Toward a phenomenology of feelings.

Abstract

Our understanding of emotion cannot be complete without an understanding of feelings, the experiential aspect of emotion. Despite their importance, little effort has been devoted to the careful apprehension of feelings. Based on our apprehension of many randomly selected moments of pristine inner experience, we present a preliminary phenomenology of feelings. We begin by observing that often feelings occur as directly experienced phenomena of awareness; however, often no feelings are present in experience, or if they are present, they are too faint to be observed by a process intended to observe them. Feelings range from vague to distinct and sometimes do, but other times do not, include bodily sensations. When bodily sensations are present, there is a wide range of clarity and location of these sensations. Sometimes people experience multiple distinct feelings and sometimes people experience one feeling that is a mix or blend of different feelings. We also discuss what feelings are not, including instances when feelings do not appear to be present, despite evidence suggesting the presence of underlying emotional processes (e.g., behavioral evidence of emotion). These instances of emotion but not feeling lead us to speculate that experiencing feelings is a skill developed over time through an interaction of interpersonal and intrapersonal events.

Investigating pristine inner experience: Implications for experience sampling and questionnaires

“…that are directly apprehended by people in their everyday environments. Hurlburt, Heavey, and Kelsey (2013; hereinafter called the ''inner speaking paper'') described inner speaking in this journal; other aspects of inner experience have been described elsewhere (Heavey, Hurlburt, & Lefforge, 2012;Hurlburt & Akhter, 2008;Hurlburt, Heavey, & Bensaheb, 2009).…”

Response: Commentary: Can Inner Experience Be Apprehended in High Fidelity? Examining Brain Activation and Experience from Multiple Perspectives

“…We happily accept that the DES process does indeed interfere with Susan's experience, and therefore that her DES-apprehended experience is not in fact pristine—that was our intention when we used aspired in “we aspired to faithful apprehensions/descriptions of phenomena as they present themselves of themselves (Hurlburt, 2011a), not skewed or distorted” (Hurlburt et al, 2017, paragraph 27). DES aspires to apprehend pristine experience, but we have repeatedly and consistently acknowledged that it always falls short (Hurlburt and Akhter, 2006; Hurlburt and Schwitzgebel, 2007; Heavey et al, 2012; Hurlburt, 2011a,b,c, 2017). The question is the degree to which it falls short, and whether that degree can be controlled by appropriate methods (Hurlburt, 2011a).…”

Why Should We Study Experience More Systematically: Neurophenomenology and Modern Cognitive Science

“…It has for example already broadened our understanding of different kinds od experiential phenomena [26], it has deepened our understanding of thinking [27,28] and feelings [29], etc. On the contrary, I believe that the use of diverse rigorous methods is in fact advantageous, even necessary, since it enables comparison of results obtained on different levels and enables mutual constraining already among different first-and second-person methods…”