Thinking with Feeling

Fostering productive thought in the classroom

Douglas P. Newton

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2014
• Print ISBN: 9780415819824
• eBook ISBN: 9781317811008
• Topic: Education
• Subtopic: Education General

Are emotions good or bad for thinking and learning?

Have you ever wondered why a good lesson of one year falls flat in another?

Why do students behave the way they do?

Teachers are expected to foster productive thought yet the neglect of emotion in the classroom, in favour of intellect, means teaching and learning is often not as effective as it might be. Thinking with Feeling explores what we mean by productive thought, its interrelationship with mood and emotions, how teachers can manage that interaction to improve teaching and learning, and what teacher trainers could do about it.

Synthesising the most important international research in the field, it offers a framework for productive, purposeful thought - deduction, understanding, creative thinking, wise thinking, and critical thinking - and explains how mood and emotion can support and also impede learning. It considers the effect of the interplay of emotion and intellect on classroom behaviour, on students' public performance and performance in tests, and how emotional labour can affect the teacher.

Illustrated with examples from practice, this challenging, thoughtful study offers education professionals a basis for understanding the interaction of emotions and cognition and making it a successful partnership in order to improve teaching and learning.

Chapter 1

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Second thoughts

Sense and sensibility

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Human thought frequently, perhaps always, bears the stamp of emotion. Academic activity is no exception; it is a matter of thinking and feeling and the feeling can determine whether the thinking is successful or even takes place at all. Given that, it is surprising that teachers may plan for the intellect but not for the emotions. This neglect has a long history and may be transmitted from one generation of teachers to another, as novice teachers simply imitate what they see. This chapter outlines the interaction of thinking and feeling and indicates its potential to shape productive thought. Subsequent chapters will explore this interaction in more detail and consider its implications for fostering particular kinds of productive thought.

Productive thought

Productive thought is potentially powerful and enabling. Being able to make sense of the world, think things through to a conclusion, create a solution to a problem, act wisely and judge the quality of thought allows us to meet and deal with the challenges and vicissitudes of life. For instance, if you understand how force relates to momentum, rocket science could be the job for you; knowing how your boss is likely to respond can help you plan your bid for promotion; and teasing out what underlies a politician’s rhetoric might lead you to vote for someone else. Productive thought – teasing more from and making more of the known – has the potential to help someone meet the demands of a challenging world.

Sense

Surely, learning rocket science, justifying a promotion and considering a politician’s proposals are just matters for the intellect? The emotionless android Data, of the Starship Enterprise, had only his intellect to depend on. He turned the handle and out came the mental products, all of which were absolutely rational, unsullied by emotion. Human thought can be like this, but when it is, it still has a tendency to take short cuts, it does not always explore every alternative, and it fails to mention its departure from the logical straight and narrow (e.g. Kahneman & Tversky, 1979). As Spellman and Schnall (2009: 118) put it, ‘the rational human is neither rational nor human’.

Sensibility

Sensibility is our receptiveness to emotional effects and it is greater than we might like to think. All the big decisions in life, like who to marry, where to live, whether or not to accept a job in another city and what to do with that lottery win, are partly shaped by emotion. Even the relatively small things, like what to do on your day off or which shoes to buy can depend on your mood. There is a way of taking decisions on the toss of a coin which recognizes the importance of emotions. If the coin comes down heads, do it; but, if that doesn’t feel right, don’t do it. A decision can be logical but not the right one for you (Spicer, 2004; Sylvester, 1994). And, sometimes, emotions simply outweigh logic. Norman (2002), the designer, describes how his intellect told him his black and white computer screen did everything he wanted but his emotions told him to replace it with a colour monitor. We also relate to others through our feelings, sometimes to the exclusion of sense. Stephen Fry (1998) describes how he judged people he visited as a child according to the make of their lavatory cleaner. Even ‘dispassionate’, academic research is driven by emotion. Neumann (2012: 8) describes how ‘the systematic exploration and analysis of selected aspects of our world relies on feeling [as much as] thinking, knowing, and learning’. In effect, people do it because it offers interest, excitement and pleasure, which outweigh the periods of tedium and frustration. The point is that, like it or not, our thoughts involve emotions. But this does not mean those thoughts are irrational, or the decisions are wrong, or that emotions are always bad for thought.

