Appraisals, Emotions, and Inherited Intentional Objects

Abstract

Modern appraisal theories inherited a problem from the Schachter theory: are emotions directed at intentional objects, and if so, why? On both theories the emotion is initiated by some sort of cognitive state, which according to Schachter produces a state of arousal, and according to appraisal theorists a cluster of emotion-specific states. If cognitions are components of the emotional state it may seem like we can explain why emotions inherit objects from those cognitions. In this article I focus on appraisal theories, and argue that appraisals are emotional components because they are synchronized with other emotion subsystems. However, emotions do not inherit their intentional objects from appraisals, because the appraisals that are emotional components are generic, rather than object-directed.