Are Your Emotions Interfering With Your Thinking? Probably Not

We often make the distinction between rational and emotional thinking, contrasting rational and emotional as the two options that are fighting for which one is going to prevail and lead to better decisions and more effective actions.

Needless to say, many of us think that rational thinking is a better option for guiding our decisions, because emotions, well, they can be messy. Emotions like impatience or anger can lead to impulsive actions, emotions like fear or doubt can lead to avoidance, and emotions like comfort and safety can lead to complacency.

In a previous post, I posed this question: Are you an emotional or a rational decision maker? My goal was to demonstrate that it is not possible to be an emotional decision maker, because there is no such thing as an emotional decision maker. Surely, we sometimes let our emotions influence our decisions. We may use them as a basis for choosing between one shirt to buy over another, one person to date over another, one job offer to accept over another, or one place to live over another. But the decision making itself involved many cognitive processes that enabled us to select what information to focus on, to analyze it, understand it, compare it, synthesize it, and formulate an action plan.

Now that we have established that we are not emotional decision makers, does it make it easier to answer the question? Are you a rational or an emotional thinker?

The opposite of rational is not emotional

As tempting as it sounds, the opposite of rational is not emotional. The opposite of rational is… irrational. Our thinking can be rational or irrational and nothing in between. Rational vs. irrational is a different quality from emotional vs. non-emotional. It is a common misconception to think that for a decision to be rational, it must be non-emotional. “You are not thinking rationally right now, you’re being emotional.” Rational decisions can be infused with emotion as much as irrational decisions can. Choosing to skip dessert – the rational choice, if your goal is to reduce your daily caloric intake and avoid simple carbs – could make you feel good or bad. Choosing to order and savor dessert – a choice inconsistent with your goal – could also give rise to either positive or negative feelings, and sometimes both.

So, if emotions are not a good index of whether we are thinking rationally or not, what is?

To answer that question, let’s take a closer look at what rationality is.

In his book on rationality, Steven Pinker defines it as “the ability to use knowledge to attain a goal.” In the case of rationality, knowledge refers to “justified true belief.” The justification for the belief may come from experience (as in the collection of an adequate amount of data that support the assumptions and justify holding the belief to be true) or from rules of logic (as in all humans have one brain; Yolanda is a human; therefore, Yolanda has one brain). There is a rumor, by the way, that the octopus has several brains! I am having a hard enough time managing one, I can’t imagine what it’s like to have to manage several!

With rationality we’re entering rough terrain. Being rational is cognitively demanding. Think of the following simple situation:

Imagine you are buying postcards to send to your friends from the quaint seaside town you chose to spend your vacation. The postcards have landmarks on one side and inspirational quotes on the other. Consider the following “if-then” rule: if a postcard displays a lighthouse on one side, then it has a happiness quote on the other. You have four postcards in front of you: the first one is displaying a lighthouse, the second one a windmill, the third one a serenity quote and the fourth one a happiness quote.

Which of the postcards do you have to turn over to determine if the rule has been violated?

Finding the (only right) answer to this question requires reasoning and understanding the rules of logic. You may have found the right answer in seconds. You may also have found the wrong answer in seconds, which is the case with most people. Reasoning can be taxing, which makes it easy to slip into the irrational. Reasoning our way through life is like playing chutes and ladders. You step on the wrong square and down the path of irrationality you go.

Why is understanding the difference between being rational and being irrational important?

First, it is much easier to accomplish our life goals when we rely on rationality.

Second, we have to stop blaming our emotions for our irrational decisions. Having feelings is not the same as being irrational. You can be cool, calm, and collected and still unreasonable and defiant of any rule of logic. So, feel free to feel!

Third, we all tend to slip into irrational thinking, several times a day, every day. We cannot always rely that our minds will produce rational thoughts, that they will apply flawless reasoning, and that we will engage in critical thinking.

And last, irrational thinking comes with its own set of problems. At the core of many contemporary schools of psychotherapy lies the evidence-based tenet that many of the emotional problems that we experience, like anxiety or depression, have their roots in irrational thinking. It is the irrational thinking that drives the emotion, and not the other way around. The purpose of cognitive behavioral therapies, for instance, is to challenge irrational thoughts and restore emotional equilibrium by relying on more rational thinking.

Which postcards did you choose to turn over?