A fluid partnership

Immordino-Yang and Damasio (2007) have described the interaction of thinking and feeling (more properly, cognition and emotion). On the one hand, there is High Reason, where the intellect reigns, as in the thoughts of Data. On the other hand, there is the purely emotional response, uninformed by reason – if a snake was suddenly to appear, you would leap back with a surge of fear. But between these extremes, and where most of our thinking lies, cognition and emotion interact. What we store and recall is shaped by this interaction and we remember highly emotive events more than the unemotional, we fill our minds with worries which deflect attention and occupy mental space, we note that our creativity is enhanced by some states of mind more than others, we do what we feel is in our best interests rather than what we reason to be so (and we justify it afterwards), and we look for personal relevance in events to motivate us. Such effects enter into the various kinds of productive thought. This means that mental products can change with mood and emotion. For instance, the essays of depressed college students can include more gloomy, sad references and make more self-reference than those who are not depressed (Rude et al., 2004). If moods change, so do the essays. Emotion shapes the landscape we think in. What is foremost in our minds, what we attend to and how we process the information can depend on the prevailing state of mind (Spicer, 2004).

For over two millennia, there has been a tendency to see this as bad for thought (Phelps, 2006). Plato talked of the rational mind struggling to master the emotions, like a charioteer (reason) with unruly horses (the spirit and the appetites) (Kristjánsson, 2007; Laidlaw, 2012; Sokolon, 2006). Two thousand years later, Descartes reaffirmed the division between reason and passion (Damasio, 1994). This helped to shape the attitudes of later generations. Thomas Jefferson, for instance, saw American independence as confirming that what matters is reason alone (Lehrer, 2009). Kant (1785/2002) took this to its limit, but a somewhat solitary voice, that of Hume (1739/1978), argued that ‘passions’ have the prime role in directing affairs, although they may be modified by reason. Deutscher (2011) has demonstrated that, while neither view is entirely tenable in its extreme form, reason and emotion are inseparable. Lehrer (2009: 20) goes further: ‘If it weren’t for our emotions, reason wouldn’t exist at all.’ Nevertheless, emotions are commonly seen as primitive responses which impede good thinking, a nuisance, unreliable guides to action, obstacles to clarity of thought and ‘the sand in the system’ (Koole, 2009; Oatley & Jenkins, 1996; Ragozinno et al., 2003; Spicer, 2004).

This stark division into desirable reason and unwelcome emotions has been challenged by direct observation. Damasio (1994) described it as Descartes’ error: we are not computing machines with an unfortunate tendency to be emotional; far from being an encumbrance, ‘emotions are vital … to intelligent action’ (Evans & Cruse, 2004: xii; Mayring, 2003; Pekrun, 1992, 2011; Wundt, 1907 in Zajonc, 1980). Damasio (1994) described one of his patients whose emotional system was severely impaired. The unfortunate man was unable to make decisions which were clearly in his best interest. Had it been the intellectual system that was compromised, the emotional system may have looked out for him much as it does for your pet dog. In the human brain, however, the two systems co-exist, there are numerous connections between them and they communicate with one another, sometimes harmoniously and sometimes discordantly (Sylvester, 1994). Cambria et al. (2009: 32) explain that, ‘Although we often tend to separate sense and sensibility, there is no such hard line in our brain between rationality and emotions … emotions are often the product of our thoughts while our reflections are often the product of our affective states.’ Plato’s charioteer may fight to subdue the horses but can go nowhere without them (Laidlaw, 2012). Thought is more likely to be productive if emotions and reason work in harmony.

This is not to say that there is no such thing as rational thought or that irrationality is acceptable (Fried, 2011; Sylvester, 1994). We have two systems doing their best to keep us out of trouble and help us thrive (Evans, 2004; Hänze, 2003; Oatley & Jenkins, 1996; Pekrun, 2006). In evolutionary terms, the emotional system is the older of the two and is probably shared to some extent with some other animals. It can be fast, automatic and unconscious and it can be informed by rational thought (George, 2009). In the distant past, it became tuned to the dangers of the ancestral environment and has written in it what Gross (2002) has called the ‘Wisdom of the Ages’. The other system, that of the intellect, can be a bit of a plodder in comparison and is more limited in capacity, but is more open to reflection and management. It can be very rational, but is, nevertheless, imperfect. But without emotion it can lack direction. Knowing and managing the partnership between these systems could make thought more efficient and productive.

