3 Functions of Emotions

As a psychologist, I receive lots of questions about emotions and how to deal with them. Today, I thought I’d take the opportunity to educate you on the 3 main functions of emotions. There are many times when it appears emotions arise in us only to derail our mood and day, but that’s not necessarily the case. Even the worst emotions can be tools that we can use in our everyday lives as long as you understand what they're trying to tell you.

There are some emotions that are enjoyable to experience and others that feel awful. At times, that leads us to think of some emotions as “good” and others as “bad.” Let’s take that train of thought and see how it can play out if applied in a different scenario. I was re-watching Spike Lee’s film Crooklyn the other week. It’s about a family living in Brooklyn in the '70s. One of the children, Nate, has a broken arm, and his mother insists that he eats the black-eyed peas she made him for dinner because they are full of calcium. This child hates these peas! Well, in walks Dad with cake for everyone and the family is overjoyed—but poor Nate can’t have any cake until he eats those peas.

If you were to ask Nate which was good or which was bad, he would tell you that cake is good and peas are bad. His rationale—and I think most of us would agree—would be that he prefers the taste of cake. However, as his mother pointed out, the black-eyed peas are good because they have nutrients that are necessary for healing. They both serve a function and have a place in our lives. So let's start breaking down some of the functions of emotions and see where they fit.

Emotions motivate us

One function of emotions is that they get us revved up and ready to go. There is nothing that can motivate a behavior faster than emotions. I’ve seen people work harder than they ever had in their lives or give up faster than I can blink all based on their emotional experiences. Emotions get us prepared for action.

In fact, some of our action urges are hardwired in our biology. For instance, the action urge associated with anger is to attack. The action of attack will look different depending on the person. It could be displayed as yelling, hitting, gossiping, intentionally sabotaging someone, or self-harm, to give some examples.

The reason I use the word urge is that you don’t have to act on it. I could have the urge to urinate while walking down 5th Ave in Manhattan, but I wouldn’t wet my pants in the street. I would problem solve the situation which would lead me to find the nearest restroom. While running to the restroom, I could have the urge to yell at people for walking too slowly, but I would try to resist that urge and focus on something else, which allows the anger to dissipate. In some ways, emotions are like the nitrous button in your suped-up Fast and Furious-style...

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