A Cognitive-Relational Approach to Emotions—The Appraisal and Coping Components of Sadness, Shame, Guilt, Jealousy, and Disgust

This study employs a cognitive-relational framework to examine the appraisal and coping components of five major negative emotions. Three hundred and fifty undergraduate students were asked to recall a personal experience involving one of five negative emotions (shame, guilt, sadness, jealousy, disgust) and to complete scales tapping the ways they appraise the emotion-arousing situations, the ways they describe their emotional inner state, and the ways they cope with this state. Results indicate that the five assessed emotions were clearly differentiated on the basis of cognitions about the external situation and the individual's inner state as well as on the basis of the reported coping strategies. The pattern of appraisal and coping of each emotion seems to support some of Lazarus' theoretical hypotheses.