Figure 6.

Cognitive responses. This figure shows some of the different cognitive possibilities the nervous system can find to face a stimulus. (A) As long as the stimulus matches the expectation, a response is not necessary. (B) If a mismatch occurs and an effective response is not available, an emotion is disinhibited, which in turn regulates the attentional competition to access the cognitive systems. While searching for an effective response, but not yet found, these advanced systems can (C) positively (optimism) or (D) negatively (pessimism) shape the expectation (Carver and Scheier, 1998; Carver, 2006), or alternate between both in a cyclic process (e.g., motivation and then frustration). When an effective response is finally found, it can (E) modify the stimulus or the associated relationship, (F) modify the expectation to match the stimulus, or (G) reframe the stimulus through a conceptual combination to create a new interpretation and therefore a new expectation about it. There are, however, other possibilities (not shown in this figure) that can modify the operation of the global system by acting upon different functional elements, thus giving rise to singular psychological and behavioral phenomena (see text in “Modify System Dynamics” for details).