The Emotion Ontology

The Emotion Ontology
*Swiss Centre for Affective Sciences, University of Geneva, Switzerland and
Cheminformatics and Metabolism Team, European Bioinformatics Institute
Barry Smith and Janna Hastings*

Preamble: What “Ontology”?

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Google hits Jan. 2004
ontology + Heidegger 58K
ontology + Aristotle 77K
ontology + philosophy 327K

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Google hits Jan. 2004
ontology + Heidegger 58K
ontology + Aristotle 77K
ontology + philosophy 327K
ontology + software 468K
ontology + database 594K
ontology + information systems 702K

5
Comparison 2004/2012
ontology + Heidegger 58K 1.91M
ontology + Aristotle 77K 1.66M
ontology + philosophy 327K 4.91M
ontology + software 468K 7.80M
ontology + database 594K 10.20M
ontology +information systems 702K 5.14M

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http://bioontology.org
Roadmap Center of the National Institutes of Health
Stanford University School of Medicine
The Mayo Clinic
University at Buffalo Department of Philosophy

Examples of Ontology Projects funded
by National Institutes of Health
NIH / NHGRI GO: Gene Ontology
NIH / NIGMS PRO: Protein Ontology
NIH / NIAID IDO: Infectious Disease Ontology
NIH / NIAID Major Histocompatilibity Complex
(MHC) Ontology
NIH / NHGRI SO: Sequence Ontology
NIH / NLM FMA: Foundational Model of
Anatomy
NIH / NHGRI CL: Cell Ontology
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Some questions
How to find data?
How to understand data when you find it?
How to use data in hypothesis-checking and reasoning?
How to integrate with other data?
Idea: sound logic, definitions, principles of classification
help
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a short
movement of one
lower leg
crossing the
other leg with the
foot pointing
outward
on right: Werner
Ceusters

same overt physical movement;
different behavioral context and
underlying (neuro)physiology
part of a mannequin’s step on the catwalk
an epileptic jerk
the kicking of a ball by a soccer player
a signal (“Get out!”) issued in heated
conversation
a “half cut” in Irish Sean-nós dancing
12

13/
Foundational
Model of
Anatomy
(fragment)

Affective science
The interdisciplinary study of:
 emotional functioning, regulation,
expression, and physiological markers
 affective disorders such as bipolar,
depression and schizoaffective disorder
Friday, May 24, 2013 14

Friday, May 24, 2013 15
Clinical observations
Self-reports
Neuroimaging
Physiological
monitoring
Questionnaires
Many different types of data
Behavioral
monitoring

Data aggregation (e.g. NIF)
Friday, May 24, 2013 16
Neuroscience Information Framework

New York State
Center of Excellence in
Bioinformatics & Life Sciences
R T U New York State
Center of Excellence in
Bioinformatics & Life Sciences
R T U

CONTINUANT OCCURRENT
INDEPENDENT DEPENDENT
ORGAN AND
ORGANISM
Organism
(NCBI
Taxonomy)
Anatomical
Entity
(FMA,
CARO)
Organ
Function
(FMP, CPRO) Phenotypic
Quality
(PaTO)
Organism-Level
Process
(GO)
CELL AND
CELLULAR
COMPONENT
Cell
(CL)
Cellular
Component
(FMA, GO)
Cellular
Function
(GO)
Cellular Process
(GO)
MOLECULE
Molecule
(ChEBI, SO,
RnaO, PrO)
Molecular Function
(GO)
Molecular
Process
(GO)
initial OBO Foundry coverage, ontologies
automatically semantically coupled
GRANULARITY
RELATION TO TIME
18

Anatomy Ontology
(FMA*, CARO)
Environment
Ontology
(EnvO)
Infectious
Disease
Ontology
(IDO*)
Biological
Process
Ontology (GO*)
Cell
Ontology
(CL)
Cellular
Component
Ontology
(FMA*, GO*) Phenotypic
Quality
Ontology
(PaTO)
Subcellular Anatomy Ontology (SAO)
Sequence Ontology
(SO*) Molecular
Function
(GO*)Protein Ontology
(PRO*)
Extension Strategy + Modular Organization 19
top level
mid-level
domain
level
Information Artifact
Ontology
(IAO)
Ontology for
Biomedical
Investigations
(OBI)
Spatial Ontology
(BSPO)
Basic Formal Ontology (BFO)

