Sample Essay on A Mood Diary

Example of Personal essay, Sample Paper

 

Time	Mood	Notes
DAY 1
9:00	Joy	Got up, the weather was good. Felt great.Smiled.
11:00	Anger	Felt so angry-plans were ruined. Yelled. Knocking with my fist on the table when alone.
13:00	Guilt	Sorry about having been so angry. A strange feeling in my chest.
15:00	Surprise	Found out news I did not know before. Astonished and pensive.
17:00	Joy	Was very polite and smiled.
19:00	Disgust	Watched a movie. Irritable. Heart rate.
21:00	Tranquility	No thoughts, just felt calm.
DAY 2
9:00	Joy	Got up early and turned on nice music. Smiled.
11:00	Interest	Thought about the man’s ability to resist pain in emergency situations. Squinted.
13:00	Nervous	Was silent. Blanching. Saliva production.
15:00	Joy	Thought of rain and almost felt its smell. Smiled.
17:00	Joy	Met a friend. Smiled.
19:00	Sad	Could not help a person. Stared at one point.
21:00	Excited	Thought about a meeting. Strange feeling in my stomach.
DAY 3
9:00	Joy	Smiled at things in the morning. Felt easy.
11:00	Tranquility	Was very kind and attentive to everybody.
13:00	Joy	A great desire to do something nice.
15:00	Alarm	Was too movable. Not quiet. Could not do anything. Flushing of the skin.
17:00	Distress	No problem solution. Sitting still, almost no gesticulation. Stomach activity.
19:00	Joy	Solved a problem. Smiled.
21:00	Tranquility	Very reserved but feeling nice.

 

According to the mood dairy shown above the calculation of the emotions experienced across the reporting period gave these results:  39%  for Joy
14%  for Tranquility
4,7% per each of the following emotions – Distress, Alarm, Anger, Guilt, Surprised, Excited, Nervous, Sad, Disgust, Interest.

A Mood Diary Essay
Joy is the most frequent emotion during the reporting period. Together with Tranquility the form 53% of the emotional conditions experienced by the person. This means that the majority of time the leading emotions are represented by positive ones. But at the same time situational emotions easily suppress the leading ones. At the same time the person does not get stuck on one emotion, which shows the emotional lability of the person. This definitely shows that the speed of the neural processes is high. Owing to the rapid change of the excitation and braking in the cortex  the emotions can switch very quickly.The interpretation of the mood diary results reveal the presence of certain physiological and cognitive components of emotions. The diary shows that every emotion is accompanied by some kind of manifestation. Let us start with the canalisys. The component that seems to be the core all the experienced emotions listed in the mood diary is the sensation of emotion itself. The change of the state of mind while experiencing the emotion can be seen in the diary. For instance, while experiencing anger the way of feeling of the reality changed. This refers to the cognitive component of emotion. Being angry the person yelled and even knocked with the fist on the table when alone. The set of behaviors performed by the person changed according to the emotions experienced. The ideation, imagery, and thoughts that occur during emotion also pertain to the cognitive component. For example it is observed in the diary that when the person experienced joy and tranquility the emotions was accompanied by positive thinking: “a desire to do something nice”, “being very kind to people”, ect. Or while experiencing other emotions: “sorry about having been so angry”, “very reserved but feeling nice” and so on.

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But actually the cognitive component including thoughts, feelings and other cognitions is hard to measure. For example the statement:” No thoughts, just felt calm” is very hard to judge. That is why the cognitive component is sometimes invisible. Talking about physiological components, according to the mood diary there are a lot of them. Of course besides the visible physiological components there also are invisible processes such as the activation of the chemicals secreted by the body's various glands and the neural processes. The visible manifestations of the physiological component listed in the mood dairy are: flushing of the skin, blanching, saliva production, stomach activity, the feeling of the increasing heart rate and so on. As far as the diary was taken for a short period of time it hard to make a conclusion about the regularity of appearing of different emotions but we assume it does exist. Our supposition is that it has to be circular and by this keep the emotional activity in balance. This also concerns the emotional components, because the way they change among each other also makes a perfect balance for the brain activity.

 

Sources:
James, William. 1884. "What is an Emotion?" Mind 19:188-204.