How does the way you think about infertility affects your life?
Abstract: The present article focuses on discussing the integrative understanding of INFERTILITY PROBLEMATICS THROUGH EMOTIONAL–COGNITIVE PARADIGM. There has been substantiated and explicated the potential of the approach under consideration, whose basis is the elaboration of the analogy between the structures of the cognitive process of identifying concepts of infertility–related emotions and the activity directed at developing the corresponding neural networks, which enhances perfecting the neural network model of the research object in terms of broadening the analogy between the model and the prototype. As a result of studying the cognitive representation of basic infertility–related emotions and emotional combinations, there have been two major types of EMOTIONAL CONCEPTS revealed – operationally closed loop and situationally dynamic ones – in accordance with the aims, the object and the results of conceptualizing emotions as a cognitive process.
Key Words: cognitive emotional representation, cognitive interpretation, conceptualizing emotions, nervous system, neuronetwork, psychology.
Meta Key Words: cognition, cognitive–emotional representation, cognitive interpretation, cognitive process of identifying emotional paradigm, cognitive stage, conceptualizing emotions, emotiology, emotions, emotional–cognitive paradigm, impact of nervousness, integrative understanding of infertility, nervous system, neuronetwork, neural network model, psychology, psychological preventive measures, psychological techniques for integrative understanding of infertility.
1. SCIENTIFIC REPRESENTATION OF THE PROBLEMATICS
INTRODUCTION
The actuality of the multi–dimensional problem of INFERTILITY can be vividly illustrated by the fact that recently there have been more than 80000 analytical overviews concerning this question published (just according to PubMed data) let alone numerous articles, scientific publications and research papers all over the world. Studying ways of conceptualizing and verbalizing emotions and feelings and their correlation with thoughts have become an interdisciplinary research mainstream focus for both paradigms of modern cognitive science/cognitive psychology and emotiology. Together with this, the problem of coding as converting one signal system into another with the help of the inner code (mental language) or the outer code (existing verbally and non–verbally) which is now so essential in the theory and practice of modern cognitive psychology has hardly ever described and comprehensively analyzed in emotiological–cognitive dimension. Modern cognitive psychology primarily focuses on researching the peculiarities of cognition (attention, memory, language processing, perception, problem solving, and thinking) and its interrelation with various types of actions/behavior/feelings/thoughts, etc. as the response to cognitive or emotional stimuli. Emotional stimuli and direct cognitive response are among priorities in the theory and practice of improving expert systems for special purposes, which is a considerable challenge for psychological science. Modern emotiology focuses on analyzing emotions as a cognitive phenomenon in the dimensions of philosophy and psychology in order to substantiate its status of a fundamental ontological category based on the category concept FEELING to develop a maximum efficient methodology of the further research of interpreting functions of emotions on cognitive level and discussing the structural and content peculiarities of the concept EMOTION. As a result, understanding the essence of the cognitive system and its integrative correlation with emotions explicates the importance of perfecting the existing systems of identifying categories of emotions and changing these emotional categories by developing new higher–precision ones [from negative to neutral/from neutral to positive/from negative to positive]. Modern emotiology regards conceptualized emotions as categorization and conceptualization operators of semantic space stability, entering structures of the personality’s existence. Together with this, the correlation between cognition and emotions as the development of conceptual and verbalized psycho–empirical structured global differentiation expressed in articulating (emotional) experience of people’s four main psychological dimensions (intellectual functioning, haptic experience, the feeling of one’s personal identity and specialized protection systems has been proved both by the cognitive and psychological theories of emotions. Thus, emotiological studies are getting oriented towards the cognitive field as a component of the whole system of framing techniques and technologies of organizing cognition.
That is why, at the present stage, perfecting the existing systems of identifying thoughts’ fragments of the actualization of emotional concepts and developing new higher–precision ones are among priorities in the theory and practice of improving expert systems for special purposes, which is a considerable challenge for psychologists. All the above determines formulating a deeply actual psychological mission of our time, consisting in neural network modeling of the emotional–cognitive interaction, or in other words, in creating a functional model of the objectivization of the conceptual picture of the world inside the personality’s cognition, which explicates the timeliness of our research.
