Dealing With Emotions and Making Wise Decisions Research Paper

For many, emotions have been long considered as critical obstacles to wise decision-making by inhibiting pure rationality. Emotions, however, are important constituents of decision-making. Individuals naturally maximize their efforts to make wise, best decisions amidst influences of emotions. This essay argues that emotions are integral parts of decision-making by referring to the theme of emotions, reality, and decision-making in John Updike’s “A&P”.

Updike shows that emotions ‘coming of age’ may result from decisions taken under strong emotional influences. Sammy, for instance, starts to ponder over leaving barely few seconds before he actually quits the job. When asked why he had resigned, Sammy points the embarrassment of the three girls by Lengel. At this point, Sammy appears to be in absolute control of his emotions and perhaps understands his motives for leaving the job. Clearly, Sammy comprehends his motive for leaving the job, but Lengel might not understand this. Sammy’s decision to quit the job is driven by emotions toward the three girls.

Consequently, Lengel believes that Sammy is most likely to regret for the rest of his life. The emotions generate strange feeling in Sammy’s stomach, and he asserts that the feeling could reflect how the world would be hard for him thereafter. Obviously, Sammy made the decision to quit his object while under strong emotions, and therefore he never thought of the consequences. The decision to quit the job, however, presents a new opportunity for Sammy. One can only realize this after the resignation by observing changes in Sammy. Sammy is now ready to face the real world. The case of Sammy shows that there is more to life than confining oneself to a particular place.

The ability to make wise decision can propel or break one’s career. Yet a poorly made decision could end the same career in a moment. The author reveals the major reason behind Sammy’s decision and motivation to leave his job. It is because Sammy has a bright future beyond the grocery store, which is a symbol of consumerism. Sammy must therefore quit his job to realize this dream. Thus, decisions one makes, even if driven by emotions, could lead to discovery of new potentials.

In decision-making, there are satisficers and maximizers (Moyano-Díaz, Martínez-Molina and Ponce 500). People who are satisficers tend to aim for simple satisfaction, and they are most likely to take initiatives after an evaluation of the level of satisfaction they are most likely to derive from their decisions. In this manner, these individuals create a certain extent of acceptability. Satisficers have failed to aim for an ideal or the best choice, but rather they focus on just good enough option. As a result, they achieve positive emotions or subjective well-being because of their decisions (Moyano-Díaz et al. 500).

In most cases, people tend to make some of the worst decisions when they experience some forms of strong emotions. It is imperative to note that emotions may also guide individuals during decision-making processes. However, emotions could also be responsible for generating certain feelings that could change one’s perspectives and inhibit effective comprehension of actual occurrences at a given moment. This is the case of Sammy, who actually does not take adequate time to evaluate his decision to quit the job. Sammy shows making critical decisions when emotional could inhibit logic and abate one’s ability to achieve important goals through wise decisions.

One should appreciate the role of emotions in decision-making because of its abilities to distort individuals’ ability to make decisions. Emotions may narrow one’s perception of potential options and solutions. Studies have shown that this could be among the most demoralizing elements of negative emotions on choices. On the contrary, studies have identified the paradox of increasing the number of options available (Moyano-Díaz et al. 500). Theoretically, people tend to have several choices to choose from, but available findings have shown that increased number of choices normally have adverse consequences on perceived well-being of individuals. Specifically, individuals who spend more time, energy and resources to search various alternatives might experience dissatisfaction or regret later about their decisions.

However, it remains unclear why people experience such adverse consequences. Options are always the same, but emotions are responsible for skewing individuals’ view of options. In most negative cases, people tend to see ‘now potential way out’ of their situations, specifically when emotions control decision-making processes. While in many cases, many people may not see possible means of overcoming their challenges. Thus, negative emotions have strong influences on options and decision-making abilities.

One major way in which emotions influence decision-making is through affecting thought processes of individuals. Anger, for instance, reflects a strong form of emotion, and it could derail decision-making. In this case, one may focus on an individual rather than concentrate on a situation as a casual element. Decisions based on anger could be harsher to others even if they have no role in initiating the feeling. Anger is known for its harmful effects because of possible prejudice or stereotyping of others, especially people outside the group. However, the extent of negative emotions impacts on decision-making differs significantly. Fear and sadness, for instance, are also forms of negative emotions, which do not lead to more outcomes that are destructive or stereotyping of others.

