+ 35 Social emotions: what are they, what are they and examples

  • Jul 26, 2021
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Social emotions: what are they, what are they and examples

A distinction many authors adhere to is that between fundamental, basic, or primary emotions, and complex, or social emotions. The former seem to be related to ends such as physical survival, the establishment and the maintenance of a personal relationship, the possibility of carrying out the actions undertaken; they are common to man and higher animals. The latter depend to a great extent on the cognitive purposes and capacities offered by cognitive and social development.

Emotions allow us to feel part of a community, have shared moral values, feel empathy, and identify with others. They not only belong to the private dimension of life, but also to the collective dimension, and many of our emotions are, in fact, social emotions. In this Psychology-Online article we will see the social emotions: what are they, what are they and examples.

You may also like: Secondary emotions: what are they, characteristics and examples

Index

  1. What are social emotions
  2. Development of social emotions
  3. Types of social emotions
  4. What are social emotions

What are social emotions.

All emotions have their function and reason for being, and many have a direct effect on our relationships with others. Some emotions are already present at birth, the so-called primary or basic emotions, while others arise when, during development, they must perform an adaptive task. The latter are secondary or complex emotions, including shame, guilt, regret, envy, which are conditioned and shaped by experience.

Social emotions appear later and, unlike primary ones, are only present in human beings. It is about those expressions that are influenced by the growth of the individual and by social interaction during development. They are complex because they need more external elements, emotional images or heterogeneous thoughts to be activated.

Socialization and the acquisition of the first rules that the environment imposes as ideal ways of displaying emotions cause these to lose their initial connection with physiological expressions and become more and more socially determined.

In this article we talk about the difference between primary and secondary emotions.

Development of social emotions.

Between the two months and one year of life, children begin to use emotional expressions at the communicative and social level, a direct antecedent of the ability to relate and cope with stimuli in a way that is consistent with their own objectives. It is in this period that he makes his social smile appearance, activated by the high tones of the eloquence and by the proximity of human faces.

This is followed by the facial expressions of other emotions such as surprise (6/10 weeks), the joy-sadness binomial and anger (3/4 months), the anger resulting from an experience frustrating (7 months), fear and circumspection in the face of stimuli perceived as ambiguous, new or dangerous, and fear of strangers appear predictably together with locomotion (5/9 months).

The last phase of the child's emotional development, after the first year of life, refers to the appearance of social emotions such as guilt, shame, shyness, contempt. These emotions are called social emotions precisely because they are learned from the cultural context of reference and refer to the appreciation that the child, as a consequence of the experiences derived from socialization, learns to give of himself and of the the rest.

Types of social emotions.

Now that we have seen what social emotions are, we are going to specify what they are and what types there are. Complex emotions for some authors are the product of the combination of primary emotions, while that for other scholars complex emotions are self-conscious and based on self-awareness themselves. Social emotions, strictly speaking, are related to the type of relationship we want to have with another person, and that make it important a purpose for interacting with him in an adoptive or aggressive

We can distinguish between two types of social emotions:

The social emotions of attachment

These types of social emotions are destined to receive adoption. And they are for example:

  • Love
  • Tenderness
  • Sense of belonging
  • Loneliness
  • Sense of exclusion

The social emotions of aggressiveness

This other type of social emotions are the ones we experience when we want the evil of the other and are:

  • Rejoice and evil joy, that is, enjoy the misfortune of others
  • Rage
  • Hate
  • Antipathy
  • Envy
  • Jealousy

What are the social emotions.

In addition to those already mentioned, social emotions are:

  • Admiration
  • Embarrassment
  • Self-consciousness
  • Confusion
  • Guilt
  • Heartbreak
  • Detachment
  • Spite
  • Contempt
  • Strangeness
  • Gratitude
  • Indignation
  • Unsafety
  • Pride
  • Patriotism
  • Gate
  • Recato
  • Remorse
  • Ridiculous
  • Blush
  • Sympathy
  • Blush
  • Shame
  • Embarrassment
  • Vulnerability

Emotions, even social ones, are not the same for everyone; on the contrary, they are conditioned by the predisposition and the atmosphere of belonging: not all peoples have the same emotional correlations. For example, those who live in the Asian continent express different emotions, in different ways, from Europeans. A situation due to the way in which emotions are regulated by the reference culture, capable of making some of them prevail over others. In the West individual emotions prevail, while in the East the subject is not priority, it is the good of society that also counts to the detriment of the self-sacrifice of individuals.

This article is merely informative, in Psychology-Online we do not have the power to make a diagnosis or recommend a treatment. We invite you to go to a psychologist to treat your particular case.

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Bibliography

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  • Cinotti, N. (2016). The gelossia e le emozioni sociali. Recovered from: https://nicolettacinotti.net/la-gelosia-e-le-emozioni-sociali/
  • DeAgostini (2021). I sviluppo emotional. Recovered from: https://www.sapere.it/sapere/strumenti/studiafacile/psicologia-pedagogia/Psicologia/La-psicologia-evolutiva/Lo-sviluppo-emotivo.html
  • IPSICO (2019). You emozioni umane. Recovered from: https://www.ipsico.it/le-emozioni-umane/
  • Poggi, I. (2008). The mind of the cuore. Le emozioni nel lavoro, nella scuola, nella vita. Rome: Armando Editore.
  • Punset, E., Bisquerra, R., Gea, P., & Palau, V. (2015). Universe of emotions. Valencia: PalauGea.
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