7.6: Guidelines for Communicating Emotions Effectively

The ABC Model

We’ve spent a majority of this chapter looking at the various ways in which we are effected and affected by our emotions. Emotions are powerful parts of our identities; there are many ways in which our emotions positively and negatively impact our life experiences. Being able to distinguish our emotions from one another, anticipating when debilitative emotions may arise, and recognizing the power we hold in order to change our emotional reaction based on our perceptions is the next step in important skills we can add to our toolbox of competent communication.

Psychologists have largely studied the ways in which emotional responses occur within the mind and body. The appraisal theory of emotions demonstrates that emotions arise from how our internal communication responds to an event. An appraisal is our internal communication creating an opinion, interpreting, judging, and responding to an event (Course Hero, n.d.a). When we appraise an event, we are creating an emotion in response based on our beliefs and perceptions. Stress can be a great example of how appraisal works. When we experience stress, there are often times that we can pinpoint what is causing the stress, called the stressor. Our perception of the stressor is that it is overwhelming or that it is causing an extraordinary amount of pressure. These judgments of the stressor are creating our emotional reaction to the event itself (Spielman, et al., n.d.a). The event we are experiencing does not cause the emotion: our judgments about the event do. But these judgments are rarely done with complete conscious awareness on our part. The appraisal process is automatic, which is why we can often find ourselves in an emotional state that we can’t explain and do not prefer. But we do have the ability to reappraise our emotion-based judgments. Reappraisal is the process of consciously reevaluating the interpretations and responses to events. Our appraisal process is constantly learning and adapting to the environment and can be guided. When we are equipped with skills to actively reappraise situations and contexts that block our ability to feel productive emotions, we can work to reframe the internal communication and change the thoughts and beliefs into rational ones.

Rational-emotive behavioral therapy is a type of therapy that helps individuals gain communicative skills in the reappraisal process. The framework behind the rational-emotive approach involves trying to gain a deeper understanding of the causes behind emotional reactions. This type of therapy has three guiding principles, which fall under the ABC model. The ABC model aims to identify the activating event (A) that causes the irrational belief (B), then to understand and adjust the emotional response, or consequence (C) to better process the information and adjust the emotional outcomes (Turner, 2016). Next, we will walk through the ABC model with examples of how it might play out in our everyday life.

Recognize the Activating Event (A)

We start the ABC model with recognizing the activating event. Sometimes when we are in the middle of experiencing an emotion, we do not stop to isolate what happened beforehand. We can start to recognize this activating event to help us understand where we are emotionally. You may ask yourself:

• What happened right before I noticed the change in my emotional state?
• Who was around me or involved in the event? How did they react or what did they do in the event?
• What was my role in this event?

Then it is important to be able to name the emotion we are experiencing. It is important to be able to build up self-awareness and to be able to name and identify our emotions. Pay attention to the way your body reacts to emotions: What are you feeling physically, mentally, and emotionally? Are you sad, frustrated, or angry? Sometimes our physical reactions to these very different emotions can feel the same. Being self-aware and tapping into our emotional intelligence will allow us to fine-tune what we’re truly feeling and how we choose to name it.

For example, in the workplace we tend to mask a lot. Reappraisal is an effective tool to avoid the emotional labor of constant masking. Consider if you have a boss that tends to be insensitive frequently. Once we have made a generalization of someone’s actions, it is easy to continue this trend. Once someone acts on our beliefs of what that person’s personality traits are we tend to see their actions as fitting into those characteristics, which we call confirmation bias.

One of our authors shares her personal example:

I had a boss once who was very terse in the morning before drinking coffee, yet made comments to me about my morning attitude. I tried to understand why he made these attributions of my behavior and found that I was using confirmation bias, but should have used reappraisal to avoid this trend. I looked first at the activating event itself. I found that in going straight to my computer before a morning greeting, I was in fact supporting his confirmation bias that I was unfriendly in the morning. Not starting with a morning greeting was that activating event. In reflecting on the previous questions, it was easier for me to see, I played many roles in this event. First, I had confirmation bias, so it is easy not to accept that I played a role in his perceptions of my behavior. Second, I was able to name my emotions. It was hurtful and resulted in me feeling defensive.

So why was she mad? This leads to the next step, which is challenging our interpretations of the event.

Challenge the Irrational Beliefs (B)

Once we have isolated the activating event and are able to name our emotion(s), we can start to challenge any beliefs that are proliferating negative emotions, which are called irrational beliefs. This term may imply that we are illogical, but in this sense it refers to the loss of connection from our experiences to our understanding (of lack thereof) of those experiences. We can start by being blunt, honest, and logical with ourselves in order to push towards changing our thoughts and behaviors. This is a straightforward request of ourselves, but it is difficult to do.

When we challenge our deeply held beliefs, we can start to make changes where we find it beneficial to. We need to own our feelings. This involves using the language of responsibility. Recall that some language assigns blame, which is not necessarily used intentionally. If we remove “you” language and use “I” language or “we” language, we can open the door to understanding. We can avoid “but” statements or anything defensive. In Chapter 4, we discussed defensive language in detail, but here we can add that removing defensive language can open the doors to effective communication. We should strive for accurate and authentic conversations, and avoid speaking in generalities, counterfeit emotional language, and patronizing responses. We should focus on owning feelings, or revisiting “I” language. Then we can identify the underlying thought patterns and beliefs that lead us to conclusions about the intent behind the message, the relational dimensions attached to our emotions, and challenging “absolutes.” These will often be reflected as absolutes, such as “I must,” “I should,” or “I cannot.” Possessing rigid expectations of ourselves and others only leads to disappointment, judgment, regret, and anxiety.

For example, consider this statement: ”My roommate makes me so angry! He always eats the food in the refrigerator that I have my name on!” This can be reframed without the absolutes, to give ourselves room for alternative conclusions: "I am really frustrated because the food in the refrigerator I wanted to eat is gone." By removing the absolutes and blame, we open ourselves to understand this could have been unintentional and gives us room to move through the emotion instead of spiraling the emotion or enhancing the negative consequences of that emotion.

Recognize the Emotional Consequences (C)

Often we see our emotions as our own, but our emotions affect others (like with emotional contagion). We can attempt to recognize the consequences for experiencing our emotions. Perhaps we do not want to be seen as “angry” at work or “defensive” with friends. We can start by changing our listening style when we notice activating events occurring. When we are people-oriented listeners, we focus on the relational dimension instead of the circumstances of the moment. Then we can respond sensitively when others communicate their emotions. If our emotions are contagious and we influence each other in multiple dimensions, it is important to ascribe to the policy “treat others the way you want to be treated.” We want validation. When we share our emotional experiences with others, it can allow us to feel vulnerable. We can validate emotional responses of others while respecting boundaries to ensure our relational partners know they are respected. When we reframe or reappraise the situation, we give ourselves room to change our perspectives and our underlying emotions.

There are steps we may take proactively to avoid needing to constantly reappraise. We start by using the language of responsibility from Chapter 4. When we use language that automatically places blame on others, we may become defensive. If we follow the steps of the language of responsibility, we are taking responsibility for our actions and beliefs without blaming others. We can also look at past encounters and figure out if there are patterns that we can avoid. There are times we have irrational thoughts (such as assigning intentionality) we can avoid. When we are faced with similar situations in the future, the emotionally healthy response recognizes failure is a part of life, and that all emotions are necessary (to some extent) but need to be channeled appropriately. By recognizing patterns, we can change our thinking in an attempt to change our negative emotions and channel them in a way that protects ourselves and our relationships.