Conversely charitable and campaigning organizations may try to tap into shame to encourage action. For example, gamification efforts may attempt to tap into a user’s pride through leaderboards or badges. These are emotions which designers often play to. The biggest criticism of this model is its failure to take into account the pairing of Pride and Shame. Sadness + Disgust = Remorse (with its opposite being love)ĭisgust + Anger = Contempt (with its opposite being submission)Īnger + Anticipation = Aggressiveness (with its opposite being awe) Surprise + Sadness = Disapproval (with its opposite being optimism) Trust + Fear = Submission (with its opposite being contempt)įear + Surprise = Awe (with its opposite being aggression) Joy + Trust = Love (with its opposite being remorse) The basic emotional pairs are as follows:Įmotions on Plutchik’s wheel may be combined as follows:Īnticipation + Joy = Optimism (with its opposite being disapproval) The wheel is a simple model and there are almost certainly additional emotional inferences that could be drawn from a more complex model – however, it focuses on the basic emotions that most designers are likely to want to elicit in their users and as such provides a useful starting point. The wheel can be used by designers to examine the complexities of emotion and to act as a “ colour palette” for emotional design – with the idea being that blending different emotions will create different levels of emotional response and intensities of that response. Copyright terms and licence: CC BY-SA 2.0 They were first described back in 1980.Īuthor/Copyright holder: xdxd_vs_xdxd. The 3D model is the “cone-shaped model of emotion”.

He developed both 2 and 3 dimensional models for this. It was designed to help the user understand the nuances of emotion and how emotions contrast with each other. The 8 basic emotions that Plutchik devised were:įrom this initial emotional theory Plutchik then developed a Wheel of Emotion. Primary emotions are “idealized” and their properties must be inferred from evidence but cannot be accurately stated in full.Įach primary emotion is paired with another and is a polar opposite of that pair.Įmotions can and do vary in degrees of similarity to each other.Įmotions exist in varying degrees of intensity. Other emotions are simply a combination of these 8 basic emotions or are derived from one (or more) of these basic emotions. While emotions can be displayed and evoked through different mechanisms in different organisms there are common elements to emotions that can be identified across all emotional animals. The purpose of emotions is an evolutionary survival response enabling the organism to survive when confronted by environmental challenges. They are equally applicable to all animals as they are to human beings.Įmotions evolved differently in different species and may be expressed differently between those species. He posited 10 points with regard to emotion:Įmotions are found at all evolutionary levels of species. Copyright terms and licence: Public Domain. He argued that the primary emotions are an evolutionary development and that the response to each such emotion is the one that is likely to deliver the highest level of survival possibility.Īuthor/Copyright holder: Machine Elf 1735.

Robert Plutchik devised the psycho-evolutionary theory of emotion and this helps categorize emotions into primary emotions and the responses to them. Plutchik’s Psycho-evolutionary Theory of Emotion

He held a doctorate degree as well as positions at the professorial level at two respected universities. Before he passed away in 2006 he was responsible for 8 books (and editing another 7), nearly 300 articles, and 45 chapters in emotional research as a psychologist.

Robert Plutchik, was a thought leader in the study of emotions. The corner stone of emotional design is the idea that if you can elicit strong emotions in your users – you can use those emotions to either create loyalty or to drive a customer to take action. Products that they like, on the other hand, quickly slip from the user’s mind and are replaced in time with products that are liked better or even loved. Products that people love are products that people use over and over again. One way of understanding emotions is Plutchik’s Wheel of Emotions – this may help you deliver better experiences to your users when designing products. Designs which tap into the user’s emotions are considered to do more than just respond to their stated needs and provide a greater level of user experience. Emotional design is a big buzz word within the UX community.

Wheel of emotion