1.

getting over her/him" so

that you can get yourself back
together and think straight again.

2. The second partial nature

of emotion is that it draws its
perspective from personal
interest. It addresses subjective
concerns and takes action
primarily to satisfy such concerns
(O'Donohue, & Kitchener, 1996).
For example, Gemma broke up
with her boyfriend. She then
dropped out of school because she
cannot bear to see him in campus
with another girl. In this situation,
Gemma sacrificed her education,
wasting time and money for a
broken relationship. A highly
partial perspective is interested
only in the immediate situation;
no rational explanations from a
broader perspective are relevant.

3.

4.

5. The Capricious Nature of

Feelings

6. The third problem with

emotions is that it rises up for
arbitrary reasons. For example,
you did not give money to an old
beggar asking for alms simply
because she tugged at your shirt
and startled you. Aspects or
situations that have nothing to do
in moral situations could rile up
your emotion, and this emotion
will certainly influence your
subsequent moral judgment
(Pizarro, 2000).
 7.

8. How Emotions Help in

Making the Right Decisions

9. Although several studies

point out the negative effects of
emotion in making decisions,
contemporary research on how
emotions facilitate reasoning is
also catching up. Several studies
suggest that emotions are the
foundation of all our cognitive
and behavioral processes; and
emotional responses often guide a
person in making beneficial
choices without any conscious
reasoning (Arnold, 1960; Damsio,
2003)
 10. In this line of thought,
researchers studied two groups of
research participants. Group 1
was made up of relatively healthy
people with no history of head
injury; while the second group
was composed of those with
decision-making defects resulting
from head injury. Both groups
were measured while performing
gambling tasks. The researchers
observed that Group 1 began to
choose cards that were to their
advantage even before they knew
what strategy worked best. While
the second group continued to
choose disadvantageously even
though they already knew what
the best card strategy was.
Moreover, in the same gambling
task, the researchers observed
that the skin properties of the first
group changed in response to
thinking about risky choices, even
though the participants did not
know the move was actually risky.
The second group, on the other
hand, never had such reaction.
The study suggested, "In normal
individuals, non-conscious biases
guide behavior before conscious
knowledge does (Bechara, et al.,
media, mass media, etc.).
Therefore, the individual
plays a pivotal role as a free
moral agent in analyzing,
choosing, and valuing what
he/she considers as most
important when he/she
makes his/her choices
 11. Society, as a whole,
functions as a way of
controlling the behavior of
an individual. It becomes
necessary to impose social
controls and sanctions so
that the individual would be
guided accordingly. To a

certain extent, society coerces its members to follow