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pessimistic character and affect their beliefs in the sense that an optimist person
strengthens beliefs that have a positive feeling associated and a pessimistic person
strengthens beliefs with a negative associated feeling. Thus the strengths of beliefs
may depend on non-informational aspects of mental processes and related personal
characteristics. To model this for the case of feelings a causal relation
feeling → belief
can be added. This introduces a second recursive loop, as shown in Figure 2.
body
state
belief
belief-
feeling
loop
body-
feeling
loop
feeling
Fig. 2.
The two recursive loops related to a belief
From a neurological perspective the existence of a connection from feeling to belief
may be considered plausible, as neurons involved in the belief and in the associated
feeling will often be activated simultaneously. Therefore such a connection from feel-
ing to belief may be developed based on a general Hebbian learning mechanism (Hebb,
1949; Bi and Poo, 2001) that strengthens connections between neurons that are acti-
vated simultaneously, similar to what has been proposed for the emergence of mirror
neurons; e.g., (Keysers and Perrett, 2004; Keysers and Gazzola, 2009).
Another type of support for a connection from feeling to belief can be found in
Damasio's Somatic Marker Hypothesis; cf. (Damasio, 1994, 1996; Bechara and
Damasio, 2004; Damasio, 2004). This is a theory on decision making which provides
a central role to emotions felt. Each decision option induces (via an emotional re-
sponse) a feeling which is used to mark
the option. For example, when a negative
somatic marker is linked to a particular option, it provides a negative feeling for that
option. Similarly, a positive somatic marker provides a positive feeling for that op-
tion. Damasio describes the use of somatic markers
in the following way:
'the somatic marker (..) forces attention on the negative outcome to which a given action
may lead, and functions as an automated alarm signal which says: Beware of danger ahead
if you choose the option which leads to this outcome. The signal may lead you to reject,
immediately
, the negative course of action and thus make you choose among other alterna-
tives.
(…) When a positive somatic marker is juxtaposed instead, it becomes a beacon of
incentive. (…) on occasion somatic markers may operate covertly (without coming to con-
sciousness) and may utilize an 'as-if-loop'.' (Damasio, 1994, p. 173-174)
Usually the Somatic Marker Hypothesis is applied to provide endorsements or
valuations for options for a person's actions. However, it may be considered plau-
sible that such a mechanism is applicable to valuations of internal states such as
beliefs as well.
