Emotions & Religiosity: A Psychological Perspective

Emotions & Religiosity
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Psychology 1
Contents
Introduction......................................................................................................................................2
Research Structure...........................................................................................................................4
What is Psychology.........................................................................................................................5
What are Emotions?.........................................................................................................................7
What is Religion?............................................................................................................................9
Emotions and Religion..................................................................................................................11
How Psychology is connected with Emotions and Religion?.......................................................12
Islam and Emotions.......................................................................................................................14
Hinduism and Emotions................................................................................................................16
Christianity and Emotions.............................................................................................................19
Buddhism and Emotions................................................................................................................21
Sikhism and Emotions...................................................................................................................24
References......................................................................................................................................30

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Introduction
Emotions are the lead factor which regulates human behavior. Emotions are the feelings
which change the thought procedure and point of view of a person. The behavior of human
changes according to his/her emotions. Here this is to mention that emotions are not static in
nature, it varies and due to this human nature, behavior, the way of responding also changes. In
addition to these emotions also influences the personality of people. Emotions are somewhere
related to the human psychology. Psychology is a study of brain, behavior, and reactions of a
human in a scientific manner (Barrett, 2009). It is a kind of modern science. Phycology describes
that every other person is different and they all have their own thinking and behavior. There is a
different type of psychology such as cognitive, forensic, social, and developmental psychology.
Psychology is not a physical aspect but matters at a very high level in human behavior; it
is all related to the mind. In this subject, a person gets to know that how a human brain works
and in which manner the same perform it is functions. Emotions are one of the areas of
psychology (Humphreys, 2011). It may state that psychology is the wide term whereas emotions
are it is one of the factors. Emotions affect others and also get affected by them. Various theories
have been given by many of the scientists on the subject of emotions and psychology. Here this
is to understand that emotions are not a thing to control and in fact, no one can control his/her
emotions completely. These are an important aspect of human behavior which describes the
personality of a person.
Sometimes while watching a movie or reading a book, a person feels something weird in
his/her nature. These are the situations, where a person feels the emotions which are not the real
one. These kinds of feelings are quasi-emotions which occur according to an imaginary situation

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(Säätelä, 1994) Emotions play a very vital role in psychology. Further emotions are the natural
reaction towards a particular situation. For Instance, if somebody wins a lottery, he/she must be
happy and on the other side when someone experiences some mishappening in his/her life,
he/she becomes sad (Thagard, 2010). Emotions often get influenced by some of the factors such
as biological factors, personal perception, social factors and religion. Religion is one of the
important factors that affect a person’s emotions.
Across the globe, there are number and kind of religion such as Hinduism, Islam,
Catholic, Buddhism, and Judaism which are followed by people. These religions control and
regulate emotions of their followers up to a great extent. Whatever a person learns from his/her
religion, the same turns into an emotion somewhere in his/her behavior (Smith, 2009). This is the
reason that two persons of different religion commonly have different emotions and perception.
The main logic behind this is that people from same religion have same belief and learning.
Although everyone has their different personality and thinking procedure, yet religion is
the factor which united people by it is essentials. No matter what, people from same religion
have the same point of views regarding their religion and they have the same concept. Every
religion gives the different lessons, and follower of particular religion gets the same education
and instruction. Most of the times religious theory work as lead factor behind emotional
experiences. Every religion has different thinking about gender, music, culture religion and so on
(Rees, 2017). People behave accordingly and their emotions also flow in the same direction only.
Some religion focuses on education, some focuses on early marriage and so on; people follow
the practices according to their religion. The same is also vice-versa. It means as religion affects
emotions, similarly, emotions also affect religious theories. This study focuses on the terms
emotions, religions, and their relations.

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Here in the study of emotions and religions, this is to mention that they are connected
with each other in a psychological context. What is psychology? In order to answer this question,
this is to cite that psychology is a manner of thinking (Pastorino & Portillo, 2011). This is a
subject, which comprises mental theories and perception of a person. The Human body reacts
according to the signals received from the brain, and psychology controls the brain. Emotions
have a great place in the subject of psychology as content. There many of the religions do exist.
How they have been developed, how they got influenced by emotions, what were the emotions,
which played a significant role in the development of religion, these all are necessary to study in
the subject of psychology when it is about emotions and religion.
Further, religion also put an impact on emotions of it is followers. This is very important
topic to study those emotions and religions are connected with each other (Wilson, 2012). People
who have positive emotions are often leading to religion and spirituality in their lives. Whereas
those people who have some negative views about life are less spiritual in their nature.
Psychology is all about the thought procedure and behavioral reaction about a particular thing or
place or person or a situation. But the same get influenced by religion and emotions of people.
Research Structure
This literature review is based on the topic Emotions & Religiosity from the
psychological perspective. This discussion is adhering to include an understanding of emotions,
religion and psychology as the first phrase. The relation between emotions and religiosity can
only be understood by defining these terms in details. Further, the importance of psychological
study, the relation of religion and emotions and their significance in the area of psychology will