1.1. COGNITION, EMOTIONS AND EMOTIONAL–COGNITIVE CORRELATION
There is increasing scientific interest in integrative understanding of the interplay of emotional and cognitive processes. The key objective of this paper is to reveal the peculiarities of the emotional and cognitive processes, considering the language of emotions to be an inclusive system of representation the essence of emotional–cognitive interaction through identifying verbalized concepts and categories of emotions, analyzing and comparing them for the further reconstruction of the conceptual picture of the world inside the personality’s cognition.
What is cognition? What is the essence of the cognitive process?
Cognition is defined as ‘the mental action or process of acquiring knowledge and understanding through thought, experience, and the senses.’ Cognitive processes include thinking, rethinking, analyzing, comparing, knowing, remembering, judging and problem–solving. The essence of the cognitive process itself, thus, consists in ability to perceive and react, process and understand, store and retrieve information, make decisions and produce appropriate responses.
What role does cognition have?
Cognition has a physical basis in the brain with over 100 billion nerve cells in a healthy human brain. Each of these can have up to 10,000 connections with other nerve cells called neurons.
Cognition fundamentally controls a personality’s thoughts and behaviors and these are regulated by discrete brain circuits which are underpinned by a number of neurotransmitter systems. There are a number of brain chemicals which play major roles in regulating cognitive processes; including dopamine, noradrenaline (norepinephrine), serotonin, acetylcholine, glutamate and GABA. In order to better understand what drives certain behaviors, in both healthy and disease states, it is important to consider cognition and the underlying neurobiology that underpins these behaviors. Personality’s distinct cognitive functions arise because of processes occurring within certain parts of our brain, but only some of these, end up entering our conscious awareness.
What is the role of the cognition in representation of the reality?
Cognition is constantly changing and adapting the personality to new information, regulating the personality’s behavior through the thought, which usually takes many subtler forms, such as interpreting sensory input, guiding physical actions, and empathizing with others.
Most theories of cognition assume that the mind forms internal representations and if we want to understand the mental algorithms involved in cognitive processes, we must understand the nature of the data that these algorithms input, process, and output. Therefore, we need to understand how minds represent features of the world.
By the cognition’s magic of form–transformations, the personality’s imagination is constantly reconstructing the reality in the mind, using the analysis for accurate representation of the feelings/behavior/actions/things/events/situations/ etc., based on visual and sensitive stimuli transmitted through the perceptional systems into the neural network: “…we invent new meanings, make discoveries, have new ideas that never existed before, and use our powerful imaginations routinely in everyday life. Cognitive science, at last, is focusing on these mysterious, creative aspects of the mind… All of these wonders come from systematic manipulation of forms” [2, p. 2–3], and, it is importantly to consider, that “Form does not present meaning but instead picks out regularities that run throughout meanings. …Form prompts meaning… Cognition is constantly manipulating meanings and the meanings causing the expressions…” [2, p. 5] and that ONLY COGNITION SUBSTANTIATES THE STATUS OF WHAT IS WHAT: “Form runs up against the mysteries of meaning” [2, p. 5], together with this, we can make a conclusion about the thought: our thought is the basic constituent of any process of cognitive representation of the reality: “Importantly, thought and language are embodied. Conceptual structure arises from our sensorimotor experience and the neural structures that give rise to it. The structure of concepts includes prototypes; reason is embodied and imaginative” [2, p. 2]. Thus, we can explicate another peculiarity dimension of the complicated process of cognitive reconstruction of the reality through the thought and through the language of emotions. It is combining discreteness at microlevels with irreversible evolutionary tendencies, constituting inner self–organizing process in the complex system of emotions, cognition and language.
For further understanding of the cognition’s role, we can look through next paragraph, where the cognitive neuroscience’s principles of cognition are revealed through the paradigm, that the world around us influences a cognitive system as a result of converting its analogous characteristics into digital–sign (digital–verbal, in our understanding) ones: “Phenomena that were once not even perceived as problems at all have come to be regarded as central, extremely difficult questions in cognitive neuroscience. What could be simpler than recognizing that a cup of cappuccino is a cup of cappuccino? When we look at works in cognitive neuroscience, we find this recognition problem listed under “conceptual categorization”, already regarded as a higher–order problem, beyond the already difficult feat of “perceptual categorization”. Apparently simpler still would be the simple recognition of a single entity, as when we look at a cup of cappuccino and perceive the cup of cappuccino. As neuroscience has shown, the many aspects of the cup of cappuccino –the color of the cup, the shape of the cup, the topology of the handle, the smell of cappuccino, the texture of the surface of the cup, the dividing line between the cappuccino and the cup, the taste of cappuccino, the heavy feel of the cup in the hand, the reaching for the cup and so on and so on –are apprehended and processed differently in anatomically different locations, and there is no single site in the brain where these various apprehensions are brought together. How can the cappuccino cup, so obviously a single thing for us at the conscious level, be so many different things and operations for the neuroscientist looking at the unconscious level?” [2, p.7 – 8].
