Culture and Gender - How Do They Affect Emotion?

For a very long time, Psychologists have tried to determine the emotion differences between Genders and cultures. A person can recognize an emotion from facial expression. The argument is that whether a person knows what emotions are as a baby or by observing it as they grow up. I believe that a person is born with these emotions for example when a baby is upset he cries because he knows that's the way to express his feelings or laugh to show that he is happy.

Women are stereotypically more emotional and men are stereotypically angrier. In two studies by Kring, women were found to be more facially expressive than men when it came to both positive and negative emotions. These researchers concluded that men and women experience the same amount of emotion, but that women are more likely to express their emotions. An American Psychological Association article says that, “boys are generally expected to suppress emotions and to express anger through violence, rather than constructively.A child development researcher at Harvard University argues that boys are taught to shut down their feelings, such as empathy, sympathy.

Another difference between gender is facial expression. Woman generally smile more when happy,or cry when sad. Whatever they feel is expressed in their face unlike men. Society somewhat restricts men from expressing their emotion so much so that they automatically shut off any expression of feelings.

Emotions are a universal thing. It is recognized in every culture but is not necessarily the same. The way a person expresses their feelings or emotions is due to how they were raised and taught to deal with them. In some countries it is ok for some men to cry or express their emotions freely while in other countries it is 'frowned upon'. For example, In Europe men greet each other by hugs and hugs whereas men in America would be offended by that or would feel awkward.

Alzheimer's Disease: What Can We Learn About Memory?

 About 100 years ago, The Alzheimer's disease was discovered. It was ,however , unfamiliar to people. Now a days , A lot of people have lost themselves our a family member or loved one because of this disease. Alzheimer's is the most common type of Dementia, it starts in the hippo campus affecting the memory first then spreads to the rest of the brain. It kills cells and eventually they die and the brain becomes much smaller in size.

From the video I watched in class, I learned that the most people that get affected are the people who take care of the patient. The person with Alzheimer's gets so ill that he can't recognize the people around him that were his/her entire life before. They  become moody and not everyone can tolerate that. I felt terrible for the families in the video for having to go through that because it's such a hard thing to do,just to watch the person you once knew and loved fade away.

 

The Gift of Fear

The study of the evolution of emotions dates back to the 19th century. The theory of evolution and natural selection has been applied to the study of human communication, mainly by Charles Darwin in his 1872 work, The Expression of the Emotions in Man and Animals. He thought that just like every human and animal trait, emotions also adapted over time.

Duing the old times, Humans survived by the most basic emotions Fear,pride and suffering. They had to go by their survival skills and instincts, naturally many of them died because of various reasons. In modern day , because of all the technology advances that made human life so much easier, humans now have access to more emotions and feelings. Love and joy ,for example, are emotions I feel are now more commonly used because of the safe enviroment humans live in. They are always assured to have access to food and shelter without having to hunt which would basically consume their entire day.

So it is quite obvious that as humans evolve,they need their emotions to evolve with them to accomodate them later in life so they could deal with the things that they have to face in life.