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also describe in this literature review. As this research is expected to be done from a
psychological perspective, required terms and description will be acknowledged.
In addition to this, different religions, their evolution, development, the role of emotion in
their development will also include. To understand the fact that how these different religions
affect emotions of people is also an important part of this literature review. This literature
research would include the discussion on world’s most common religion followed by people
across the globe such as Christianity, Islam, Hinduism, and Buddhism in order to understand the
impact of emotions in development of these religions. Further, this discussion would also focus
on Sikhism religion which is not followed by people as much as other religions, yet has it is a
significant influence in the area of emotions.
What is Psychology
In order to understand that how emotions and religion affects a human nature in terms of
psychology, this is to understand that what is meant by the term “Psychology” is. In an academic
meaning, Psychology is a scientific learning of brain. Psychology is not a subject which only
related to human body, but the same is an essential element in respect of every living element.
Psychology is a general concept in the study of behavioral science. In addition to the study of
the brain, it also includes a study of the behavior including unconscious and conscious
phenomena. As an isolated science, this subject focuses on the study of behavior of a specific
person and his/her reactions and responding with respect to a particular situation. While on the
opposite side as social science, it studies and focuses on groups. A person who practices this
subject is known as “psychologist” (Kasket, 2017). This is the person who studies the cases and
treats people when they face issues related to this subject.

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Phycology can also be considered as mental characteristics of a person or a group.
Psychology is a wide subject and it includes the topic such as what are the components and
functions of the brain, how a similar work, how individuals act and collaborate in gatherings
(Pandya, 2011). There is kind of psychology according to the area of practice. Some of the
common types of psychologies are counseling psychology, forensic psychology, organizational
psychology and educational psychology. According to American Psychological Association, this
is a scientific study of behavior and mental processes. When a person reacts in a similar way,
again and again, people often say that it becomes his/her psychology. So here it can comprehend
that in broad sense individuals consider the term “behavior” as psychology. As prior specified
this is an extensive subject, one cannot know about each and every component of this subject.
People are still researching the area of this subject.
Human behavior is a complicated element. This varies from person to person and further
in relation to one person, situation to situation. But there are some elements which affect human
behavior (Disaster Management Institute, Bhopal, 2018). In reality these elements do not affect
human behavior directly, instead, they control human emotions and then after human behavior
affect accordingly. So in this context, in spite of the fact that it can be mention that psychology
influences human conduct however not in an immediate way.
This is additionally important to comprehend that why the research and investigation of
psychology are critical yet necessary? This subject is important in order to understand the
behavioral development of an individual as well as society. This subject characterizes the mental
instability of a person and can also help to resolve the same (Philipee, 2017). This subject deeply
studies a human brain and defines the problems with the same. All the mental ailments are
someplace comes into the region of psychology.

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What are Emotions?
To discuss the impacts of religion on emotion, in the first place it is important to know
that what precisely emotions are? There is no explanation or interpretation of emotion is
accessible. It can be comprehended that emotions are not a materialistic element. A person
neither can contact the same not can be in touch with the same. But everyone can feel emotions.
This is a very personal aspect. Everyone has their own emotions according to which they behave
(Griffiths, 1997). Emotions have a very significant influence on a person’s behavior. A person
reacts to situations according to his/her mood and the mood is influenced by emotions. A person
makes choices according to his/her emotions. Emotions play a vital role in psychology. Emotions
often treated similar to feelings and also includes experiences such as love, pain, joy, happiness,
fear, anger and grief.
Emotions often dealt with like moods and but there is a difference between mood and
emotion (Sixseconds, 2018). Emotions are the more specific whereas moods are more general in
sense. Emotions have an identifiable cause. For instance in the wake of being failed in an
examination, one could detect discouraged. This depression is an emotion here. On the other
side, moods are milder than emotions. Moods do not have a particular reason and they are not
specific in nature similar to emotions. Advance it might state that emotions are the result of a
particular event whereas mood influence behavior of a person in relation to upcoming events.
Mainly emotions have three significant parts/components such as subjective feelings;
physiological response and behavioral response (Human Diseases And Conditions Forum, 2018).