James C. Mancuso (1992) Does "emotion" Refer to a Real-world Entity?. Psycoloquy: 3(09) Mood (8)
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PSYCOLOQUY (ISSN 1055-0143) is sponsored by the American Psychological Association (APA).
Psycoloquy 3(09): Does "emotion" Refer to a Real-world Entity?
DOES "EMOTION" REFER TO A REAL-WORLD ENTITY?
Commentary on Nesse on Mood
James C. Mancuso
Department of Psychology
University at Albany
Albany NY 12203
JCM61@ALBNYVMS.BITNET.
Abstract
We would profit from determining ways people istantiate
the constructions of "mood" and "emotion" rather than attempting to
develop a construction allowing confidence that we have created a
correspondence to an external something.
Keywords
Mood, evolution, natural selection, fitness, emotion,
adaptation, function, depression, psychology, psychiatry.
1. Do we profit from attempting to attach the terms "mood" and
"emotion" to an extant world? Are we still at a point from which it
takes great effort to regard "mood" and "emotion" as constructions that
we [who, as scientists, are to be regarded as a subset of "persons"]
impose on some kind of input? Would we not profit from attempting to
determine the ways in which persons instantiate those constructions,
rather that attempting to develop a construction which will allow
confidence that we have created a correspondence to an external
something?
Volume: 3 (next, prev) Issue: 09 (next, prev) Article: 8 (next prev first) Alternate versions: ASCII Summary