feeling would be poor guides to action.
 

First Feelings, Second Thoughts

 The book states that due to the rational mind have to take a moment before it respond that the emotional mind, the first impulses in an emotional situation is the heartâs, not the headâs.  And there is also another kind of emotional reaction, slower than the quick-response, which they first pass through the step in our thoughts before it leads to feeling.  This kind of emotional reaction needs deeper deliberation.  The example from the book is it takes seconds or minutes to unfold emotions like embarrassment or apprehension over an upcoming exam.

 The rational mind usually does not decide what emotions we should have.  Instead our feelings typically come to us after it comes to a reality.  What the rational mind can ordinarily control is the course of those reactions.
 

A Symbolic, Childlike Reality

 As Seymour Epstein points out, while mind makes logical connections between causes and effects, the emotional mind is indiscriminate, connecting things that merely have similar striking features.  There are many ways in which the emotional mind is childlike, the more so the stronger the emotion grows.  One way is categorical thinking.  For example someone mortified about speaking the wrong things might think that he always say the wrong thing.  Another way is personalized thinking, with events perceived with a bias centering on oneself.  Like the driver who after an accident, explained that the telephone pole came straight at me.  The beliefs of the rational mind are tentative, this means that if some new evidences emerged , it will replace the rational mind with a new one.  In contrast to the rational mind, emotional mind takes its beliefs to be absolutely true.  No matter how the argument is from a logical point of view, it did not affect the emotional mind at all.
 

The Past Imposed on the Present

 When some feature of an event seems similar to an emotionally charged memory from the past, the emotional mind responds by triggering the feelings that went with the remembered event.  If the feelings are strong then the reaction that is triggered is obvious.  But if the feelings is not cleared, we may not realize the emotional reaction we are having.  Say if you have the prior experience of being very angry when somebody drive quickly pass you, you will have some degree in the next time somebody drive pass you.
 

Appendix C

The Neural Circuitry of Fear

In this chapter, the author discussed what really made us to feel fear. As discussed in this chapter, amygdala is the central of fear. Destruction of this part in the brain will lead to the disability of feeling of fear, which is very dangerous in some sort of incidents. The chapter gives an example of a rare brain disease which damaged just the amygdala in the brain. The patient was then unable to feel afraid when somebody put a gun on his head. The patient lost the ability to fear. The chapter goes on using an example to shows how the brain work with fear.
 
 

Appendix D

W. T. Grant Consortium: Active Ingredients of Prevention Programs

This appendix talks about the major ingredients of effective programs. These factors involved emotional skills, cognitive skills, and behavioral skills.

Emotional skills included how to identify, express, and assess feelings. After doing the above procedures, we will have to learn how to manage and control these feelings in order to reduce stress.

Cognitive skills as told in this chapter involved self-talk which is the recognizing one's own behavior, reading and interpreting social cues which may involved recognizing social influences on behavior, using steps for problem-solving and decision-making, understanding the perspective of others, understanding behavioral norms, a postivie attitude toward life, and self awareness.

Behavioral skills are divided into nonverbal and verbal. Nonverbal included communications through eye contact, gestures, and other kinds of facial and physical expressions. Verbal is to make clear requests and responds.
 
 

Appendix E

The Self Science Curriculum

This appendix talks about the main components of what a self should have. The key components are self-awareness, personal decision-making, managing feelings, handling stress, empathy, communications, self-disclosure, insight, self-acceptance, personal responsibility, assertiveness, group dynamics, and conflict resolution.
 
 

Appendix F

Social and Emotional Learning: Results

The final appendix shows some examples of the results by using social and emotional learning. Different researches performed have showed satisfying results. Researchers applied social and emotional learning to primarily students and found a lot of advantages using these kinds of learning. They found students have an increased in responsiblity, more socialized, and more considerated to others. Other researches found that by using these learning, students have an improvement in social cognitive skills, emotion, recognition, understanding, and better self-control. These are just some of the researches that were told in the text. But the fact is that all the researches that have been performed tend to have an increased in the ability in either social and emotional control in students. As a result, we found that social and emotional learning are successful in helping children's development.
 

Questions and Answers
 
 

On p. 294: "we do not decide when to be mad" What do you think about this? Does this mean we don't make choices in the way we act towards others? (Dr. James)

I think that mad is a stimulation by certain media.  I agree with "we do not decide when to be mad" because we will not suddenly get mad without any stimulations.  One type of stimulation is the people around you.  For example, somebody drive driving too slow and was blocking your way.  You may have the chance of getting angry.  This slow driver is the media of stimulating your mind saying that "why is something preventing me from speeding up?"  I think that mad is a type of stimulation by the reality, but we still have the chance to decide whether or not we should perform this "mad" out.  Sometimes we do not have the chance to give oneself to choose whether to get mad or not if the incident happened immediately.
 

