Sociology of emotions

The sociology of emotion applies sociological theorems and techniques to the study of human emotions. As sociology emerged primarily as a reaction to the negative effects of modernity, many normative theories deal in some sense with emotion without forming a part of any specific subdiscipline: Karl Marx described capitalism as detrimental to personal 'species-being', Georg Simmel wrote of the deindividualizing tendencies of 'the metropolis', and Max Weber's work dealt with the rationalizing effect of modernity in general.

Emotions are on one hand constitutive of, embedded in, and on the other hand manipulated or instrumentalized by entities that are studied by sociology on a micro level, such as social roles and norms and 'feeling rules' the everyday social interactions and situations are shaped by, and, on a macro level, by social institutions, discourses, ideologies etc. For example, (post-)modern marriage is, on one hand, based on the emotion of love and on the other hand the very emotion is to be worked on and regulated by it. Likewise, modern science could not exist without the emotion of curiosity but it does narrow it leading sometimes to over-specialization of science. Many forms of cultural stratification could not exist without disgust and contempt, and there are politics that could not exist without fear, as many civil and ethnic wars could not take place without hate. (requires citation)

We try to regulate our feelings to fit in with the norms of the situation, based on many - sometimes conflicting - demands upon us. Systematic observations of group interaction found that a substantial portion of group activity is devoted to the socio-emotional issues of expressing affect and dealing with tension. Simultaneously, field studies of social attraction in groups revealed that feelings of individuals about each other collate into social networks, a discovery that still is being explored in the field of social network analysis.

Ethnomethodology revealed emotional commitments to everyday norms through purposeful breaching of the norms. For example, students acting as boarders in their own homes reported others' astonishment, bewilderment, shock, anxiety, embarrassment, and anger; family members accused the students of being mean, inconsiderate, selfish, nasty, or impolite. Actors who breach a norm themselves feel waves of emotion, including apprehension, panic, and despair. However, habitual rule breaking leads to declining stress, and may eventually end in enjoyment.

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