Emotions and Vulnerability

Emotions are fundamentally embodied and intersubjective, not merely cognitive appraisals. Drawing on phenomenology and enactivism, this chapter argues that emotions constitute our experience of the world as meaningful and are inseparable from existential vulnerability—an ontological condition rooted in the lived body's exposure to others and contingency. The introduction surveys competing theories of emotion (cognitive, perceptual, feeling-based, motivational) and contends that all insufficiently address the lived body's richness. The volume's three parts move from phenomenological analyses of emotional life and vulnerability, through psychopathological perspectives, to the transformative role of embodied emotions in psychotherapy, establishing embodiment as the conceptual bridge integrating emotion theory, psychopathology, and psychotherapy.

Study at a glance

Abstract

This chapter introduces the philosophical rationale for investigating emotions in their dimensions of embodiment and existential vulnerability, drawing on phenomenology, psychopathology, and psychotherapy as complementary perspectives. Grounded in phenomenology and enactivism, it argues that emotions are essentially embodied, intersubjective phenomena through which we experience the world as meaningful in the first place. According to this approach, emotions cannot be adequately captured by cognitivist or appraisal-theoretic frameworks alone but must be explored in their embodied dimensions and intertwinement with existential vulnerability. This constitutive vulnerability is described as an ontological condition rooted in the lived body, its essential exposure to others and contingency. The Introduction surveys contemporary philosophy of emotion, mapping competing accounts across cognitive, perceptual, feeling-based, and motivational theories, before arguing that all tend to consider the richness of the lived body insufficiently. The volume’s three parts address the experiential richness of the lived body by moving from phenomenological analyses of emotional life and vulnerability, through psychopathological perspectives, to the transformative role of embodied emotions in psychotherapy. The Introduction thereby establishes embodiment as the conceptual bridge integrating emotion theory, psychopathology, and psychotherapy into a unified inquiry of emotions as a central aspect of human vulnerability.