The Psychology of Emotion in Restorative Practice

How Affect Script Psychology Explains How and Why Restorative Practice Works

Vernon Kelly, Margaret Thorsborne

• Publisher: Jessica Kingsley Publishers
• Year: 2014
• ISBN:
  9780857008664
• Topic: Social Sciences
• Subtopic: Social Work
• Index: Social Sciences

How and why does restorative practice (RP) work? This book presents the biological theory, affect script psychology (ASP), behind RP, and shows how it works in practice in different settings.

ASP explains how the central nervous system triggers 'affects' which are the basis of all human motivation and emotion. The book presents a clear explanation of what ASP is, how it relates to RP, and how ASP helps practitioners to understand relationships, emotions and dynamics in their work. The chapters are based around case studies which demonstrate RP in criminal justice, organizational and education settings. They show how theory links to practice, and how having a deep understanding of the theory has helped practitioners to be successful in their work.

Providing an accessible explanation of how RP works, this book will be invaluable to all RP practitioners in any setting, as well as RP students and academics.

Part 1

The Theory Underpinning Restorative Justice

Affect Script Psychology

CHAPTER 1

Caring, Restorative Practice and the Biology of Emotion

Vernon C. Kelly, Jr.

Introduction

Restorative interventions work because human beings care. Amongst other things: people care about what others feel and think about them; they care that others have been harmed and are in need of repair; they care that they may have harmed others and don’t know how to fix it; they care that others care for them; they care if others act as if they don’t care for them; and they sometimes care to act as if they don’t care because they have been harmed. Furthermore, all human behavior is motivated by what we care about.

In order to provide a theoretical basis for the methods of restorative practice and the motivations of victims and offenders, it is necessary to delve into how and why we care. Such an exploration must acknowledge that we are biological beings, living in social settings from birth on, and that the unique psychology of each of us evolves from a complex interplay of these factors. Ultimately, this will lead to a discussion of how human emotion and the dynamic interplay of emotions between people creates the atmosphere essential for successful restorative interventions.

Our commonly inherited biology is the critical factor in social bonding behaviors, be it between two individuals or larger groups of people. In part, this is because everyone knows what it feels like to experience joy, fear, excitement, anger and shame, even though the ratio of positive to negative feelings varies widely in each individual. Furthermore, everyone is affected by the emotions of others in quite similar ways.

In these next two chapters, I present a brief overview1 of the biological basis of human emotional dynamics. My main goals are:

•To provide a theoretical basis for understanding the techniques used by those involved in all forms of restorative practice (RP), including restorative justice (RJ).

•To clarify what is meant by restorative practitioners when they say someone has experienced harm because of the actions of another person(s).

•To explain how and why restorative conferences and circles affect the behavior and emotions of both victims and offenders in dramatic, predictable ways.

Affect Script Psychology

The Motivational System

THE AFFECTS

In the early 1960s, Silvan Tomkins (1962, 1963) posited a biologically based theory of emotion, cognition and personality in the first two books of a four-volume series entitled Affect Imagery Consciousness (AIC). In what has grown into the system known as affect script psychology (ASP), the term affect has a very specific meaning. An affect is a biological program, wired into the central nervous system of all newborn infants. The affect system in human brains is comprised of nine affects:

Positive affects	Neutral affect	Negative affects
interest-excitement	surprise-startle	distress-anguish
enjoyment-joy		fear-terror
		anger-rage
		shame-humiliation
		disgust
		dissmell

Each one of these affect programs is set off or triggered when our sensory system (sight, smell, taste, touch, hearing and/or pain) perceives a certain signal in the environment around us or inside of us – the stimulus conditions of the environment. It is the evolved function of these affect programs to provide us with information about what is going on so that we pay attention to the most important events taking place in our world at that moment. Each affect is triggered by a very specific set of stimulus conditions. Fear-terror, for instance, is the response to our senses picking up on something too big, too loud or too fast going on. On the other hand, when our senses encounter some novel stimulus that is just right, interest-excitement is triggered. Distress-anguish is the response when too much has been happening for too long, and enjoyment-joy the affect triggered when that too much finally stops happening.

The triggering of each of the nine affects is an automatic process – it does not require thought. As such, the triggering of an affect can be compared to the knee jerk response. If the stimulus conditions are exactly right, a particular affect is triggered, just as the lower leg jerks upward when the knee is tapped in exactly the right spot. Both of these responses occur because that is the way human biology works. It is how we are wired by all the nerves and nerve endings found throughout the body. We have no conscious ability to control either set of responses. In Tomkins’s opinion, the automatic responses of the affect system serve a function critical for the survival of our species. They focus our attention immediately on one thing at a time, making us consciously aware of whatever is the most important thing happening at that moment. Each moment of consciousness, he suggests, is preceded by an affect. In other words, we only become consciously aware of something if it first triggers an affect.

The significance of Tomkins’s insight conveyed in that last sentence cannot be overstated. It is often a difficult concept to accept because it implies a massive shift from the theories of almost all current and past ‘experts’ in human emotion and behavior – theories that most of us learned and believed from early childhood on. Simply stated, it means that affect motivates everything humans do and think.

