How Many Human Emotions Are There?
Written by Kamini Wood, Professional Certified Coach
Kamini Wood is the founder and CEO of Live Joy Your Way and the AuthenticMe® RiseUp program. An international best-selling author Kamini is driven to support people of all ages to heal their relationship with themselves and to stop outsourcing their self-worth. As a result, her clients become their own confident, resilient self-leader with healthier relationships.
Human emotions have long fascinated researchers, and the question of how many there are has yielded various theories. Psychologist Robert Plutchik identified eight basic emotions—happiness, sadness, anger, fear, trust, anticipation, surprise, and disgust—which combine to form complex emotions. Paul Eckman later proposed six universal emotions, excluding trust and anticipation. However, recent studies suggest there are 27 distinct emotional categories, highlighting the complexity of human feelings. Understanding these emotions and their impact on behavior can enhance our ability to navigate and manage our emotional experiences effectively.
According to Robert Plutchik, a psychologist and professor emeritus at the Albert Einstein College of Medicine, all human emotions can be broken down into eight basic emotions:
Happiness
Sadness
Anger
Trust
Anticipation
Surprise and
Disgust
Plutchik believed that these eight primary human emotions overlap and blend into each other, combining into secondary and complementary emotions. For instance, joy and trust can combine to create love. The psychologist illustrated his model with the famous “wheel of emotions”.
However, many researchers questioned Plutchnik’s wheel of emotions, arguing that, for emotions to be considered basic, they need to be universally experienced across all cultures. During the 1970s, psychologist Paul Eckman identified six basic and universally experienced emotions:
Happiness
Sadness
Anger
Fear
Surprise and
Disgust
Nevertheless, a recent study indicates that there are many more foundational emotions than originally believed – researchers identified 27 different categories of emotions.
The impact on human behavior
Scientists today agree that foundational emotions serve as the basis for the more complex and delicate emotions that we experience. Emotions are an inseparable part of our lives that we use to communicate our subtlest feelings. They influence our perceptions, behavior, and choices at any given moment.
1. Happiness
When experiencing happiness, we are in a state of satisfaction, gratification, and well-being. Therefore, happiness is probably the emotion we strive for the most. We express happiness through body language, facial expressions, laughter, and a cheerful voice tone.
Our feeling of happiness, however, is influenced by our thoughts. People who experience more gratitude and have a positive outlook tend to feel happier and more content. Also, research suggests that happiness is often linked to positive outcomes such as increased longevity, enhanced relationships, and improved mental and physical health.
On the other hand, unhappiness is linked to a variety of poor mental health conditions, such as anxiety, stress, depression, and loneliness.
2. Sadness
We all experience sadness from time to time. The type and severity of sadness vary depending on the cause. However, if you experience feelings of grief, hopelessness, disappointment, and lethargy for prolonged periods or if these feelings are severe, you may be suffering from depression.
3. Anger
Although anger is usually considered a negative emotion, it can sometimes be constructive in encouraging you to find solutions to your problems. However, when excessive or expressed in harmful ways, anger can become a dangerous emotion that quickly turns into aggression and hostility. Furthermore, anger can impact our mental and physical health, leading to alcohol and drug abuse, heart disease, and diabetes.
4. Fear
As the emotional response to an immediate threat, fear is an emotion that plays a crucial role in survival. A normal reaction to a potentially dangerous or threatening situation is the flight or fight response: our heart rate and respiration increase, our muscles become tense, and our mind becomes extra alert. This kind of response helps us prepare to effectively manage danger in our environment.
5. Surprise
We experience surprise as a response to something unexpected. This emotional reaction can be positive, negative, or neutral, and it is often characterized by a specific facial expression (raised eyebrows, open mouth, and widened eyes), verbal, and physical reactions. This is also an emotion that often triggers the fight or flight response.
6. Disgust
According to researchers, this emotion evolved as a reaction to food that might be harmful or even fatal. In addition to physical disgust for food, blood, poor hygiene, and rot, we can also experience moral disgust when we witness other people engaging in behaviors that we consider offensive, immoral, or malicious.
Emotions play a vital role in our lives. By understanding them, we can better understand how to control these emotions and their impact on our behavior.
Read more from Kamini Wood
Kamini Wood, Professional Certified Coach
Kamini Wood is the founder and CEO of Live Joy Your Way and the AuthenticMe® RiseUp program. An international best-selling author Kamini is driven to support people of all ages to heal their relationship with themselves and to stop outsourcing their self-worth. As a result, her clients become their own confident, resilient self-leader with healthier relationships. Kamini is a certified life coach, board-certified by the American Association of Drugless Practitioners, holds specialty certifications in Calling in the One®, Conscious Uncoupling®, NewMoney Story®, and teen life coaching. Also trained in conscious parenting, Kamini aims to meet her clients where they are, supporting and guiding them on their journey to where they want to be, both personally and professionally. Her mission: create space for each person to see the unique gifts they bring to this world.
