Positive and Negative Emotions: Definition and list

During the course of a day, there are many emotions that we can experience. Emotions are part of the natural condition of the person and these can be classified into positive emotions or negative emotions.

The connotation “negative " does not imply that they are emotions that we should not have or that are bad for us, all emotions, whether positive or negative, help us in our development and configure us as people.

It is normal that we all prefer that in our lives there is a prevalence of positive emotions, however the most important thing for the functioning of people is that a balance is established between these two classifications of emotion.

If you are interested in knowing what emotions are and what would be considered positive or negative emotions, keep reading this Transkerja.com article, where we will expose the positive and negative emotions: definition and list.

You may also be interested: Negative emotions: fear and anxiety

What are emotions?

What are emotions? Emotions are considered an affective state that produces a set of organic changes at a physiological and endocrine level. Emotion is experienced instantaneously, appearing at a certain moment and with the tendency to act in polarities of positive or negative. On the other hand, it maintains a short duration in time and its origin is usually influenced by an external experience, on which a process of assessment is established, which is reproduced automatically influenced by our past evolutionary and personal experiences. The functions of emotions can respond in an adaptive, motivational or social way.
  1. Adaptive: prepares the organism to adapt to the action that precedes, that is, adapts the behavior to the action that must be carried out according to the environmental conditions.
  2. Motivational: stimulates or decreases the motivation to address a specific goal.
  3. Social: maintains a predictive component, producing that outsiders can intuit minimally how we act and that one can see it in others, which contributes to interpersonal relationships.

Types of emotions: positive and negative

As we have previously established, emotions can be presented under two different classifications: positive and negative emotions. What are positive and negative emotions?

Positive emotions

Positive emotions refer to the set of emotions that are related to pleasant feelings that understand the situation as beneficial and remain in a short space of time. Examples of positive emotions are happiness or joy, among others. Positive emotions help increase attention, memory, awareness, retention of information and allow us to keep several concepts at the same time and how they relate to each other. Faced with this, it should be noted that positive emotions are mobilizing, that is, when we experience them, we have more desire to do things and we perform better.

Negative emotions

Negative emotions refer to the set of emotions that stimulate unpleasant feelings and consider the situation that is presented as harmful, which allows the person to activate their coping resources. Negative emotions warn us of certain circumstances considered a threat or a challenge. Examples of negative emotions are fear, anger or sadness, among others. Negative emotions increase our awareness helping us to focus attention on the problem that is presented to us, being also mobilizing.

Both types of emotions are normal and necessary. However, the predominance of positive emotions leads to a healthier and happier life, while the presence of more negative than positive emotions, leads to stress and overwhelm, which can cause problems to intensify.

List of positive and negative emotions

There are a lot of emotions that can be classified in the connotation of positive emotions or negative emotions. What are the positive and negative emotions? Below is a list of the most frequent positive and negative emotions.

List of positive emotions

  • Acceptance: availability to approve a specific situation.
  • Affection: feel love for someone or something.
  • Gratitude: feeling of esteem towards someone who has done something for us and the feeling of wanting to return it arises.
  • Joy: feeling that manifests from a good mood, brings satisfaction and is accompanied by a smile or laughter.
  • Love: feeling of affection towards someone or something, that brings us closer to happiness.
  • Welfare: state in which the person is in a balance in the proper functioning between his somatic and psychic life.
  • Fun: focus attention on an entertainment that generates a sense of well-being.
  • Enthusiasm: born from the passion towards something or someone.
  • Hope: confidence in achieving what you want.
  • Happiness: feeling of absolute satisfaction.
  • Joy: very intense emotion generated by something that you like a lot.
  • Humor: state that allows us to focus attention on the comic side of what happens to us.
  • Illusion: being hopeful about something or excited about it.
  • Motivation: reaction to what we have to do that encourages us to do it with more enthusiasm and energy.
  • Passion: comes from love and tends to manifest itself in the sexual sphere.
  • Satisfaction: an effect that is born from the fulfillment of something, well done and that helps to increase confidence and self-confidence.

List of negative emotions

  • Boredom: state of mind that arises in the face of lack of distraction or stimuli.
  • Ago bio: feeling that implies an emotional load which produces fatigue.
  • Anguish: state of mind that involves restlessness, which arises as a result of a concern or suffering.
  • Anxiety: state of restlessness, which involves a high physical and psychic excitement.
  • Disgust: feeling of dislike related to something or someone, which produces rejection.
  • Guilt: feeling of responsibility over an event or action, of a negative nature.
  • Deception: feeling of disappointment. It arises in a situation that does not turn out as the person expected.
  • Despair: it arises before the loss of patience, when it is considered that what the person faces is irreparable or due to the impotence of being able to overcome it successfully.
  • Disgust: feeling produced before a result that was not expected or desired.
  • Stress: feeling overcome in a certain situation, by the demand for performance.
  • Frustration: impossibility to please a goal or desire.
  • Outrage: anger against a person or action for being considered unfair.
  • Anger: primary emotion that indicates a very great anger against a person or situation.
  • Fear: Anguish due to the perception of a danger
  • Concern: state of concern in front of a problem or situation.
  • Rage: feeling of anger that tends to be accompanied by the expression of this anger: screaming, sudden actions, violent behavior, etc.
  • Remorse: feeling guilty for an action taken.
  • Grudge: hostility towards someone, due to some previous cause with that person who has been able to harm or offend you.
  • Sadness: feeling of emotional pain, caused by a trigger and that leads to thoughts with a pessimistic tone, vulnerable and tending to cry.
  • Shame: discomfort due to an action in which the person has felt humiliated or because of the fear of making a fool of himself or someone else does.