ABSTRACT
A basic assumption of this chapter is that affective feelings are a fundamental mode of subjective experience. Hence, I devote a separate chapter to that topic. The emotional system is understood in this chapter as including affective feelings, neurophysiological processes, and behavior. Following Damasio (and, of course, William James), affective feelings can be understood as ‘readings’ of bodily states. They are primary sources of motivation that are involved in carrying out actions that meet our needs. Generally speaking, we do what is pleasurable and avoid doing what is unpleasurable. In this way, affects serve as proximal motives that fulfill distal evolutionary as well as. Also discussed in this chapter is the topic of affect regulation, including its neural basis and the phenomenon of coregulation.
