Science University Research Symposium (SURS)

Exploring the Effects of Stress on Emotion Perception

Publication Date

Fall 11-11-2024

College

Sciences and Mathematics, College of

Department

Psychological Science, Department of

SURS Faculty Advisor

Michael Oliver

Presentation Type

Metadata Only

Abstract

Everyone has experienced some level of stress at some point in their life. Having the ability to perceive emotions is crucial for the development of social and communication skills, as well as coping with the stress that we encounter. It is understood that stress can impact cognitive abilities like memory and focus. McEwen and Sapolsky (1995) found that high stress affects brain functions, disrupting memory and making it harder to focus on external cues. However, there is currently little definitive research exploring the relationship between stress and emotional perception. The purpose of our study was to explore this relationship. Data was collected from an in-person questionnaire and an apple watch used to determine heart rate. We used paired t-tests to compare stressed and non-stressed conditions for the same participant. We also used Pearson’s r to determine the magnitude of the relationship between induced stress and emotion recognition. The analysis was conducted through SPSS. The analysis revealed... This clarified how stress influences emotional processing, benefiting both cognitive psychology and clinical work.

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