By Cláudia Simão
Positive emotions are a very important part of our lives. They help us enjoy life, connect with others, and feel good. Within the family of positive emotions, a new classification emerged recently: the family of enjoyable emotions. Enjoyable emotions are those emotions that induce pleasure when experienced. And consequently, when we perform behaviors that bring us joy, we are more likely to choose to repeat those same behaviors in the future.
On a broader level, positive emotions are useful to broaden our mindsets, according to the Broaden and Build theory. For example, positive emotions can be useful in encouraging the discovery of new and creative actions and thoughts, or even in investing in positive social relationships. A broad mindset leads us to build our personal resources at both physical and intellectual levels. The consequences pointed out are an optimization of individuals’ health and well-being – something we must focus on to improve our quality of life.
However, feeling emotions is as important as expressing them. Emotions that are enjoyable to express and experience, such as gratitude, admiration, or pride, have a crucial praising component that can elevate states of compassion and empathy and can promote prosocial behavior. They have a unique characteristic: the pleasure of ‘shared experiences’.
Shared Experiences
Shared experiences are elicited through praises, because praises are enjoyable to give, rewarding to receive, and further induce self-praising, enjoyable emotions in those who performed the praised deeds. Praising others is a marker for extraordinary actions, such as generosity or great virtues. The expressions of these enjoyable emotions acknowledge those undertaking praiseworthy actions as positive and desirable human beings, thereby contributing to their self-affirmation. This is also a response to external approval and a heightened sense of self-worth resulting from having one’s deeds acknowledged by others. These characteristics stimulate the attribution of desirable traits, and people seek to confirm those features about the self. When that happens, individuals are motivated by the consequences of these desirable emotions, pursuing behaviors congruent with desirable social norms to improve their self-image. Examples are motivation to self-improve, and to engage in mindful, sustainable behaviors, such as mindful cooperation with others.
Being perceived as a decent human being, a good person, is rooted in concerns for social reputation and self-respect, and therefore praiseworthy actions will signal virtue and self-worth. There is a tendency to behave in the service of self-enhancement, leading to more virtuous behavior, and motivating the congruence between highly desirable behaviors and their most appreciated social rewards. The outcome of being praised, and consequently enjoying self-rewards, is an individual impetus to conscientiously comply with appeals to do good. One implication for this seems to be related to economic generosity, triggered by the anticipation of public credit for good deeds. These feelings can become a crucial instrument for socially mindful behaviors, making people conform more often to the desirable norms of helping others in need.
Enjoyable Emotions Boost Behavior Change
The experience of enjoyable emotions has an intrinsic value as these are perceived as being derived from a pleasant experience. The association between a positive experience and pleasantness increases the anticipation to experience a similar event. Actions and behaviors that make people feel good are more likely to be repeated in the future. Also, the anticipated pleasantness associated with enjoyable emotions has been suggested to be an excellent predictor of behavior change. When assessed individually, different enjoyable emotions can be used for different motivational purposes. For example, hope can be used to motivate individuals to start a behavior needed to overcome a threat. Given hope’s nature – future engagement and goal orientation – it encourages people to act and to persevere in the face of adversities, to try different approaches, feeling part of the solution used to reduce the threats.
Pride has a component of engaging in behaviors that are reputation-enhancing. Actions and behaviors that are socially valued or prestigious and are worth sharing motivate people to repeat them in the future. This is because humans spend time and energy on actions that boost their social status, signaling their importance for the greater good, a perfect tool to affirm shared values and beliefs. Another important enjoyable emotion for behavior change is interest: interest drives attention and facilitates learning. It helps to generate new and creative solutions for problem-solving tasks. This emotion is also highly linked to the exploration of new areas and topics, encouraging individuals to discover concepts out of their awareness scope.
Gratitude has a broader reach – feeling and expressing gratitude influences psychological well-being, and physical and mental health. As a trait, it impacts many dimensions of our lives, including work-related outcomes. The tendency to recognize and be grateful for the job performance of co-workers is highly related to well-being and psychological safety in organizations. Gratitude is a powerful emotion to help us bond with others, to make us connect and feel closer to unknown others perceived as great humans.
Enjoyable emotions are an alternative approach to encouraging behavior change: they help us to connect with others and enjoy life, and their pleasant memories keep us connected and hopeful for the future. Benefits derived from enjoyable emotions are plenty – and they seem to help process information in the service of self-enhancement. Promoting strategies that help people feel good, and consequently investing in prosocial actions, such as being kind to others, acting more sustainably, or uplifting others. This will only improve our societies, which need prosocial behavior for their sustainable evolution.
This article was edited by Carina Müller
