The theory in which the physiological reaction and the emotion are assumed to occur at the same time

• A. James-Lange theory of emotion
• B. Low road emotions
• C. Conscious mind
• D. Cannon-Bard theory of emotion

Answer: (D)

Emotions and physiological arousal are produced in parallel, not in a strict cause-and-effect sequence. In Cannon-Bard theory, when a stimulus is detected, the thalamus sends signals to the cortex to generate the subjective feeling of emotion and at the same moment sends signals to the autonomic nervous system to create the bodily arousal. This explains why the emotional experience can occur even when bodily changes are not clearly driving it, and why similar arousal can accompany different emotions—the two processes happen together but independently. The other ideas involve either emotion arising only after we notice bodily changes (the intuition that feeling follows the body’s signals) or separate pathways that don’t capture the synchronized experience Cannon-Bard proposes.