The indeterminate affect: Anxiety in interaction in individuals, self-organizing groups, and media

Abstract

As a history of ideas and casuistry of concepts, the article has modest goals: (1) I argue that anxiety is both ‘sensation’ and ‘emotion’. (2) I discuss this distinction, observing that, while useful intra-culturally, it can lead to confusion because both emotions and sensations are conditioned by historic and cultural factors (I compare Indian, Chinese, and Greek tables of affects). (3) I thereupon address the question of how societies define (and deal with) anxiety, starting from a discussion of a recent New York Times article, as well as of a recent study in political anxiety. (4) This provides a transition to the question of anxiety in unstructured crowds, including political movements. Using social psychology, I urge that the study of crowds needs to be brought into the 21st century (Stephen Reicher), given their capacity for self-organization. (5) A refined sense of crowd dynamics may diminish our reasons for fearing anxiety, in groups notably, just as channelling group anxiety through communication may contribute to positive social change.