A comparison of dimensional models of emotion: Evidence from emotions, prototypical events, autobiographical memories, and words

The intensity and valence of 30 emotion terms, 30 events typical of those emotions, and 30 autobiographical memories cued by those emotions were each rated by different groups of 40 undergraduates. A vector model gave a consistently better account of the data than a circumplex model, both overall and in the absence of high-intensity, neutral valence stimuli. The Positive Activation - Negative Activation (PANA) model could be tested at high levels of activation, where it is identical to the vector model. The results replicated when ratings of arousal were used instead of ratings of intensity for the events and autobiographical memories. A reanalysis of word norms gave further support for the vector and PANA models by demonstrating that neutral valence, high-arousal ratings resulted from the averaging of individual positive and negative valence ratings. Thus, compared to a circumplex model, vector and PANA models provided overall better fits.

Title	A comparison of dimensional models of emotion: Evidence from emotions, prototypical events, autobiographical memories, and words
Creator	Rubin, D. C.
Creator	Talarico, Jennifer M.
Publisher	Memory
Academic Department	Psychology
Division	Social Sciences
Organization	Lafayette College
Date Issued	2009
Date Available	2012-07-10T13:03:37Z
Type	Article
Language	English
Keyword	circumplex
	emotion
	vector
	autobiographical memory
Bibliographic Citation	Rubin, D. C. and J. M. Talarico. (2009) "A comparison of dimensional models of emotion: Evidence from emotions, prototypical events, autobiographical memories, and words." Memory 17 (8): 802-808.
Standard Identifier	Handle 10385/991
Standard Identifier	DOI 10.1080/09658210903130764
Permalink	http://hdl.handle.net/10385/991
Rights Statement	In Copyright
Rights Holders	Psychology Press