ABSTRACT
Everyone experiences emotions throughout their waking and working day, and even
when they sleep. Yet like the term ‘risk’, there is no single widely accepted definition
for what we all experience. All standard dictionaries offer definitions for the term
‘emotion’, from ‘disturbance of mind’ which suggests something moderately
alarming, to ‘mental sensation or state’ which at least begins to hint that the emotions
that everyone experiences are neither positive nor negative, but are neutral. For
example the fact that a particular person feels fear is only meaningful in context. If the
fear is preventing the person from pursuing a course of action that would be beneficial
for them, the emotion is negative. Conversely if the fear is preventing the person from
doing something dangerous then the emotion is positive. Emotions in themselves
have no absolute meaning, their significance is only important in relation to the
objectives that people seek to achieve.
