Boost Your Psyche for 2026: Master the Motivations, Emotion & Personality Quiz!

The key idea is that emotion comes from how we interpret what’s happening. Lazarus’ appraisal theory says our emotions are produced by cognitive evaluations of an event’s meaning for us, not directly by automatic bodily signals alone. The same situation can spark different emotions depending on what we decide it signifies—threat, challenge, hope, harm, and so on. This appraisal often happens quickly, and emotions can arise even when physical arousal is minimal, because the feeling is rooted in the meaning we assign to the event.

Lazarus calls this process primary appraisal (is it relevant and potentially harmful or beneficial?) and secondary appraisal (do I have the coping resources to deal with it?). The resulting emotion reflects the outcome of these appraisals. This approach contrasts with view that emotions are just a result of bodily arousal or something determined only by past experiences; instead, it centers on how we evaluate the situation in the moment.