The benefits of negative emotions

The benefits of negative emotions  

Having devoted several posts recently to the area of increasing happiness, we shifted gears a little last time out and focused on the potential hazards of being too committed to the idea of cultivating positivity. In today’s post, we will take that one step further and highlight some of the possible benefits associated with the experience of negative emotions.

Such a topic may seem to go against the grain of a blog series devoted first and foremost to well-being. However, that is not necessarily the case. What we are concerned with here is highlighting what appears to work, what can be of benefit; and that means being open to all possibilities… even being positive about the potential benefits of negative emotions!

Hedonic theories on happiness and well-being emphasise maximising the experience of positive emotion and minimising negative emotion. Taken at face value, this is a useful perspective, but, as outlined last time, when taken to extremes, these ideas can prove counter-productive. Perhaps of more use when seeking to consider the possible upsides of negative emotions is the eudaimonic perspective on happiness.

We addressed the differences between hedonic and eudaimonic views on happiness earlier in this series, but to reiterate those points briefly, the hedonic view is more concerned with an emotion-based analysis that also incorporates subjective assessments of life satisfaction, while the eudaimonic view seeks to consider happiness and well-being in the context of meaning, purpose, and self-understanding. This implies a broader focus, and raises the question of how we process the emotions we feel, rather than simply ‘keeping score’ of whether we feel more positive or negative emotions.

Fear can be useful. It serves a logical evolutionary purpose. Fear alerts us to possible danger in our immediate environment. Millennia ago, when humans lived in caves and had to be wary of large predators, an inability to feel or recognise fear would most likely have ensured an early death. Too often in the contemporary public conversation we regard fear as a bad thing and somehow evidence of weakness among those who feel it. Any emotion taken to an extreme can be debilitating, but that is not what we are talking about here.

Anger can be a motivator. If you feel under-estimated or slighted, the anger we feel arising from this can be accompanied by an “I’ll show them” attitude. This, in turn, can enhance performance, depending upon the situation. If this was your default mode in day-to-day life then that might not be healthy, but you should be able to see how anger, a so-called negative emotion, can be useful if channelled in a productive direction.

We can point to numerous instances even in recent history when anger fuelled mass movements that led to positive social change. Examples that come easily to mind would be the civil rights struggle in the United States and also the global drive for gender equality. Without the fuel of anger (ideally, controlled), such movements would struggle to generate the necessary momentum.

Emotions such as envy and jealousy are generally frowned upon and regarded as ugly. Certainly, that can be the case, but, again, as with so much else, the key here is how you respond to feeling such emotions. Will you feel hostility towards the person or situation that triggered those feelings and will you simply wallow in that? Or, might envy, too, be a motivator? If you play a particular sport and resent that someone is better at the game than you are, this might motivate you to train more and develop your own skills. In an academic setting, if someone consistently gets better exam scores than you, but you don’t think they’re necessarily smarter than you, your response might be to study more and improve your own knowledge. These are just two examples of the positive outcomes that can arise from experiencing the kind of emotion that tends to be condemned in the court of public opinion.

It is important to stress that the purpose of this entry is not to claim that negative emotions are superior to positive emotions or that we should somehow seek to ‘replace’ positive with negative emotions. That would be at least as misguided as thinking in the opposite terms – seeking to eliminate negative emotions and only experience the positive. The absurdity of the former proposal will hopefully be apparent to us all, but that should not distract from the realisation that seeking to do the latter – no matter what the latest pop psych best-seller may suggest – would be at least as unwise, and perhaps even dangerous.

The current state of research knowledge suggests that a balance is key. Yes, the experience of positive emotions will be beneficial, but negative emotions can also play an important role in facilitating health and maximising performance, and we need to be aware of that. So, the next time you are feeling guilt, anxiety, or shame, don’t berate yourself for having those feelings, instead recognise the emotion and ask yourself why you are feeling it. Attempting to address the issues that provoke those emotions will most likely prove more beneficial for your well-being than seeking to deny, suppress, or bury them beneath a layer of forced positivity.

It should also be noted that there is a difference between experiencing the inevitable, everyday negative emotions and more serious mental distress. The point I am trying to make is that those everyday feelings should not necessarily be denied, and neither should we berate ourselves for feeling them. However, more serious anxieties and depressive symptoms may well require external intervention, and we also need to be able to know when we are drifting towards that territory, or consult with a GP or mental health professional if unsure.

Dr. Mark Barry

Mark Barry was awarded a PhD by University College Cork in 2015 for his research into adolescent well-being. He has lectured psychology at UCC since 2013, and is also a freelance writer.