How does the cognition construct the reality?
Understanding cognitive functions is imperative to understanding the mental representation of the reality. Cognition ensures realizing processes directed at receiving and processing, keeping and using, organizing and accumulating multimodal knowledge structures, including emotional ones.
The unique peculiarity of cognition in constructing the reality becomes clearer when we turn to the conception of reference as the ability of a personality to identify the world and himself/herself with the help of signs, together with the processes of recognizing and understanding as its necessary but insufficient components. From this perspective, reference can be directed both outwards (other–reference) and inwards (self–reference). Other–reference is generating signs in the process of cognizing the world considered by the observer/experiencer to be outer. Self–reference is generating signs in the process of cognizing the world considered by the observer/experiencer to be inner, including recognizing/identifying/comparing and understanding oneself (one’s own identity, psychology, structure, status, affects, etc.).
Inclusive interpretation of cognition necessarily presupposes dividing the world into specific objects, revealing various characteristics, properties and regularities, as well as realizing the boundaries of your own self/selves, your own place and role as the subject and the object of cognition in the world order. And it is concepts that are the units of knowledge where results of conceptualization as one of cognitive processes are represented. At the same time, verbal signs take part in forming concepts as knowledge structures, arousing states of neural activity as representations of interactions with constantly changing world the personality is structurally related to all the time.
Cognition has an impressive array of methods for manipulating meaning through systematic analysis of forms such as identification, classification, comparison, transformation, dynamics, intensity, emotional colouration, etc. – it is the feature of representing knowledge of [recent] experience acquired by a neuronetwork in the process of interaction with outer world: “Identity, integration and imagination – basic, mysterious, powerful, complex, and mostly unconscious operations – are at the heart of even the simplest possible meanings. The value of the simplest forms lies in the complex emergent dynamics they trigger in the imaginative mind. These basic operations are the key to both the invention of everyday meaning and exceptional creativity. Operations for the construction of meaning are powerful, but for the most part invisible. …the basic mental operation we call conceptual blending” [2, p. 57], “Conceptual blending is a basic mental operation that leads to new meaning, global insight, and conceptual compressions useful for memory and manipulation of otherwise diffuse ranges of meaning. It plays a fundamental role in the construction of meaning… The essence of the operation is to construct a partial match between two input mental spaces, to project selectively from those inputs into a novel ‘blended’ mental space, which then dynamically develops emergent structure. Mental spaces are small conceptual packets constructed as we think and talk, for purposes of local understanding and action – they are very partial assemblies containing elements, structured by frames and cognitive models. It has been suggested that the capacity for complex conceptual blending (“double–scope” integration) is the crucial capacity needed for thought and language” [2, p. 57–58]. Consequently, we understand GOGNITIVE REPRESENTATION of the outer world as the process of the adaptation of a neuronetwork to presented samples of the corresponding meaning of the form through modifications according to the meaning’s algorithms of the weight coefficients of correlations between neurons with its ability not only to correctly react to signals received in the process of this interaction, but also to generate the right output for input signals.
What is emotion?
The vital and integrative mission of all emotions is the most accurate and detailed representation of the information/knowledge, through developing the corresponding neural networks in terms of broadening the analogy between the model and the prototype. Constantly correlating with cognition, emotional paradigm always affects the cognitive process of coding and decoding information, integrally connected with identification, comparison, classification and post–identification, that is why evoked by any our emotion, our every remembrance can be vividly reflected in our memory.
For perfect understanding of this statement, we should ask you to do the following:
(1) “…now, close your eyes, breathe and think of the happiest you’ve ever been or ever could be. Think of your most positive, most delicate memories. Now open your eyes. Notice how the reality almost has changed? Look inside your soul and notice how your emotions have changed?”;
(2) “…now close your eyes again and think of your worst memories, things that make you angry, frustrated, self–ashamed, suffering from nerves, grief–stricken or sad. Open again your eyes. Notice how the reality almost has changed? Look inside your soul and notice how your emotions have changed?”
