Psychology and Pedagogy of AngerRichardson, Roy Franklin
Science
Psychology and Pedagogy of Anger
Richardson, Roy Franklin
Anger
Anger has an important influence upon mental life and behavior long
after the emotion itself has disappeared. The functional effect of anger
may be disclosed in a period after the emotion proper has disappeared.
Other emotions may immediately follow anger, such as pity, regret,
sorrow, joy, shame, remorse, love and fear. Feelings and tendencies are
left over which the subject is fully aware are directly related to the
previous emotion. For purposes of study, the period after the emotion
will be divided into two parts; first, that immediately after the
emotion has disappeared, and second, the more or less remote period of
indefinite time. The reaction while the emotion is present, and the way
in which the emotion disappears, are conditions which determine to a
large extent what will consciously appear after the emotion has passed
away. With the aim of finding out what mental factors follow in the wake
of anger, the subjects were instructed to keep account of any sort of
consciousness of which they were aware as referring either directly or
indirectly to the previous emotion observed.
Pity is frequently associated with anger. Mild anger may merge into pity
at the point where attention changes from the situation exciting anger
to the effects of angry behavior on the offender. Pity often follows the
imaginal humiliation of the person committing the offense. It follows
more readily when the emotion is against children, servants, dependents
or persons with whom there is close intimacy. A kind of self-pity is
sometimes associated with anger. With one subject, a mildly pleasant
self-pity would frequently follow anger at an injury. At times there is
found a curious mixture of anger and self-pity. H. observes, “At times I
would be angry, then at other times I would find myself taking a
peculiar pleasure in rehearsing my injuries and feeling rather pitiful
for one who had been mistreated like myself.” An observation from C.
will illustrate the suddenness of the transition from mild anger to
pity. Angry at a clerk for a slight offense, he observes, “As I turned
away I said to myself, ‘I wish that fellow would lose his place,’ but at
once I felt a little pity for him and said, ‘No, that would be too bad,
he has a hard time putting up with all these people.’” Subject A., angry
at a child observes, “I found myself tending to punish him, I saw his
face, it looked innocent and trusting, that restrained me, I now
thought, ‘Poor little fellow, he does not know any better,’ and I felt a
pity for him to think that such a person as myself had the correcting of
him.”
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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