Nevertheless, the partnership between the emotions and the intellect is not always an easy one. Sometimes emotions impede thought, as when anxiety in an examination blocks recall and fills space needed for conscious thought. Sometimes, it behaves like Tweedledum and Tweedledee, pointing firmly in opposite directions, as when reason indicates one course of action but emotion urges us to take another. But emotion also makes many decisions feasible by narrowing the options to what matters to us. Ideas and events automatically pass through our personal what-matters-to-us filter where those of little relevance are put aside. The result is quickly signalled by an emotional response that may also prompt us to take action (Evans, 2004). This filter behaves as though it has a built-in bias favouring a state of pleasure or contentment so that we are likely to prefer and choose what make us feel good (Phillips, 2003). Without something to look after our general well-being in this way, we could soon find ourselves in difficulty (Charland, 1998).

The interplay between thinking and feeling does not pass unnoticed in everyday life, and we experience it in literature. Indeed, emotions are the bread and butter of fiction writers (Oatley, 2002; 2009). Joseph Conrad (1904/1994), for instance, described the impact of emotion on the thinking of Sotillo, one of his characters in Nostromo: ‘Sotillo had spent the morning in battling with his thoughts; a contest to which he was unequal, from the vacuity of his mind and the violence of his passions.’ Here, emotion was supreme but this is not always so. In Le Grand Meaulnes, Alain-Fournier (1913/1966) described reason’s mastery of emotion in a young woman’s decision not to marry: ‘She had made herself think that such happiness was not for her, that the boy was far too young, that he had made up all the wonderful things he described to her.’ But feelings can also motivate thought and action. Moisevitch, in Chekhov’s The Steppe (1888/1991), ‘was embarrassed at the sight of the money. He got up, and, as a man of delicate feeling unwilling to pry into other people’s secrets, he went out of the room on tiptoe.’ And emotions can reward us with pleasant feelings, encouraging us to prolong the agreeable situation. De Carvalho, writing of life in Roman Spain in A God Strolling in the Cool of the Evening (1997), described a senator’s response to a book: ‘He was smiling, delighted, still savouring in his thoughts the dialogues he had just heard.’ Equally, emotions are everywhere in teaching and learning and they ‘profoundly affect students’ engagement and performance’ (Pekrun & Linnenbrink-Garcia, 2012: 259). How emotions do this can also be quite subtle and pass unnoticed. In teaching, there can be a tendency to plan for the intellect alone, but not for moods and emotions, and how they might interact to make a productive partnership.

Thinking with feeling in the classroom

This interaction has largely been ignored in education, except by a few, such as the American teacher, philosopher and educational theorist John Dewey (1859–1952) (Adler & Obstfeld, 2007; Hargreaves, 2000; Immordino-Yang & Damasio, 2007). Dewey recognized that the schism between the intellect and emotions was unfortunate. He valued, in particular, the motivating role of interest and curiosity (Dewey, 1916; 1938/1998). More recently, some have seen emotional development and regulation as potential goals. Bloom’s 1956 taxonomy of educational objectives, for instance, began with the cognitive domain; the affective domain was added later, but they were not related. Anderson and Krathwohl’s revision of the taxonomy acknowledged the involvement of affect but is confined to the cognitive domain (Moseley et al., 2005). Immordino-Yang and Damasio (2007: 3) contend that this lack of attention to the relationship is a serious omission as, ‘we feel, therefore we learn’. Even subjects which expunge emotions from their discourse, such as physics, can arouse the breadth of emotions from ‘interest, intrigue, fascination and enthusiasm [to] boredom, disillusionment, frustration and fear’ (Alsop & Watts, 2000: 21). Alsop and Watts have come to believe that learning science involves the emotions as much as it does the intellect. In other subjects, like history, Wulf (2011: 92) believes it needs to be ‘emotionally anchored in the imagination of the students to give it a presence and relevance for the future’.