Basic Formal Ontology
Friday, May 24, 2013 20
BFO:Entity
BFO:Continuant BFO:Occurrent
BFO:ProcessBFO:Independent
Continuant
BFO
BFO:Dependent
Continuant
BFO:Disposition

Basic Formal Ontology
and Mental Functioning Ontology (MFO)
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BFO:Entity
BFO:Process
Organism
BFO:Independent
Continuant
BFO
MFO
BFO:Dependent
Continuant
Behaviour
inducing state
Mental Functioning
Related Anatomical
Structure
Cognitive
Representation
BFO:Quality
Affective
Representation
Mental Process
Bodily Process
BFO:Disposition

BFO:Entity
BFO:Process
BFO:Independent
Continuant
BFO
MFO
BFO:Dependent
Continuant
Cognitive
Representation
Affective
Representation
Mental Process
Bodily ProcessBFO:Disposition
MFO-EM
Emotion Occurrent
Organism
Emotional Action
Tendencies
Appraisal
Subjective
Emotional Feeling
Physiological
Response to
Emotion Process
inheres_in
is_output_of
Emotional
Behavioural Process
Appraisal
Process
has_part
agent_of
Foundational entities in the
Emotion Ontology

Ongoing work using the Emotion
Ontology
Emotional responses in model
organisms (mouse, zebrafish …)
Department of Genetics, Cambridge; European
Bioinformatics Institute
Friday, May 24, 2013 23

Cognitive Neuroscience of Emotions
Friday, May 24, 2013 24
Task Classification in MFO/MFOEM
Recognition of gender in emotional facial
expressions
Visual perception of emotional facial
expressions (subClassOf perception)
Recall of personal emotional memories
with instructions to try re-create feeling
Memory of emotional episodes
(subClassOf memory)
Listening to emotional sounds (e.g. grunts
of disgust)
Auditory perception of emotional stimuli
(subClassOf perception)
Viewing emotional film extracts Visual and auditory perception of
emotional stimuli (subClassOf perception)
Paradigms selected based on study of random sample of 15
papers from BrainMap database. Conclusion…
Cognitive Neuroscience does not usually study canonical
emotions! The link from perception of emotional fear in facial
expressions to canonical fear is subject to empirical research

Studies of the biochemical basis of
emotion
Emotions are effected in part by
neurotransmitters such as dopamine, tryptophan
Friday, May 24, 2013 25
dopamine
(CHEBI:25375)
molecular entity
(CHEBI:25375)
biological role
(CHEBI:24432)
neurotransmitter
(CHEBI:25512)
has role
neurotransmitter
receptor activity
(GO:0030594)
Molecular function
(GO:0003674)
realized in
happiness
(MFOEM:42)
part of
emotion
(MFOEM:1)
subtype

Emotion occurrent
An emotion occurrent is a processual emotion in
which a person participates over a specific time
period
A person undergoes or is the subject of the
emotion; he emotes
This terminology leaves open what the person
feels or is aware of
Friday, May 24, 2013 26

Emotional personality trait
An emotional personality trait is a stable
enduring characteristic of a person
which involves a predisposition (i.e. a
disposition which gives rise to an increased risk)
to undergo emotions of a particular sort, both
occurrents and dispositions.
Friday, May 24, 2013 27

Friday, May 24, 2013 28
Mary’s
behaviour
hurt me
Appraisal
(CNS)
Physiological response
(CNS, NES, ANS)
I feel
ANGRY
Subjective
feeling (CNS)
Behaviour (SNS)
An emotion occurrent is a mental process
that is a synchronized complex of constituent mental and physical
processes including an appraisal process as part, and which gives rise to
an action tendency. At least one appraisal precedes the other
components of the emotion, while it or others continue throughout the
emotion occurrent and guide the process.
I want to
PUNCH
something
Action
tendencies
(CNS)

