Basic Emotions

Our movie emotion search engine is based on these 8 emotions represented here: Fear, Anger, Sorrow, Joy, Disgust, Credibility (Acceptance), Anticipation and Surprise. These are based on Robert Plutchik's (1980) psychoevolutionary theory of basic emotions.

The first ones are: basic emotion states of Commedia dell'arte are fear, anger, sorrow, and joy.

Fear

Fear is an unpleasant feeling of perceived risk or danger, real or not. Fear also can be described as a feeling of extreme dislike to some conditions/objects, such as: fear of darkness, fear of ghosts, etc. It is one of the basic emotions.

Anger

Anger is an emotion of displeasure, usually regarding an act or idea of another person or organisation. Sometimes a person feels angry at him- or herself for having acted stupidly or badly, etc.

Anger involves a sense of wrongedness, outrage, frustration, irritation, or violent conflict.

Sorrow

Sorrow or suffering is any unwanted condition and the corresponding negative emotion. It is usually associated with pain and unhappiness, but any condition can be suffering if it is unwanted. Antonyms include happiness or pleasure.

In a phrase like "suffering from a disease" emphasis is on having the disease, less on the unhappiness it causes.

Related terms are sadness, sorrow and grief. Some view anger as a type of suffering. Boredom, or ennui is the suffering from a lack of interesting things to see, hear, etc., or do (physically or intellectually), while not in the mood of "doing nothing".

Joy

Happiness, pleasure or joy is the emotional state of being happy. The definition of happiness is one of the greatest philosophical quandaries. Proposed definitions include freedom from want and distress, consciousness of the good order of things, assurance of one's place in the universe or society, inner peace, and so forth. More generally, though, it can be defined as the state which humans and animals are behaviorally driven towards, to counter external forces which would otherwise lead to unhappiness (and presumably eventual death).

Associated emotions include joy, exultation, delight, bliss, and love. Antonyms include suffering, sadness, grief, and pain. The term pleasure (like its opposite pain) is often used to specifically indicate localized, physical sensations, while happiness is sometimes used to refer specifically to a long-term, inner feeling.

These other 4 emotions, disgust, credibility (acceptance), anticipation and surprise are considered to belong to basic emotions as well.

Disgust

Disgust is an emotion, typically associated with things that are perceived as unclean or inedible. Disgust is one of the basic emotions of Robert Plutchik's theory of emotions.

Disgust may be further subdivided into physical disgust, associated with physical or metaphorical uncleanness, and moral disgust, a similar feeling related to courses of action. Antonyms to disgust are sympathy, liking.

A recent study found that women and children were more sensitive to disgust than men. Researchers attempted to explain this finding in evolutionary terms.

Credibility/Acceptance

Credibility or acceptance is an emotion or mental attitude that something is believable and should be accepted as true.

In movie related terminology we use credibility rather than acceptance, since this is the essential thing in movies, how credible the characters and storyline is thought to be, in order to achieve acceptance in the audience.

A cognitive activity or state that is the opposite of resistance. Lack of acceptance of things that cannot be changed can contribute towards negative mental states such as depression or anxiety.

Increasing one's acceptance of oneself and one's life was part of the Buddha's teachings. Through the first noble truth, 'Life is suffering', he invites people to accept that suffering is a natural part of life.

Note that acceptance is not the same as approval, sympathy, liking etc. A dictionary definition of the word may list approval as a synonym, but another definition may list tolerance as one. Acceptance means agreeing that something will happen or has happened, and living with it regardless of whether one previously liked it or not. Approval indicates judging something to be the right thing to do/happen. Sympathy means affinity for something, which is beyond acceptance, although the verb to sympathise means to be understanding of something, which is closer to the meaning of acceptance. Liking means wanting something to happen.

Minority groups in society often describe their goal as "acceptance". In this case, it means for the majority to allow them full participation on equal terms in all aspects of society. Acceptance is often contrasted to tolerance, in which the minority is allowed to exist unmolested but not fully accepted.

Anticipation

An emotion of pleasurable expectation for something good to happen.

Anticipation is an emotion involving pleasure in considering some expected or longed-for good event, or irritation at having to wait. Robert Plutchik listed anticipation as one of the eight basic emotions in his psychoevolutionary theory.

Surprise

An unexpected presentation of a gift or good news; also one may expect to receive a gift, but does not know what: it is kept secret, because it is a surprise.