In the previous article about needs, I explained how emotions or feelings are used by Nature as tools to guide animals through life and increase their chances of survival. Compared to humans, animals have a limited capacity to understand and predict the possible outcomes of their actions. However, if they simply follow their emotions — repeating activities that produce pleasant emotions and avoiding situations that generate negative emotions — that alone can be enough for survival. If you have not read the part about needs, I encourage you to read it before reading this article.
In this section, we will discuss emotions in more detail. Emotions play a huge role in our lives. But have you ever thought about what they really are? According to the Merriam-Webster dictionary, emotion is defined as “a conscious mental reaction (such as anger or fear) subjectively experienced as a strong feeling usually directed toward a specific object and typically accompanied by physiological and behavioral changes in the body.” This is a fairly accurate definition. Emotion is indeed a reaction. A reaction implies that emotion is always secondary to something that happened before it. This could be an external signal — such as a situation, event, or someone’s actions or words — or an internal signal, like your thoughts, memories, or images. In other words, emotion is the result of your assessment of how an external or internal signal impacts your needs.
Let’s imagine you texted your partner, they read the message, but did not reply. If, during your assessment of this situation, you think that this is a sign of a deteriorating relationship, your emotional reaction will be anxiety because your assessment indicates that your interpersonal needs are at risk of being unsatisfied. As you can see in this example, your emotion is a reaction to your assessment of the external situation.
So, what kinds of emotions do we know? Scientists disagree on the number of emotions, but the most popular view is that there are at least four basic emotions: joy, sadness, fear, and anger.
Okay, but why do we need emotions? What are their biological functions? There are two main biological functions of emotions: motivational and communicational. The first one is called motivational because emotions urge us to act in a certain way. This function was discussed in the previous article about needs.
But what about the communicational function? An emotional reaction also contains an expression of emotion. For example, we can recognize fear and other emotions just by looking at another’s body language and facial expressions. Emotions are not exclusive to humans; animals also have emotions, but they do not have language. This is why communication in animals involves emotional expressions too.
Imagine a monkey in the jungle that suddenly sees a leopard. The monkey becomes fearful and expresses its emotion by screaming and jumping, along with other facial expressions. These emotions can be read by other members of the group, allowing them to prepare for the danger. They will also start feeling fear, even though they did not see the leopard. Thus, emotions — more specifically, emotional expressions — help communicate important information. Humans also pay a lot of attention to the emotional expressions of others. In fact, the ability to understand the emotional states of others is one of the first cognitive abilities that an infant develops, and it is necessary for survival. For example, imagine a mother who is holding her several-month-old child. Suddenly, the mother sees a snake on their path and expresses fear. The child, looking at the mother’s eyes and face, will also begin to feel fear and learn that snakes are dangerous and should be avoided.
Now let’s discuss the pathology of emotions. Disorders of emotions consist of two groups of symptoms: disorders of emotional reactions and disorders of mood. Let’s start with disorders of emotional reactions. Emotional reaction is a response to a specific event. Here’s how our emotional reactions can be impaired:
1. Emotional explosiveness: This is when anger is disproportionate to the actual negative event. Imagine someone accidentally stepping on your foot in a bus and immediately apologizing. Instead of accepting their apology, you start yelling and become aggressive. That’s emotional explosiveness — disproportionate anger in response to a minor negative event.
2. Emotional vulnerability: This occurs when, in response to an insignificant negative event, one reacts with disproportionate sadness. For example, someone calls you a fool, and in response, you feel sad and cry the rest of the day.
3. Apathy: This is the absence of emotional reactions, even in response to significant events, both positive and negative. For example, if the results of your health check reveal that you have cancer, but you feel nothing in response to this event, that’s called apathy.
4. Paradoxical emotional reactions: This happens when negative events trigger positive emotions and vice versa.
5. Emotional ambivalence: This refers to the simultaneous experience of two contrary emotions.
Now, let’s move on to the pathology of mood.
Mood is more stable and extended in time than emotional reactions. It is the emotional background upon which emotional reactions occur. Low mood is a condition in which negative emotions are more frequent and intense than positive emotions. High mood means that positive emotions appear more frequently and intensely than negative emotions. Mood is similar to body temperature. Just like body temperature, mood can be within the normal range and can decrease or increase in certain pathological conditions. It’s important to understand that normal mood should reflect real life circumstances. For example, if you feel sad after a breakup or divorce, that is normal reaction to the loss of a relationship and dissatisfaction of the interpersonal need. If your mood is elevated after buying a new house, getting promoted, or getting married, that is also normal reaction to satisfaction of certain needs. In these cases, your mood fluctuations are normal because they reflect your life circumstances. Mood becomes pathological if it loses connection with real-life events. Let’s first look at pathologically increased mood.
