ABSTRACT
Theories of particular complex phenomena such as emotions inevitably reflect the different fashions and paradigms in psychology in general. In the wake of Freud, emotions were predominantly considered to be the obscure representatives of the Id, inconveniently interfering with realism and rationality. The results of earlier experimentation seemed to sustain this conception of emotions. Studies of perception and problem solving (e.g., Beier, 1951; Cowen, 1952; Pally, 1954; van de Geer, 1957) revealed states of enhanced arousal and fear to have detrimental effects upon performance. Other investigators (e.g., Bacon, 1974; Baddeley, 1972; Easterbook, 1959) found emotional states to have the effect of narrowing perception by focusing attention upon central regions of the perceptual field while leaving out peripheral cues. More recently, however, there is an increasing tendency to study the organizing and functional aspects of emotional states.
