Natural Language Processing for
Cognitive Analysis of Emotions
Gustave Cortal1,Alain Finkel1,4,Patrick Paroubek2, and Lina Ye3
1Universit´e Paris-Saclay, CNRS, ENS Paris-Saclay, Laboratoire M´ethodes Formelles, 91190, Gif-sur-Yvette, France
2Universit´e Paris-Saclay, CNRS, Laboratoire Interdisciplinaire des Sciences du Num´erique, 91400 Orsay, France
3Universit´e Paris-Saclay, CNRS, ENS Paris-Saclay, CentraleSup´elec, 91190, Gif-sur-Yvette, France
4Institut Universitaire de France, France
gustave.cortal@ens-paris-saclay.fr,alain.finkel@lsv.fr,pap@limsi.fr,lina.ye@centralesupelec.fr
Abstract. Emotion analysis in texts suffers from two major limitations: annotated gold-standard cor-
pora are mostly small and homogeneous, and emotion identification is often simplified as a sentence-level
classification problem. To address these issues, we introduce a new annotation scheme for exploring emo-
tions and their causes, along with a new French dataset composed of autobiographical accounts of an
emotional scene. The texts were collected by applying the Cognitive Analysis of Emotions developed by
A. Finkel to help people improve on their emotion management. The method requires the manual analysis
of an emotional event by a coach trained in Cognitive Analysis. We present a rule-based approach to
automatically annotate emotions and their semantic roles (e.g. emotion causes) to facilitate the identifi-
cation of relevant aspects by the coach. We investigate future directions for emotion analysis using graph
structures.
Keywords: Sentiment Analysis ·Aspect-Based Emotion Analysis ·Natural Language Processing ·Cog-
nitive Analysis of Emotions ·Rule-Based system
1 Introduction
1.1 Cognitive Analysis of Emotions
Similar to many psychological theories (e.g. Freud’s psychoanalysis, Perls’ Gestalt therapy, Greenberg’s Emotion-
focused therapy, Shapiro’s Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing and most psychological theories
of emotions including Appraisal Theory), the Cognitive Analysis of Emotions (CAE) (Finkel, 2022) considers
that the mind, in a given scene, processes emotions and associated cognitions according to a cycle. For the
most part, this process is not conscious and begins with the identification of a situation and its issues. Then, it
is followed by a reflection concerning the benefits and disadvantages of possible choices of actions. A decision
is made, and the chosen action is executed. Finally, the cycle ends with a return to a ready state that is able
to process the next scene.
For instance, I am waiting for my turn to take a ticket at the cash desk of the cinema when someone passes
me. I feel angry because I think neither I nor the social rules have been respected. I evaluate my possible
actions and their consequences: protest verbally, physically push the person away, do nothing or run away. As
my fear of a conflict overtakes my anger, I decide to keep quiet and do nothing.
The conflict I avoided in the outside world may be internalized in my mind. I may be angry at the part of
myself that didn’t defend my rights, or I may be sad to be separated from my vision of a fair world. In this
example, the emotion processing cycle did not go as well as possible. I remain mentally preoccupied after the
scene. I have regrets and doubts. I mentally replay the scene differently.
The CAE is part of discrete emotion theory as it studies how the four primary emotions (joy, sadness,
anger and fear) appear in autobiographical accounts describing brief scenes (lasting a few tens of seconds) with
emotions experienced by the author. One of CAE assumptions is that an emotion coming to our consciousness
is a message to solve a problem (in the sense of problem-solving) associated with this emotion.
The universal problems, signaled by the four primary emotions, are formalized through the notion of
territory. The previous scene stages an attack on the following two territories: my free time (constrained by
the cinema queue) and my comforting vision of an organized and predictable world with laws accepted by
almost everyone. Anger and fear are signals that at least one of our territories is under attack. It is up to
us to defend (anger) or flee (fear) from it. Joy and sadness are signals that a change in our connection to a
arXiv:2210.05296v1 [cs.CL] 11 Oct 2022