Introduction
Emotion reflects a person’s subjective attitude toward objects and phenomena of the world around them, other people, and oneself in the form of direct experience. Often emotions are a way of expressing human feelings and create a subjective field of reality in which it will exist. The number of emotions, frequency, and manifestation specificity is expressed in emotionality. This particular trait describes the expression of a person’s reaction to a specific event. Impulsive responses are usually influenced by whether emotions are being processed now: negative or positive. The amygdala and prefrontal cortex are responsible for decision-making and emotion processing (Manuel et al. 682). Although these processes mediate decision-making is not entirely clear, the influence of shared emotionality on decision-making is evident.
The Rationality of Decisions
Decision-making involves many components that allow individuals to evaluate their choices and arrive at the best and most beneficial decision. The logical aspect, emotional factors, and moral evaluation allow making decisions (Wray). This process is conscious, demanding, and controllable, but emotion influences it. One can see how categories such as motivation, recognition, and success affect one’s overall behavioral strategy in an academic, scientific, or work environment. In addition, some decisions that seem overly emotional at first glance may be the products of long deliberation and reflection. Social choices can be influenced by beliefs about us and our desires, not by the other person’s state.
The rationality factors include the amount of information, the time constraints on making a decision, its relevance, and the degree of belief in one’s judgment. To a different degree, each element affects how a person analyzes a situation and what decision they will ultimately choose (Wray). Time and information take precedence, but an irrelevant decision can have just as detrimental an outcome as decisions against one’s life principles.
Types of Emotions and Decision-Making
Emotions on the integral spectrum influence decision-making more than any other. These emotions are composed of a person’s evaluative subjective opinion about an issue: usually, topics such as decision safety become superior to profit because of fear of consequences (Manuel et al. 687). Risk assessment often accompanies the integral processing stage of the decision, so the unconscious level prevails over the conscious level because of the notion of collective or societal responsibility.
Accidental emotions are practically on par with integral ones: momentary decisions often result from past reflection. One can observe how emotions such as anger or anger overwhelm rationality, if present, and become prevalent in decision-making. Moreover, such emotions usually lead to the development of others that exacerbate the consequences of decisions made in haste. The frequency and severity of random emotions depend on psychological, physiological (such as headaches), and even environmental (overcast or sunny weather). As a result, deciding the influence of random emotions is the most vivid and pronounced, but this does not mean that it will always be wrong (Manuel et al. 689). Many successful examples (e.g., buying a lottery ticket or a fight followed by a reconciliation) confirm that vivid emotions can also bring beneficial consequences.
Conclusion
Thus, many factors play into decision making, and a person’s overall emotionality often accompanies every action they take. It is worth noting that decision-making, in general, is a process involving all neurophysiological and psychological mechanisms, with social influence involved. The amount of information, time and relevance, and commitment to future consequences affect the degree of rationality of the decision. Among all spectra, integral (judgment, prejudice) and random (anger, surprise, fear, and others) emotions influence decisions.
Works Cited
Wray, Jadzia M. “The Weight of Emotions on Decision-Making: A Comparative Analysis.” Inquiries Journal, vol. 15, 2020.
Manuel, Aurélie L et al. “Interactions between decision-making and emotion in behavioral-variant frontotemporal dementia and Alzheimer’s disease.” Social cognitive and affective neuroscience, vol. 15, 2020, pp. 681-694.