The Interpersonal Dynamics of Emotion: Toward an Integrative Theory of Emotions as Social Information

EASI theory postulates that emotional expressions disambiguate social situations and facilitate interpersonal coordination.

“EASI theory postulates that emotional expressions disambiguate social situations and facilitate interpersonal coordination.”

Observers distill relevant information from other people's emotional expressions, whether about internally experienced emotions, social motives, or both.

“observers distill relevant information from other people's emotional expressions-be it about their internally experienced emotions, their social motives, or some combination of the two”

Emotional expressions can evoke sentiments in observers, such as liking and feelings of closeness to the expresser.

“Emotional expressions can also evoke sentiments in observers, such as liking and feelings of closeness to the expresser”

Emotional expressions influence observers' behaviors through affective reactions and inferential processes, with the potency of each mechanism depending on observers' information processing and the perceived appropriateness of the expressions.

“Finally, our review supports key propositions of EASI theory (Van Kleef 2016) suggesting that emotional expressions influence observers' behaviors through affective reactions and inferential processes, with the potency of each mechanism depending on observers' information processing and the perceived appropriateness of the expressions.”

The social effects of emotions are functionally equivalent across expressive modalities.

“All in all, the current evidence suggests that the social effects of emotions are functionally equivalent across expressive modalities (Van Kleef 2016).”

Effects of emotional expressions are stronger to the degree that senders are more emotionally expressive and receivers have greater emotion perception ability.

“effects are stronger to the degree that senders are more emotionally expressive and receivers have greater emotion perception ability”

The relative impact of affective reactions on behavior increases when observers are less motivated and able to engage in thorough information processing and/or perceive the emotional expression as inappropriate.

“the relative impact of affective reactions increases when observers are less motivated and able to engage in thorough information processing and/or perceive the emotional expression as inappropriate”

The relative impact of inferential processes on behavior increases when observers are more motivated and able to engage in thorough information processing and deem the emotional expression appropriate.

“The relative impact of inferential processes on behavior increases when observers are more motivated and able to engage in thorough information processing and deem the emotional expression appropriate in light of the situation.”

Violations of norms and expectations regarding emotional expression can be qualitative (showing the wrong emotion) or quantitative (showing the right emotion with the wrong intensity).

“Violations of such norms and expectations can be qualitative (i.e., showing the wrong emotion) or quantitative (i.e., showing the right emotion with the wrong intensity) (Van Kleef 2016).”