Bert De Cuyper

Emotions and emotion-management

Bert De Cuyper

An emotion can suddenly arise, as a reaction to a stimulus event (either actual or imagined or relived in memory). It prompts a strong action tendency, is accompanied by bodily changes and expressions. Different emotions are experienced positively or negatively, as distinctive types of mental states, e.g. anxiety, anger, excitement.
Emotional reactions can have dysfunctional effects upon judgment, concentration, and task performance. But emotions can also promote personal engagement, further efforts to achieve, and lead to beneficial outcomes. Therefore, optimal emotion — management does not mean denying or suppressing emotion.
Individuals with challenging job demands, such as elite athletes or performing artists are very often confronted with hot affective phenomena as competition or stage anxiety, or anger. Spontaneously, they handle and shape their emotions. These regulation processes occur under the influence of internal processes, such as (un) conscious motives, but are also influenced by external forces as feeling and display rules.
There are good reasons to develop constructive strategies to manage relevant emotions. Changing external circumstances is of course a way of regulation, but often impossible to realize. So individuals have to change their way of thinking about the circumstances. They can become better managers of their emotional experiences by developing self — regulation skills such as relaxation, imagery, self — talk and performance routines.