Components of Positive Emotions and Health Resources
Components of Positive Emotions:
1. Altruism: gaining pleasure from helping others
2. Amusement: a state or experience of finding something funny, humour provides opportunity for building supportive relations 3. Gratitude: being grateful 4. Hope: anticipatory happiness. 5. Inspiration: being mentally stimulated to do or feel something 6. Interest: a feeling of wanting to learn or achieve goals 7. Joy: a spectrum of happiness 8. Love: an intense feeling of deep affection 9. Optimism: hopefulness & confidence about the success of a future event or something 10. Serenity: calm of being content; an epicurean pleasure Health Resources: 1. Physical Resources: a. There are four interaction systems: brain, nervous system, endocrine system and immune system. b. Interaction between theses systems influences and affects the body and the mind in following ways: i. Emotions: Negative emotions suppress the production of T cells; whereas positive emotions increases production of T cells ii. Stress: Stress affects the immune system and its functioning; e.g. during exams students fall ill due to stress iii. Negative Moods: negative moods lead to depression and lower the production of antibodies and vice versa. iv. Laughter & Humour: aids productions of antibodies and T Cells. 2. Psychological Resources: a. Coping behaviour: listed below are some of mechanisms of coping: i. Problem focused: aims at altering, reducing or eliminating the sources of stress by taking helps of others or taking action to change a stressful situation, etc. ii. Emotion Focused: attempts to change or reduce one’s own response to stressful experience iii. Proactive coping: Involves effort to prevent stress from happening, at the initiation stage b. Positive Reappraisal: a cognitive strategy that aims at reframing the problem in a more positive sight c. Positive Traits and Health: help to produce positive emotions during stressful situations d. Self-esteem: People with high self esteem are able to cope with stressful situations better. 3. Social Resources: People with strong social networking, have good relationship support and are high on positive emotions; this helps in coping with stressful situations.