The Effect Of Objective And Subjective Affect Labeling On Emotion Under Presence Of Labeling Words:An ERP Study

Affect Labeling is the most simple form that uses language to express feelings, which only requires to stimulate the emotional aspect of the naming and description. Lieberman, Inagaki, Tabibnia and Crockett thought affect labeling refers to the simple act of using words to characterize their feelings or the emotional characteristics of stimuli. At present, objective affect labeling researches more and the conclusion more consistent while subjective affect labeling researches less into in the study of affect labeling, and there are disagreements and disputes on the results of the study, so whether the subjective affect labeling is to enhance the emotions or weaken it has not been achieved conclusion,In this paper,we adopts the classical affect labeling research paradigm, combining with high precision time of event-relating potential technology to research into college students in the electrophysiological characteristics of emotion labeling process which has been discussed to reveal the role of objective and subjective affect labeling on emotion. Research content are two ERP experiment researches, in which the experimental materials are emotional faces selected from China faces affective picture system (CFAPS), and after undergraduate students’evaluation, selection of high intensity and esteemed experiment material were studied.In experiment1, we use the ERP technology to research the role of objective and subjective affect labeling on emotion under the task of having labeling words, the purpose of study is to examine whether the objective and subjective affect labeling can suppress emotions or not. We select18university students as effective subjects, using3(label types:objective affect labeling, subjective affect labeling, gender labeling) x2(Emotional type:happy, sad), and repeated measurement are performed, with the dependent variable is the LPP amplitude of emotion at the stage of affect labeling and after reacting the key. The result shows that under the sadness,400-600ms, the LPP amplitude of subjective affect labeling is greater than that of the objective affect labeling which is greater than the gender labeling, while there is no significant difference after600ms; Under the pleasant emotion, the LPP amplitude of objective affect labeling is greater than the gender labeling, but the difference between subjective affect-labeling and gender labeling is not significant. After reaction, whether happy or sad emotion, gender labeling LPP amplitude is greater than that of the internal affect labeling which is greater than the external emotion labeling. The LPP amplitude of the gender labeling is greater than that of the subjective affect labeling which is greater than objective affect labeling.The above results show that the role of objective and subjective affect labeling on emotions plays after naming the emotional stimulus.In experiment2, we use the ERP technology to research the role of objective and subjective affect judgment on emotion under the task of having no labeling words, the purpose of the study is to examine whether the objective and subjective affect judgment can suppress emotions. Experiments in addition have no labeling words, while the others are same as experiment1. The result shows that under the sadness, the LPP amplitude of subjective affect judgment is greater than the objective affect judgment which is greater than the gender judgment; Under the pleasant emotion, the LPP amplitude of subjective and objective affect judgment is greater than the gender judgment, but there is no significant difference between subjective and objective affect judgment. After reaction, in the case of sadness, we detect no significant difference among subjective affect judgment, subjective affect judgment and gender judgment; Under the pleasant emotion, the LPP amplitude of gender affect judgment is greater than that of the subjective affect judgment which is greater than the objective affect judgment, but there is no significant difference between subjective affect judgment and objective affect judgment.Combining experiment1and2above, we can draw the following conclusions:(1) Using of bottom-up processing with the annotations to the emotion and using of top-down processing will be different emotions.(2) The presence of labeling word has part affect in the experimental task, there is no difference before and after reaction between sad emotion and happy emotion, but of the sad emotion which has been named after have difference effect in affect labeling and affect judgment, then the further analysis found that there are gender differences.(3) Objective affect labeling (judgment) and subjective affect labeling (judgment) belong to different emotion regulation, the regulation also have certain differences.(4) The objective and subjective affect labeling will weaken emotions, and the process occurs after the named process.