Emotions und Micro Expressions

So many people tried to classify and describe emotions that it fill a book to go into all theories. Here, we tell you the 2 most important classification theories.

The two most important theories

Many scientists have a rather explorative way to classify emotions. Due to observation they have described 7 key emotions.

On the other hand, scientists tried to conclude the nature of emotions by experiments and deduction. They came up with something called the emotional space.

The main task of today's scientists is to combine these two theories (like linking quantum mechanics and Einstein).

1. 7 key emotions

Anger	Contempt	Disgust
Fear		Sadness
Surprise	Neutral	Happiness

It is important to note that feelings are not the same as emotions.

Definition: "Emotions are cognitively evaluated bodily changes."

What does that mean?

Well, imagine, your heart is beating, your hands are sweaty and you are really full of adrenaline. What emotion are you experiencing? It depends on your own evaluation: If you are sitting next to your beloved wife or husband - than it is happiness. If you are waiting for your exam, then i it is fear :)

2. Biologically oriented 3-dimensional model "emotion Space" (PAD)

We have three dimesions of the emotional space (which have equivalents in the body)

Pleasure (do you like it our not? - relates to a special area in the brain)

Arousal (level of noradrenaline in your blood, stimulation of your sympathic nerve system)

Dominance (are you in control, relates to a special area in the brain).

If each dimension is seen as the lateral edge of a cube or space, you can actually calculate an emotion by knowing the dimensional values. So if Pleasure gives you an x value, Arousal an y value and Dominance and z-value, than you can determine your emotion by these three values. Especially in Robotics, this module is used very often. For more information see the paper by Ansgar Bittermann "On the Evaluation of Emotion Expressing Robots".