Abstract
In response to the comments of Rachman (1984) and Mahoney (1984), we attempt to further clarify some of the key features of our perspective on the role of emotion in human functioning and in psychotherapy change. The model we are proposing is a compromise between a realist and a constructivist position. We believe that emotional experience involves the pick-up of real information both from the environment and from the organism itself. It is hypothesized that the basis structure for emotional experience is inwired. At the same time, however, emotion is also viewed as the product of a constructive or synthetic process through which subsidiary components are integrated at a preattentive level and synthesized into a unified conscious experience. We argue that a complex scheme of the type that we have elaborated is required to do justice to the complex nature of emotional processes, and that this complexity need not necessarily constitute an obstacle to research.
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Greenberg, L.S., Safran, J.D. Hot cognition — emotion coming in from the cold: A reply to Rachman and Mahoney. Cogn Ther Res 8, 591–598 (1984). https://doi.org/10.1007/BF01173257
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/BF01173257