Emotions and Emotion Words

Abstract

[discuss] what language reveals about emotion concepts / argue that emotional phenomena exist, more or less regardless of what words there are to designate those phenomena / the phenomena are complex, and when using words, individuals as well as languages take their pick in what they wish to designate in those complex phenomena / the words, nevertheless, do designate aspects of the complex phenomena, and they reflect the nature of the phenomena that they refer to main hypothesis . . . is that emotional experiences can, to a large extent, be described in terms of emotion components, and first of all in those of appraisal and action readiness / a 2nd hypothesis is that the major emotion words in different languages have a similar structure / 3rd hypothesis is that the dimensions of appraisal and of action readiness are cross-culturally highly general, or even universal, because they are tied to adaptationally and socially basic relationships, to cognitive mechanisms attuned to those relationships, and to biological mechanisms [examine] the structure of emotional experiences denoted by emotion concepts in 3 different cultural groups [the Netherlands, Indonesia (Djakarta), and Japan (Yamagata)] / Ss were university students