I do not think it is possible to overestimate the significance of the fact that emotions are experienced before thought – particularly in regard to emotional imprinting and development. As infants, every first experience we have is an emotional one. While there is a cognitive response that accompanies each of those experiences emotional imprinting leads the way. Let me reiterate: emotional imprinting takes the lead step in our development of a cognitive framework.
In many computer programming languages there exists a type of data referred to as “tags” or “wrappers”. Foldoc.org (an online dictionary for computing terminology) defines a wrapper as:
Code which is combined with another piece of code to determine how that code is executed. The wrapper acts as an interface between its caller and the wrapped code. This may be done for compatibility… or for security (e.g. to prevent the calling program from executing certain functions). The implication is that the wrapped code can only be accessed via the wrapper.
One of the more interesting features of this definition is that the “wrapped code can only be accessed via the wrapper.” In many ways, this statement applies to how humans experience stimuli and recall memories. When we experience an event and our subsequent emotional response, the emotion sets the “tone” of how we experience our cognitive response. I refer to this “tone” as “emotional context” which, in many ways, corresponds to the concept and function of wrapper code. All thoughts are accessed in terms of some sort of situational and/or emotional context.
And so, in the context of emotional imprinting, we are “primed” to interpret our experiences a certain way. Let us take, for example, a man who is insecure about his weight. Such an individual will be more likely (i.e. primed) to interpret certain experiences as threatening than would another person with a less fearful emotional context. This priming effect of emotional context is the basic mechanic for what clinicians refer to as “projection”. To continue with our example, his insecurity (an increased emotionally reactive context) sets up a greater probability for miscommunication. Say, for instance, he receives a verbally ambiguous remark such as “Nice dress.” And by “verbally ambiguous” I refer to a neutral tone and cantor that implies neither sarcasm nor enthusiasm. In the absence of such verbal and nonverbal queues the primed emotional context, in this case insecurity/fear, will be most influential. Thus, our self-conscious cross-dresser would be more likely to interpret a somewhat ambiguous remark as a criticism that the dress he has chosen makes him look fat.
Another slightly less esoteric and more situational illustration of this priming (as apposed to our usual ‘default’ emotional primers) would be how a person reacts to a strange sound right after watching a scary movie. It is easy to imagine that an individual who is not usually alarmed by random noises, could easily become so after watching a horror movie. This is because the emotional impact of the movie sets up a context in which subsequent thoughts are experienced. Thus, a noise that would otherwise be dismissed as the wind, the washing machine, a car driving down the street, or any of a hundred other innocuous sources of sound is more readily interpreted as the lurking of a horribly scarred serial killer with razor blades for finger nails.
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