| The study presented here compares two emotion elicitation theories: the appraisal theory due to Scherer (1984, 1988, in press) and the goal relevance theory due to Oatley (1988, 1992; Oatley & Duncan, 1992, submitted). The two theories were compared on the basis of their ability to predict subjects' emotions given information about the events which caused those emotions. It was found that Oatley's method correctly predicted 72% of emotion episodes while Scherer's correctly predicted 41%. A Chi-square analysis revealed that the difference was significant (p = 0.01). These findings support the goal relevance approach to emotion elicitation.;The final chapter, which is largely independent of the empirical study, discusses the role of computational models in the study of cognition and emotion, with emphasis upon computational models of appraisal theories and Scherer's (in press) "expert system."... |