Processes
An appraisal process is a mental process that gives
rise to an appraisal
A physiological response to emotion process is a
bodily process which encompasses all the
neurophysiological changes caused by the emotion
An emotional behavioural process is the behaviour
of the organism in response to the emotion,
including the characteristic facial expressions for
particular emotion types
Friday, May 24, 2013 29

Mental representations
An appraisal is a cognitive representation which
represents an evaluation of the relevance of
some triggering object or event to the organism
The subjective emotional feeling is an affective
representation that the organism has about its
own affect
Friday, May 24, 2013 30

Dispositions
Emotional action tendencies are dispositions to
behaviour which inhere in an organism
by virtue of the physical changes brought about
by an emotion process
Even satisfaction at completing some task is
associated with (future-directed) action
tendencies such as: to adopt a satisfied facial
expression, to relax muscles which had been
tensed …
Friday, May 24, 2013 31

Valence: classification of
positive/negative emotions
Friday, May 24, 2013 32
What are the positive emotions?
PositiveEmotion ⊑  has_valence. PositiveValence
What are the negative emotions?
NegativeEmotion ⊑  has_valence. NegativeValence
happiness PositiveValenceHas_valence
PositiveSurprise ⊑  has_valence. PositiveValence
NegativeSurprise ⊑  has_valence. NegativeValence
Surprise is not specific to one valence:

http://bioportal.bioontology.org/ontologies/1666
Friday, May 24, 2013 33The Emotion Ontology

Types of emotion
Friday, May 24, 2013 34
http://bioportal.bioontology.org/ontologies/1666

Types of emotion
Friday, May 24, 2013 35

Types of appraisal
Friday, May 24, 2013 36

Types of appraisal
Friday, May 24, 2013 37

Types of feeling
Friday, May 24, 2013 38

Physiological response to emotion

To define the characteristics of different
emotions start with canonical emotions
Friday, May 24, 2013 41
Emotion types (such as fear) show enormous variance across instances
Just as do anatomical types, e.g. human bodies
Ontology expresses what is always true… But aims to say
something useful for representation of domain knowledge.
Solution: encode knowledge in ‘canonical’ types
canonical
fear
appraisal
process
Appraisal of
dangerousness
Has part Has output
Canonical fear results from an appraisal of dangerousness

Canonical fear
canonical
fear
fear
EMOTION COMPONENT CHARACTERISTIC FOR FEAR
Action tendency Fight-or-flight
Subjective emotional feeling Negative, tense, powerless
Behavioural response Characteristic fearful facial
expression
Characteristic appraisal Something is dangerous to me
subtype

Canonical and non-canonical fear
Canonical fear gives rise to action tendencies
that are conformant to the perceived danger
Phobias = dispositions giving rise to non-
canonical fear
From laridaphobia to
(people taking pleasure in watching)
horror films

Disorders of affect
Some mental diseases involve altered emotional
functioning. (E.g. depression, bipolar disorder)
Friday, May 24, 2013 44
emotion
non-canonical
sadness
ProcessDisposition
depression
mental
disease
realized in
down-regulation
of dopaminergic
system
(GO:0032227)
has part
biological process
Mechanism of
action:
complex
disturbances in
underlying
systems

Proposal to define grief as a disorder

PAIN
International Association for the Study of Pain
(IASP)
pain =def. an unpleasant sensory and emotional
experience associated with actual or potential
tissue damage, or described in terms of such
damage.
Merskey H, et al: Pain terms: A list with definitions and
notes on usage. Recommended by the IASP Subcommittee
on Taxonomy. Pain 1979; 6:249-252.

Canonical pain & variants
PCT: pain with concordant tissue damage: the
patient experiences pain of the evolutionarily most
basic sort = pain in response to concordant tissue
damage
Variant pain
PNT: pain with peripheral trauma but discordant
(elevated) relative to tissue damage: there is
peripheral trauma, but the patient is experiencing
pain of an intensity that is discordant therewith;
NN: neuropathic nociception: no peripheral
trauma, but the patient is experiencing pain in
result of a neuropathic disorder in the nociceptive
system.

