Emotion elicits the social sharing of emotion: theory and empirical review
Rime's review argues that emotion cannot be understood as a private event. His central observation, supported by a large body of his own research, is that people talk about emotional experiences: after almost any emotional event, most people tell someone, usually soon, usually more than once, and usually to someone close. This social sharing of emotion is close to universal and does not diminish with age, which undermines the assumption that emotional independence is what development produces. He then examines what sharing does. At the interpersonal level it builds and strengthens relationships; at the collective level it spreads emotional states through groups. On regulation, his conclusion is more careful than the popular version: simply recounting an emotional event does not reliably reduce the feeling, and the benefits of sharing lie more in the social bonds it creates than in relief from the emotion itself. This vault cites it whenever talking about feelings is presented as catharsis.
Rime's review argues that emotion cannot be understood as a private event. His central observation, supported by a large body of his own research, is that people talk about emotional experiences: after almost any emotional event, most people tell someone, usually soon, usually more than once, and usually to someone close. This social sharing of emotion is close to universal and does not diminish with age, which undermines the assumption that emotional independence is what development produces. He then examines what sharing does. At the interpersonal level it builds and strengthens relationships; at the collective level it spreads emotional states through groups. On regulation, his conclusion is more careful than the popular version: simply recounting an emotional event does not reliably reduce the feeling, and the benefits of sharing lie more in the social bonds it creates than in relief from the emotion itself. This vault cites it whenever talking about feelings is presented as catharsis.
Written from the abstract, OpenAlex.
What our sources record
Reproduced as it was written when this source was checked, figures and all.
doi:10.1177/1754073908097189. Findings were generally not consistent with the view that sharing alleviates the emotional memory of the shared experience; sharing reactivates emotional arousal in teller and listener; prolonged, self-perpetuating sharing is a maladaptive outcome predicting poor recovery; the reliable benefits are social bonding and meaning-making.
Where we use it
- Why Saying It Out Loud Makes It Feel Smaller, Why We Care
Reliability of this reference
The link below was matched against the publisher's record on title, first author and year, and all three agree.
The source
https://doi.org/10.1177/1754073908097189
DOI: 10.1177/1754073908097189