Dialogues in Philosophy
Mental and Neuro Sciences
Dialogues in Philosophy, Mental and Neuro Sciences
The official journal of Crossing Dialogues
Volume 9, Issue 1 (June 2016)
ORIGINAL ARTICLES
Phenomenology of emotions with special reference to dysphoria
Otto Doerr-Zegers & Héctor Pelegrina-Cetràn
Dysphoria is a complex phenomenon which must be defi ned in the framework of different forms of affections. It belongs to the broader field of emotions, which are characterized by some essential features: i.e. movement, passiveness, transitoriness, and reference to the others. All these four essential features of emotion are specifically altered in depression, whose phenomenology is presented in a clinical case.
In discussing dysphoria, a first distinction is made between particular and global affections. The first type encompasses emotions and feelings, while the second one includes humor, mood and temper. Dysphoria belongs to one of these global affective states: the humor, which has to do with the spatial dimension of existence.
In dysphoria the patient experiences the world as oppressive and invasive of his/her intimacy; the others are lived as persons demanding answers or actions he/she is not able to fulfill. Finally, the phenomenology of dysphoria is analyzed through the four essential features described above and examples are given.
Keywords:
dysphoria, mood, emotions, humor, phenomenology, psychopathology, hermeneutics
Dial Phil Ment Neuro Sci 2016; 9(1): 1-9
Received on July 02, 2015
Accepted on July 02, 2015
Firstly published online on February 04, 2016