Interactions, Emotions, and Social Selves, Essay Example

When the question “What is different about male and female emotion expression?” is put hardly anybody can answer it comprehensively, though everybody has vague suspicion that there is something different. It is very important to understand that we are involved in social interaction every day and, factually, we rarely take trouble to think about its formation. So let us think about it, and try to answer the question: “Do males and females in American culture experience emotions differently?”

In the process of communication we always think and control situation. When talking to someone we keep in mind what result we should achieve or what emotions we should cause. And usually men and women tend to perceive the conversation itself in different manners. For example, women can indulge themselves in conversation for the conversation sake; men often follow some goals. And taking into consideration that men and women usually have different social roles it comes as no surprise that they have different behavioral patterns and express different emotions.

It cannot be denied that situations influence our response to them. So social context and cultural specialties influence emotions of people involved in interaction. There is a theory concerning emotions of males and females which author is Hochschild (1975). She claims that expectations do influence people who are expressing their emotions. Really, every culture has some rules about feelings, their expression, duration, etc. When somebody’s feeling expressions fail to observe the rules of the culture they try to cope with them – say, too loud a voice should be lowered (Lewis et. al., 2008, Hochschild, 1975). For example, it is widely known that women are supposed to be more expressive and emotional than men, and they follow this pattern. Women are not to express open anger, and men are not to show sadness – and women report to experience anger more rarely than men.

Such social contexts influence our emotional conditions and shape our interactions so as to conform to the certain rules. Simon and Nath conducted a research devoted to males and females experiencing and expressing certain feelings (2004). It is essential to place the emphasis on these two terms. Experiencing and expressing the emotions can be absolutely different in duration, object or intensity. Lewis claimed that for women it was thought natural to be more extraverts than men (Lewis et. al., 2008). It can be attributed to their different social roles – men, breadwinners, are supposed to be serious and workable, while women must be caring and sympathetic.

Simon’s and Nath’s research had given an unexpected result. Even though it was thought that women experience more frequent emotional experiences, they found out that in fact men and women experienced them equally frequently. But, quite unexpectedly, this research showed that men tend to experience positive emotions more frequently than women. Such facts could be explained by lower income of women and their social statuses.

Moreover, “men report more frequent feelings of calm and excitement, whereas women report more frequent feelings of anxiety and sadness” (Simon, Nath, 2004). Calmness and anxiety can be explained as written above, but excitement and sadness cannot be treated that easily. There were also significant differences in men and women experiencing anger. Men tend to show it behaviorally. Women show it verbally. Women try to cope with it by talking and distracting activities. Men tend to resort to things like beverages (Simon, Nath, 2004).

So it can be seen that men and women do not necessarily experience different emotions. More likely, they express them in different ways. It is because sometimes how we show our emotions matters more than how we actually feel. Our external expressions are of more social value. Notably, women revealed their emotions more willingly than men did. It can be explained by their social statuses that they maintained, and previous argument supports this idea.

Of course, in the research were used subjective methods of self-reports, and range of emotions was limited to nineteen ones. Different life situations also provided different basis for reactions of respondents. But the results were thought provoking.

First of all, it is widely known that women are usually involved in different social interactions, especially when they have children. Their emotions are part and parcel of their lives, as they must sympathize, take care of children, play with them, communicate with many other people and interact in many other ways, and their emotions are usually involved in decision making, conversations, and other activities. Women experience sadness when something goes wrong and try to fix it, and then other activity draws their attention. But men who are working cannot depress because of every upsetting error or delay, and they are usually calmer.

Upbringing, cultural circumstances, personal life situation may influence male and female emotion expressions, but, according to researches, both of them are equally emotional. Men are neither apathetic nor cold; they just act corresponding to their social position. And this social position which is formed by income, appearance, etc. demands certain kind of interaction, and this interaction implies emotionality appropriate to the person and situation.

Works Cited

Hochschild, Arlie R. “The Sociology of Feeling and Emotion: Selected Possibilities” Sociological Inquiry, 45 (1975): 2-3

Lewis, Michael, Haviland-Jones, Jeannette M., Barrett, Lisa Feldman. Handbook of emotions. New York: 2008.

Simon, Robin W., Nath, Leda E. “Gender and Emotion in the United States: Do Men and Women Differ in Self-Reports of Feelings and Expressive Behavior?” American Journal of Sociology.109.5 (2004): 1137–76