Pain-related phenomena without pain
PBWP: pain behavior without pain: there is a
cry or report of pain, but no pain is being
experienced (a fact which may or may not be
detectable by an external observer)
TWP: Tissue-damage without pain: tissue
damage normally of the sort to cause pain does
not activate the pain system.

Pain Ontology (PN) branch of MFO-EM
Lying
about pain

Symptoms Signs Physical Basis Examples
Canonical Pain
PCT: Pain with
concordant
tissue damage
Pain Manifestation of tissue damage
Signals sent to nociceptive system
Peripheral tissue damage
Intact nociceptive
system
Primary sunburn
Pain from strained muscle
Pulpitis
Variant Pain
PNT: no
concordant
tissue damage
Pain Manifestation of some disorder in
patient
Signals sent to nociceptive system +
activation of emotion-generating
brain centers
Physical disorder of
amplitude control
mechanisms
Myofascial pain disorder
Tension-type headache
Chronic back pain
NN: neuro-
pathic
nociception
Pain Test confirms nerve damage Disorder in the
nociceptive system
Trigeminal neuralgia
Post-herpetic neuralgia
Diabetic neuropathy
Central pain
PRP: Pain-Related Phenomena Without Pain
PBWP: pain
behavior
without pain
? Report of pain
Sick role behaviors accompanied by
normal clinical examination
Grossly exaggerated pain behaviors
Identified external incentives
Mental states such as
anxiety, Disordered
emotional or cognitive
systems misinter-
preting sensory signals
Factitious pain
Malingering
Anxiety-induced pain
report
TWP: tissue-
damage
without pain
No pain Manifestation of tissue damage
normally of the sort to cause pain
Suppression of pain
system by one or other
mechanism
Stress associated with
sudden emergency.
Damping of pain process
caused by endorphins.
Genetic insensitivity to
pain

Canonical pain
canonical
pain
pain
EMOTION COMPONENT CHARACTERISTIC FOR PAIN
Action tendency Withdrawal
Subjective emotional feeling Negative, tense, powerless
Behavioural response Characteristic painful facial
expression
Characteristic appraisal Something is dangerous to me

Canonical pain (PCT)
(1) a bodily process in an organism S involving two integrated levels:
(1a) activation of the nociceptive system including the pain-
associated emotion-generating brain components of S, and
(1b) a simultaneous sensory and aversive experience on the part of S
that is
(2) caused by damage to tissue located in a region R of the body of the
subject S,
(3) experienced by S as being caused by this damage,
(4) such as to involve an aversive reaction on the part of S directed
towards that which is presumed by S to be causing this damage,
(5) concordant with the tissue damage on both levels (1a) and (1b),
and also
(6) such that the sensory experience is sufficiently intense to
communicate the presence of tissue damage to the subject.

Aversive experience of x
An experience of x that involves both
1. a feeling with negative salience
2. a disposition to withdraw from or avoid x

Modified Pain
(1) a bodily process in an organism S involving two integrated
levels:
(1a) activation of the nociceptive system including the pain-
associated emotion-generating brain components of S, and
(1b) a simultaneous sensory and modified aversive experience
on the part of S
Modified aversive experience of x
An experience of x that involves a feeling with that is
phenomenologically identical to that of an aversive
experience, but because of the known absence of x, is
without a disposition to withdraw from or avoid

Modified aversive experience
(cf. Meinong, Ernstgefühle vs. Scheingefühle)

Aesthetic Pain
(1) a bodily process in an organism S involving two
integrated levels:
(1a) activation of the nociceptive system including the
pain-associated emotion-generating brain
components of S, and
(1b) a simultaneous sensory and modified aversive
experience on the part of S
that is
(2) caused by a visual or auditory stimulus,
(3) experienced by S as being caused by this stimulus,
(4) experienced by S with positive valence

Aesthetic pain
Brucknerian pain (empathy with Isolde on the
death of Tristan)

The Emotion Ontology

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