Do the same emotions occur in all cultures? Are there some emotions that do not occur in some cultures? (Dr. James)

I do not think that all the emotions occur in all cultures.  As I have said before, emotions are always stimulated by other media.  Some countries might not react to these kind of stimulators exactly the way some countries react to.  The Americans would not mind their lovers to be kissed and huged by others because it is just a kind of greetings.  But in some countries such as China, the people will have a different style of perceiving this kind of greetings.  They will think that the people who are kissing and hugging with each others are committing adultery.

How could drivers be taught to use their rational mind to acknowledge emotions? (Kisha Kawakami)

I think that drivers can be learned to use their rational mind through their experiences and also through continuously communicating with other people.  I think that communication is the best way to achieve knowledge from drivers to drivers.  Once they know how other drivers thinks, they will be able to use their rational mind to perform the correct emotions.

Is there a distinct difference between an emotion and a temperament in a person? (Alma Valvieja)

Temperament is person's disposition or nature, especially as this affects his way of thinking, feeling and behaving.  Emotion is stirring up, excitement, of the mind or the feelings, excited state of the mind of feelings.

Are there any emotions that are not universal? If so, what are they? (Kendra Watkins)

I do not think that all the emotions occur in all cultures.  As I have said before, emotions are always stimulated by other media.  Some countries might not react to these kind of stimulators exactly the way some countries react to.  The Americans would not mind their lovers to be kissed and huged by others because it is just a kind of greetings.  But in some countries such as China, the people will have a different style of perceiving this kind of greetings.  They will think that the people who are kissing and hugging with each others are committing adultery.

To what extent do cultural norms have an emotional development? Ekman claims that there are universal expressions of emotions. Can there be any variation in these expressions due to cultural norms influencing emotional expression? (Kyle Saiki)

I think cultural norms will have an development through imitating other cultures.  For example, if we go to other countries, and we do not know the manner of these countries, we will sort of imitate others from being tease by others.  Of course there are variation in those expressions due to cultural differences.  I think that they are varied by degrees.  One countries may not have the same degree of "happiness" compare to other countires.  Perhaps this incident may not be treated as important as other countries.

In regards to state specific reality, is it possible to achieve a "neutral" state in which no emotion is prevalent to influence reality? This appears to be the goal of transpersonal psychology. Is this really possible? (Kyle Saiki)

Although it is very hard to achieve this state, I think that it is still possible to achieve this "neutral" state.  Many reglious have attempt to maintain these state during their life.  But due to the increasing temptation and stimulation in this world.  It is much harder to achieve this state.  Even when you are sleeping, you still have the chance that you make dreams.  I think that the easiest way is when you think of nothing, you will achieve this state.

Are the primary emotions inherited? How do we acquire them? Does everyone have them? Is one emotion stronger than another? (Tracie Oshiro)

I do not think that emotions is learned.  I think that emotions are all learned.  For example, when you touched a hot bar, you will immediately move your hand away from it.  So you learned these "hot" and "pain" emotions through your experience, and was not inherited.  I think that most of the people have these emotions, but as it was told in the book.  The person do no feel the emotion "pain."  Although this case is rare, we still can not rule out there is still a chance that a person may lack some kinds of emotions.

Do you have mixed emotions related to driving? Give an example of your experience. (Bernadette Jambaro)

I do not have any mixed emotions when I am driving on the road.  I think that if you're mad, you're mad.  This emotion will overcome other emotions and blind you.  It will not disappear until you have calm down.
 

How do you overcome your fear? What can you suggest to other first time drivers on how to overcome their fear in driving? (Bernadette Jambaro)

I think the best way to overcome this fear of driving is to give this person support.  First time drivers who are scared of driving on the road may be too scared of other drivers who are either driving fast and driving dangerously.  I think that the best way is to get a good driving instructor to teach them until their skills are trustful.  Then they probably have the confidence to drive on the road.

What emotion is best suited for drivers? (Marissa Muraoka)

I think the best emotion is to maintain a state of calmness.

What is the key emotional factor needed to drive safely? (Shawn Shigematsu)

I think the best emotion is to maintain a state of calmness.  Once you have achieved this state, I think that everything should be under your control.

Can a person's emotional mind be changed as a person gets older? (Shawn Shigematsu)

I think that as a person gets older, his emotional mind will be changed.  As I have discussed before, emotion is learned and not inherited.  So as a person grew older, he will have more and more experiences.  This kinds of experiences will have changes to what the person might perceive to certain kinds of incidents.

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