You would be right to ask, ‘How can this be? Aren’t humans often logical and rational?’ Yes, we certainly can be. But consider this lengthy question: given that we are biological beings with a carbon-based chemistry made up of molecules and atoms from which all of our organs including our brains are constructed, what in our biological makeup motivates logic and rationality? With all of the advances in the field of neuroscience, we have moved away from the archaic notion that there is a black box of logic in our brains. Logic does not develop out of thin air. It’s not present at birth. Something causes us – motivates us – to want to become logical. The foundation of that something must be present at birth as part of our inherited biological attributes. It is beyond the scope of this chapter to detail Tomkins’s findings from his study of the faces of infants, but he uncovered the fact that each of the nine affect programs includes a specific facial pattern which is visible in infants either immediately upon birth or very soon after. Affect, therefore, is with us from the very start. It influences the way we think, from our earliest musings as children to the more complex thinking of the mature brain. The biological foundation of logic is the affect system.

As I have already mentioned, each of the nine inborn affects is an automatic reaction to and gives us immediate information about our environment without us first having to think about it. The information from the positive affects of interest and enjoyment is that something pleasant is happening. The information from the negative affects of distress, fear, anger, disgust, dissmell (foul-smelling things) and shame is that something unpleasant is happening. The neutral affect surprise-startle simply resets attention to prepare us for what comes next.

The idea that the affects are either pleasant/rewarding or unpleasant/unrewarding is essential for the next part of this discussion. But first, it is important to stress the fact that affects are simple biologic events that take place out of conscious awareness. In ASP, we use the term feelings to describe what takes place once we become consciously aware that an affect has been triggered. For instance, if someone says, ‘I’m afraid’, the sequence of events that took place is: first, a stimulus was perceived by the person’s senses (e.g. they saw, heard or felt something too loud or too big or too fast); then, second, their affect system responded with fear, producing a number of bodily reactions; and then, and only then, did they became aware of the fear. The biological (and survival) advantage of such a sequence of events is that one does not have to stop and think about a saber tooth tiger charging at them; instead, they simply experience fear and then, based on prior learning, can choose the fight or flight response most suitable for the situation.

THE CENTRAL BLUEPRINT

The affect system with its nine affects is but one feature of how and why we care. It is vitally important because it directs attention to what is going on around us. It also provides us with a flavor to what our senses detect. Anything that triggers positive affect is inherently rewarding and we want more of it, whereas negative affect experiences are inherently punishing and we want less of them.

The affect system works in conjunction with many other brain systems. Memory allows us to store information about what we like and don’t like. The ability to analyze experiences allows us to pinpoint the positive and negative aspects of an event and compare it with other events. All of these things combined act as a continual feedback system and create in each person a general plan of action – sometimes conscious and often unconscious – known in ASP as the Central Blueprint. The how and why of caring and the primary motivation of all human behavior is directed by the four rules of the Blueprint. We are continually motivated by our inborn biologic systems to:

1.maximize positive affect

2.minimize negative affect

3.minimize the inhibition of affect, and

4.maximize the power to maximize positive affect, minimize negative affect, and minimize the inhibition of affect.

Wellbeing results from a life lived with numbers 1–3 as balanced as circumstances permit. When that is the case, number 4 progressively generates more and more advanced skills to carry out 1–3. However, some physical illnesses or negative life events such as abuse can create distortions in Central Blueprint balance, leading to unhealthy behaviors. For instance, a chronically abused person might resort to a life dedicated solely to maximizing positive affect through addictive behaviors without regard for the consequences that lead to negative affect. Or someone who has had an experience that harmed them deeply might turn solely to behaviors dedicated to minimizing negative affect – perhaps by withdrawing from all social contact – thereby limiting what they used to maximize positive affect and have fun. As will be seen throughout this book, effective restorative practices restore the ability of individuals and communities to live and function in emotionally balanced ways consistent with the biological directives of the Central Blueprint.

The Cognitive System

To this point, the discussion of motivation, and the most primitive aspects of how and why we care, has centered entirely on the evolved biological workings of the human brain. Simply stated, we are all wired from birth to experience positive and negative affect based on stimulus conditions around us and to have our reactions to those feelings managed by a Central Blueprint. We care – are motivated – to automatically seek more positive feelings and to stop negative feelings.

As the infant brain matures, we become more and more aware of what we are feeling and able to think about it. We develop the motor skills and control of our bodies, including the ability to speak, that permit us to more actively pursue positive feelings and avoid the negative ones. Furthermore, the cognitive or thinking components of our brains begin to be able to anticipate what might feel good or bad based on what felt good or bad in the past.

Our brain is without question the most powerful survival tool at our disposal. Perhaps its most valuable asset is its capacity for simplification. For instance, by amplifying a stimulus, the affect system simplifies things by making us focus on just one thing at a time, even when there are a myriad of other things bombarding our senses simultaneously. In other words, if something triggers interest, we immediately focus on just that; if it triggers fear, we immediately focus on just that. If this simplification ...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Of Related Interest
• Title Page
• Copyright
• Dedication
• Contents
• Foreword
• Acknowledgements
• Introduction
• Part 1 The Theory Underpinning Restorative Justice – Affect Script Psychology
• Part 2 The Theory in Action in Communities and the Criminal Justice Setting
• Part 3 The Theory in Action in Organizational Settings
• Part 4 The Theory in Action in Education
• The Contributors
• Subject Index
• Author Index
• Also available