Pathologically increased mood is called hyperthymia. There are several types of hyperthymia:
1. Mania: Mania consists of three core symptoms. The first is pathological elevation of mood, meaning that in this state, intense positive emotions are easily triggered by insignificant positive events, and it is almost impossible to evoke negative emotions. Even a significant negative event like a death or disease of a beloved one does not negatively influence the pathologically elevated mood. The second symptom of mania is increased pace of thinking. Patients’ speech becomes so fast that sometimes it is difficult to understand them. They may jump from one idea to another and come to conclusions too prematurely, making their thinking superficial and prone to errors. The third symptom is increased psychomotor activity, meaning that patients are very energetic, full of ideas, never feel tired, and do not require rest or sleep. Mania also has different degrees. Mild mania is called hypomania, which can be difficult to diagnose, especially if you’ve never seen the person before. A person with hypomania seems very joyful, energetic, optimistic, talkative, and their activity may be productive and efficient. Only the lack of sleep and absence of consequent tiredness may suggest that this is a pathological elevation of mood. In a full-blown manic state, elevated mood, increased pace of thinking, and psychomotor excitation become so intense that their pathological nature becomes apparent. In severe cases, mania can also involve psychotic symptoms, such as grandiose delusions.
2. Euphoria: This is another type of hyperthymia. It is a state of elevated mood, but unlike mania, euphoria is characterized by reduced psychomotor activity. Patients’ spontaneous movements are decreased, as is their thinking speed.
3. Moria: Moria is characterized by elevated mood with silliness, giddiness, frivolity, and jocularity.
4. Ecstasy: This is a condition characterized by elevated mood, extreme happiness, love for all humanity, transcendence, and dissociation from time and space.
Now, let’s move on to hypothymia, or pathologically low mood. It can be described as a condition in which negative emotional reactions are predominant and more easily triggered by insignificant negative events. At the same time, even significant positive events do not evoke positive emotions. There are several forms of pathologically low mood.
The first is depression. People often misuse the term when describing their emotional state. Depression is often confused with normal sadness. Yes, sadness is part of depression, but it also has other important features.
Real clinical depression is the opposite of mania. It consists of three core symptoms. If the first symptom of mania is pathologically elevated mood, depression is characterized by pathologically low mood and lack of enjoyment. Again, the term "pathological" means that the person’s mood does not reflect real-life circumstances. In other words, there might be no real reasons to feel sad, but the person feels sad all the time. The second core symptom of depression is decreased speed of thinking. People with depression struggle with making decisions, even in simple cognitive tasks. They usually speak slowly, answer questions after a long pause, and give mostly categorical answers, like “yes” or “no.” They also lack spontaneity in their thoughts — often describes as emptiness of the mind. The third core symptom is psychomotor inhibition, which means patients lack spontaneous movements; they may not change their position for a long time and, in severe cases, may be unable to get out of bed. These are the three core symptoms of depression.
In addition to them, there may be disturbances in sleep, appetite, difficulty concentrating, low self-esteem, feelings of guilt, worthlessness, and suicidal thoughts.
These are the symptoms of classical depression, but there are other clinical forms, such as atypical depression (where patients remain responsive to positive events), agitated depression (where there is no psychomotor inhibition as in classical depression), melancholic depression (where somatic symptoms, like weight loss, constipation, sleep problems, and reduced libido, are more prominent), and psychotic depression (where, for example, feelings of guilt may transform into delusions).
Depression, like any other psychiatric disorder, is a continuum with varying levels of severity. According to the 10th revision of the International Classification of Diseases, symptoms of depression are divided into two groups: A and B. “A” symptoms include low mood, loss of interest and enjoyment, and reduced energy and physical activity. “B” symptoms include reduced concentration, reduced self-esteem, feelings of guilt and unworthiness, pessimistic thoughts, ideas of self-harm, disturbed sleep, and diminished appetite. Depending on the combination of symptoms, depression can be classified as mild (when there are at least two “A” symptoms and at least two “B” symptoms), moderate (when there are at least two “A” symptoms and at least three “B” symptoms), or severe (when all three “A” symptoms and at least four “B” symptoms are present).
It is very important to determine the severity of depression because studies have shown that antidepressant treatment is not effective in mild depression and is only indicated in moderate to severe cases. We will discuss depression in more detail in future articles.
Apart from depression, there are other types of pathologically low mood (hypothymia): anxiety and dysphoria. Anxiety differs from depression in that the main negative emotion in anxiety is fear, which is future-oriented. Anxiety urges you to prepare to face or run away from the feared object, which is why it involves increased activity and physical symptoms, like increased heart rate, respiration, chest tightness, and restlessness in the legs.
Finally, the last type of low mood is dysphoria. While sadness is the main emotion in depression and fear is the main emotion in anxiety, anger is the primary emotion in dysphoria. People with dysphoria are irritable and aggressive, looking for conflicts and confrontations, and blaming others for the negative events in their lives.
In summary, emotion is a reaction to our subjective evaluation of how external or internal signals can influence the fulfilment of our needs. Nature uses emotions as tools to prompt us to fulfil our needs and engage in behaviours that increase our chances of survival. If you feel anxious or sad, it could be a sign that some of your needs are unfulfilled. For example, you might be going through difficult times in your relationships, experiencing financial instability, having an existential crisis, or not feeling respected by your colleagues. In these cases, negative emotions are normal and do not require treatment. The only way to improve your mental well-being is by identifying which needs are unmet and trying to satisfy them.
However, if anxiety and sadness (in combination with other core symptoms) cannot be explained by your real circumstances or unmet needs, and if they are so severe that they significantly impair your professional and social functions, then they may be pathological in nature and require pharmacological and psychological interventions. Even in such cases, the real problem is not anxiety or depression itself. Remember, negative emotions are reactions to your assessment of external or internal signals. In most cases, the issue lies in how you interpret these signals. I will explain this further in a separate article on emotional disorders.