Educational institutions, like most places where people gather and interact, are awash with emotions which inevitably bear upon cognition. Teaching and learning involve both cognitive and emotional labour and could benefit from planning with both in mind (Fried, 2011; Schutz & Lanehart, 2002). Amongst other things, the learning environment can make a difference. Strictly speaking, this could include its colour, layout and smell. For instance, Moss et al. (2003) found that the smell of lavender reduced intellectual performance while rosemary increased it. The mood or other changes produced by these odours affected reaction times, attention to task, and memory. The effects of seemingly minor environmental properties like these have been found elsewhere, although they can be complex (e.g. Cupchik & Krista, 2005). The physical environment, however, is generally a given, so there may be little a teacher can do with it other than remove distractions, make it visually attractive and organize it to suit the task in hand. Some environments, however, can add considerably to the emotional labour of learning. O’Regan (2003) interviewed some older Australian students about their online learning and found frustration, fear, anxiety, apprehension and embarrassment, brought about by the vagaries of the digital systems, lack of control or mastery of the processes and the public exposure of thoughts and work. Emotions like these are likely to be counterproductive in any environment. There were, however, occasions of enthusiasm, excitement and pride when things went well. Generally, students can benefit from environments which minimize the former and maximize the latter feelings.

Then there is the subject or topic to be learned. First, learners can bring moods and emotions to their learning which affect their engagement and, at times, their recall (Forgas, 1995). For instance, students feeling sad who are asked to pass judgment on events or the actions of people may unconsciously take a more negative view than they would had they felt happy. There can be a tendency for people in different moods to process information in different ways (Gaspar, 2004a). Of course, the task itself can generate emotions which may help or hinder learning. Even very young children learning to read can feel ego-protective about their performance (Poskiparta et al., 2003). This can become very significant amongst older students, so that emotions become affective filters which determine the nature of their interaction with the subject. In foreign language learning, the student’s emotional state can obstruct or enable reception and performance. Fear of the loss of self- and peer-esteem when publicly exposing inadequacies in a language can be a powerful block to learning, while those of a different temperament, less concerned with the regard of others, succeed (Richards & Rodgers, 1986). In cultures where the public exposure of inadequacy or loss of face is felt to be humiliating, the emotions generated by the risk can be very strong. Older students learning a foreign language in Australia, for instance, found performance in front of peers and the teacher to be embarrassing, unnerving and frightening and made them blush and tremble. Even having a sensitive teacher only partly eased the emotions (Cohen & Norst, 1989). This effect is not, of course, confined to learning a foreign language (O’Regan, 2003).

Even young children can show some knowledge of the interaction of thinking and feeling. Using story-like scenarios in the USA with children from about 5 years old, there is evidence of a belief that thinking positively in bad situations will improve feelings. In the other direction, they also tend to recognize that feeling sad can adversely affect thinking in school (Bamford & Lagattuta, 2012). Of course, this is not to say that their understanding is fully conscious or adult-like or that they can manage the interaction themselves. Many of our responses to the world are automatic, unconscious and operate on an ‘act now, think later’ basis. The action of affective filters is an instance. Risk takers tend to approach a challenge or project positively, while risk avoiders are often more negative and have more cautious goals. Student discussion can also be strongly affect-laden and may rarely be dispassionate (Meyer & Turner, 2002). But students are not the only ones involved in emotional labour. Perhaps no one can be more involved than the teacher, who is subject to his or her own moods and emotions and at the same time is enveloped in those of the students, while also being subject to demands from outside the classroom. This can make teaching a stressful occupation, even for the teacher with some ability to manage those emotions (Sylvester, 1994; Wilson, 2004).

There’s more to productive thought than intellectual ability

Intellectual ability is not the only player in the thinking game. Moods and emotions are players, too, and, instead of simply being the sand in the system, they can be the oil (Spicer, 2004). Feeling positive about sci...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Half Title
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Dedication
• Table of Contents
• List of figures
• List of tables
• Preface
• 1 Second thoughts: sense and sensibility
• 2 Purposeful, productive thought: a framework
• 3 Ever watchful: moods, emotions and appraisals
• 4 It stands to reason: deductive thinking
• 5 Order from chaos: constructing causal understandings
• 6 The inventive mind: creative thinking and problem solving
• 7 Wise thoughts in action: hearts and minds in harmony
• 8 Quality control: critical thinking
• 9 Testing times: emotional performance
• 10 Different strokes for different folks: nature and nurture
• 11 Emotional labour: moods, emotions and the teacher
• 12 Two minds are better than one
• Glossary
• References
• Index