Cognitive appraisal
The lineage that, per Seth’s Glossary, dates “back to James (but not Lange)”: emotions depend on cognitive interpretation of physiological changes. Its most famous experimental form is the Schachter–Singer (1962) two-factor theory — emotion as interpreted bodily arousal (physiological change × cognitive appraisal). See stanley-schachter.
Three readings in this cluster
- As the target of a specificity critique — For Friedman, Schachter–Singer’s appraisal model presumes undifferentiated arousal (see autonomic-specificity) and was, physiologically, “exquisitely bad,” yet it eclipsed specificity research during the cognitive revolution.
- As a historical artifact — For Dror, the “cognitive” element was not a discovery about emotion but a device to extend Festinger’s social-comparison theory to emotions; the arousal-labeling framing was retrofitted onto the James–Lange debate. See origins-of-two-factor-theory.
- As a special case to be generalized — For Seth, appraisal theories are the ancestor of interoceptive-inference: “interpretation” of arousal is Bayesian inference on interoceptive causes. Appraisal becomes top-down prediction.
The through-line
All three papers pivot on the same hinge: how much of emotion is bodily signal and how much is interpretation of it. Appraisal theory answers “interpretation dominates (given undifferentiated arousal)”; autonomic-specificity answers “the signal is already differentiated”; interoceptive inference answers “the distinction dissolves — interpretation and signal are two directions of one predictive hierarchy.”