Emotions also have abilities to influence individuals’ evaluation and judgment of risk preferences and perceptions. Anger and fear, although are both emotions with negative connotations, they differ significantly based on control and certainty and thus influence decision-making. Fear is linked with evaluations of situational influences and insecurity. On the other hand, anger is related with one’s control and certainty. Consequently, these various forms of negative emotions lead to two different effects on risk perceptions. Fear creates negative evaluation of risks and leads to inclination for risk-averse choices. Conversely, anger is responsible for optimistic assessment of risks and preferences for risky choices. However, it is imperative to note that anger is linked to optimistic risk evaluation, but not general feeling. People who tend to make decisions while are angry are not happy, and they have the confidence they can overcome any possible obstacle on the way.

Emotions also affect one’s abilities for memory recall. Sammy, for instance, could not conduct benefits of quitting his job. With such outcomes, Sammy may not accept outcomes and consider the possibility of resuming the previous job to understand his reality. In such situations, psychologists have agreed that one should accept emotions in order to deal with them effectively (Alberts, Schneider and Martijn 867). At the same time, control-based approaches to deal with emotions ensure that people accept and experience their emotions completely, avoid changes, controlling or manipulating them.

Emotions generally influence information-processing systems and therefore may direct the mind to ignore certain information. In this process, people only concentrate on information that they consider as important and recall, and it thus affects overall outcomes. Emotions limit a sense of control. In the case of Sammy, for instance, he lost a sense of control during decision-making processes because of strong emotions of infatuation toward the girls.

It is important for individuals to understand their own emotions such as fear or love in order to act appropriately in a given situation. Naturally, there are several options and solutions available for people in a challenging situation. Most commonly, self-doubt and a feeling of insecurity limits decision-making abilities and depict that the situation lacks any solutions. On the contrary, individuals who manage to try various options eventually realize that every situation has solutions beyond the emotional trap.

Some researchers have demonstrated that effects on emotions on people could be influenced by “individual personality characteristics, social-cognitive variables, as well as goal pursuit and progress in specific life domains” (Garriott, Keene and Santiago 254). Information overload common in a contemporary society could have a significant impact on emotional decision-making processes. When the mind has much information to process for decisions and solutions, the possibility of making emotional decisions becomes common. The case of Sammy typically shows limited time for reflection, which leads to more irrational decisions. Thus, people may regret such outcomes when emotions are left to influence decision-making processes.

From a more positive point of view, emotions may present opportunities for effective reasoning. The challenge is usually identify decisions that could be effective when emotionally made, particularly when they are extremely complex.

In conclusion, this essay shows that emotions are critical part of any decision-making processes. Negative emotions may utterly lead to regrets afterwards while positive ones could enhance opportunities for making better decisions. People should be therefore aware of their emotions and influences of such emotions on decisions and potential outcomes. In addition, it is important to control emotional bias in order to make more rational, better decisions. In most instances, a completely emotional decision tends to extremely fast relative to rational decisions. The case of Sammy therefore reflects emotional decision that was made within few seconds. It was more reactive and critically subconscious while he faced no actual danger then. Overall, emotions have various effects on thought processes and therefore affect decisions in different ways.

Works Cited

Alberts, Hugo J. E. M, Francine Schneider and Carolien Martijn. “Dealing efficiently with emotions: Acceptance-based coping with negative emotions requires fewer resources than suppression.” Cognition and Emotion 26.5 (2012): 863-870. Print.

Garriott, Patton O, Aaron Hudyma Chesleigh Keene and Dana Santiago. “Social Cognitive Predictors of First- and Non-First-Generation College Students’ Academic and Life Satisfaction.” Journal of Counseling Psychology 62.2 (2015): 253–263. Print.

Moyano-Díaz, Emilio, Agustín Martínez-Molina and Fernando P. Ponce. “The price of gaining: maximization in decision-making, regret and life satisfaction.” Judgment and Decision Making 9.5 (2014): 500–509. Print.