them only at the level of isolated individuals is short-sighted. From the relation-alignment perspective, the functions and eff ects of emotion at the intrapersonal level are just means to an end. One of the main purposes of emotion’s intrapersonal eff ects is to prepare the individual to navigate social relations.
Although the relation-alignment functions of emotion are enabled by intrapersonal mechanisms and enacted by individuals, the relations that are of concern here are rooted in the interpersonal give-and-take that unfolds between individuals, as discussed in the next section. Th e strength of SNA is that individual-level outcomes and eff ects can be used in higher-level analyses and vice versa. For example, Selfh out and colleagues (2010) found that individuals who score high on extraversion (i.e., intrapersonal trait) tend to select more friends than people with low extraversion (individual behavior) and select others with similar levels of extraversion to their own (interpersonal relations).
Interpersonal relations
At the second level of analysis, emotion manifests in specifi c interpersonal—oft en face-to- face—interactions between individuals, making it inherently relational. Th is immediate interpersonal contact is the domain of facial expressions, vocalizations, gaze directions, posture, and other subtle—or not so subtle—signals of emotion. In one-on-one interac- tion, emotion unfolds like a mutually responsive dialog that is conducted through multi- ple simultaneous channels. In some cases, these signals are strategic; in others, they may be involuntary. One of the advantages of face-to-face non-verbal communication is that people adjust to each other dynamically without having to stop and pause to take in the explicit meaning of the information being communicated.
Commonly these emotional encounters take place between pairs of actors (i.e., dyads), which highlights their relational nature. While emotion does involve within-person inter- nal states, it can be more fruitfully understood as a relation between persons (e.g., de Rivera, 1977; de Rivera & Grinkis, 1986; Parkinson, 1996; Parkinson et al., 2005). From this view- point, emotions are not mere subjective responses to an external situation. Instead, they are a transaction between person and situation. Emotions are dynamic and embodied modes of engagement that reconfi gure relations in the shared environment, conveying informa- tion both to self and others about these relations and shaping them at the same time.
Interpersonal anger and contempt
Th e relation-alignment perspective suggests that emotions are always about some socially relevant object, which may be: (1) the individual with whom one is in direct interaction, (2) that individual’s behavior or experience, or (3) some separate event that has aff ected one or both of the individuals interacting. At the interpersonal level, emotion is an active process of negotiation whereby people seek to determine the relation between them: emo- tions orient themselves to the actual or anticipated consequences of others. Anger and contempt are good exemplars of such social emotions, because they are fundamentally communicative and oriented towards relations.
Anger aims at getting something done by forcing a change in others’ behavior, especially when one feels that one has the means to do so, whereas contempt aims to exclude the other person from social contact (Fischer & Roseman, 2007; Roseman, Wiest, & Swartz, 1994). From a relation-alignment perspective, anger aimed at someone signals that the relation with that person is still viable and their behavior subject to change, whereas con- tempt indicates that the other person is appraised as unworthy or inferior and the relation as beyond reconciliation. Th us, anger signals that the relationship is at risk, contempt signals that the relation no longer exists.
Parkinson (2001) argued that anger has developed as a strategy for regulating others’
conduct in face-to-face interactions. Real-time responsiveness to posture, gesture, and facial movement allows people to adjust their own orientation so that full-blown anger is oft en averted. Initial symptoms of disapproval may be met by conciliatory signs or back- tracking movements. For example, if an angry scowl is met with apologetic guilt that amends the cause of the anger, even a brief exchange of emotion can avoid costly confl icts and repair relationships. Since in interpersonal interaction there are two actors, emotions of one can reciprocally infl uence the other’s emotions in a mutually reinforcing feedback loop. For example, a person may be angry for being the target of someone’s anger, which may lead to a vicious cycle of escalating anger. A more virtuous circle may kick in gear when one begins to show guilt about the original cause of anger. In network terminology, reciprocated anger relations might dissolve relations over time, whereas unidirectional anger met with guilt is likely to maintain relations.
Emotion beyond dyadic interaction
Although relational emotions are grounded in dyadic processes, there are many reasons why they organically extend beyond exclusive pairs of individuals. For one, people tend to kiss and tell: even emotion that is initially experienced either in isolation or within a dyadic relationship may propagate beyond the initially involved individuals. When peo- ple experience a strong emotion, they almost invariably share it later with others ( social sharing , Páez & Rimé, Chapter 14, this volume; Rimé, Mesquita, B., Boca, S., & Philippot, 1991; Rimé, 2009). Emotion that unfolds in one interaction is very likely to be shared later in another, linking individual dyads into a larger, networked structure. Likewise, peo- ple are not limited to experiencing emotions only about the person with whom they are presently interacting. Many interpersonal encounters occur in the presence of more than two persons, creating multiple simultaneous dyadic relations and the tension in many social situations is caused by the competing demands of each relation (Fleming, 1994).
Relational emotions oft en operate in a dynamic social context of multiple interacting indi- viduals, and perceptions of others’ emotions or appraisals can change and calibrate how people think and feel about the situation and the actors in it (Manstead & Fischer, 2001).
What makes networks the true home of emotions is that people can feel emotions in relation to several other people, even in the absence of a direct personal relation with them (Yzerbyt, Dumont, Wigboldus, & Gordijn, 2003). Even in the smallest social net- work, a fundamental premise is that one relation can infl uence another. Heider’s (1958)
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balance theory posited that if two individuals were friends, their evaluations of an object should converge. Later on, it was argued that the object could be a third person in a net- work (Holland & Leinhardt, 1976). Th us, emotions toward a target can confi gure others’
relations with the target and coordinate their target-directed action (Peters & Kashima, 2007; Repacholi & Meltzoff , 2007; Sorce, Emde, Campos, & Klinnert, 1985). As a con- sequence, emotional and relation-alignment processes are likely to be distributed over many actors and their relations in a network. We posit that in addition to shaping direct, interpersonal relations, emotions can orient themselves toward reconfi guring larger pat- terns of relations between multiple actors and objects. Th is means that emotions between two individuals can impinge on relations shared by others.
As an example, jealousy inherently focuses on extra-dyadic relations. As an emo- tion, it is rooted in evolutionarily adaptive mate-guarding behaviors (Buss, Larsen, Westen, & Semmelroth, 1992), but the general pattern applies to other situations in which an intimate relationship is perceived to be in jeopardy because of others’ rela- tional advances. From a network perspective, romantic jealousy is based on the pos- sibility that one’s intimate dyadic relation becomes a love triangle (i.e., a triad) or that it is dissolved altogether. Fig. 9.1 presents a triadic diagram applicable to a jealous situation. In the fi gure, actor A may feel that his special relation with B is threatened by the possible new relation between actors B and C. For the jealousy to be triadic, actor C does not need to be present physically, just symbolically. Th e emotional encounter that takes place between actors A and B can thus aim to act on the A–B relation as well as the B–C relation.
Th is triadic analysis can be scaled up to involve groups larger than just three indi- viduals by positing that the emotion–relation dynamic operates wherever relations are found. Since many real-world emotions take place in contexts that involve multiple individuals (e.g., school, family, workplace, etc.), it is worth noting that even relatively straightforward emotions can refl ect intricate interdependencies between all of the peo- ple involved.
Emotional signal from A
Emotional signal from B Relation A–B
A B
C
Relation B–C
Fig. 9.1 Triadic relations in jealousy.