What’s vital to remember is that emotions outlast the memories that created them.
We take past emotions and project them onto situations that are in our current lives. This is to say, unless we heal what happened in the past, we’re always going to be controlled by it. Furthermore, our irrational fears, excessive frustrations and deep anxieties can be traced back to a cause, of which needs to be addressed to effectively stop the effect.
In terms of identifying, EMOTION can be termed as a cognitive–psychological phenomenon and a unique filter of emotional consciousness, which activates the inner balance of the cognizing system’s state and fixates of certain states of the structural and content interrelatedness between different systems as a response to personality’s conscious experiences.
What is the essence of emotions?
Emotions are a personality’s functional units of knowledge/experience with its own content, used to accumulate and transfer emotional information, they turn out to be the indicators of a personality’s survival as a constantly changeable boundaries between a personality and his/her outer world, which we consider to be one of the core peculiarities of the essence of the emotions. Following N.Luhmann, the world around us influences our cognitive system as a result of converting its analogous characteristics into digital–sign (digital–verbal, in our understanding) ones [4]. Therefore, we have revealed the next main peculiarity of the essence of emotions, which signs as results of converting analogous relationship characteristics into cognitive ones that the cognitive system realizes itself by means of its inner operationally closed structural interactions with other systems.
Emotions are something that happens to everyone and we should embrace them. They are what make everyone a personality; they construct our private and mysterious inner life. We feel more than we have the language to express, which is in itself profoundly frustrating. Correlating with cognition, emotions construct the reality.
There are several phrases, which can vividly exemplify this correlation:
(1) the bitter–sweetness of having arrived here in the future, where you can finally get the answers to how things turn out in the real world – who your baby–sister would become, what your friends would end up doing, where your choices would lead you, exactly when you’d lose the people you took for granted;
(2) the moment that seemed innocuous at the time but ended up marking a diversion into a strange new era of your life – set in motion not by a series of jolting epiphanies but by tiny imperceptible differences between one ordinary day and the next, until entire years of your memory can be compressed into a handful of indelible images – which prevents you from rewinding the past, but allows you to move forward without endless buffering;
(3) the frustration of photographing something amazing when thousands of identical photos already exist – the same sunset, the same waterfall, the same curve of a hip, the same close–up of an eye – which can turn a unique subject into something hollow and pulpy and cheap, like a mass-produced piece of furniture you happen to have assembled yourself;
(4) the kind of melancholic trance in which you become completely absorbed in vivid sensory details – raindrops skittering down a window, a present–bouquet of peonies, was brought by somebody is lying on your doorstep, clouds of cream swirling in your coffee – briefly soaking in the experience of being alive;
(5) the recurring thought that only seems to strike you late at night – an overdue task, a nagging guilt, a looming and shapeless future – that circles high overhead during the day, that pecks at the back of your mind while you try to sleep, that you can successfully ignore for weeks, only to feel its presence hovering outside the window, waiting for you to finish your coffee, etc.
The core emotions’ function as prime–stimuli, supported with an attentional shift from the primary focus into defocused zones, is to enhance a more precise identification of what is LIFE through transmission of perceptual/visual stimuli into the neuronetwork and to construct flexible CONCEPTS and CATEGORIES – units, which interpret the information in cognitive matrix. Consequently, we understand the ESSENCE of the EMOTIONS to be in accurate interpretation of the information from outer world, its correct transmission into the neural network and generation the right output for input signals by the neural network.
What role does emotion have?
It is essentially proved that emotions and emotional states are the cumulative significance of the current needs, the balance between the necessary and the possible, being motivated when making a behavioural decision, and, as a result, an emotional–informational reflective model that emerges in personality’s cognition and contains information about problem area where the task of fixing regulated variables is realized.
Understanding emotions as the personality’s appraisal concerning those objects that are significant for him/her, necessarily including the psychic reflection of the object of emotions (the cognitive component) and the psychological state of the personality – emotion experiencer, it is supposed that the main part in the functioning of the second component belongs to the hierarchical system of the personality’s needs. All this is embodied in the language of emotions which is connected with the reality of the open limbic system of emotional centers as an interpersonal cognitive–limbic regulation [1] through signs, with the help of which a personality conceptualize the world (of emotions) in his/her own imagination.
What is the role of the emotion in constructing the reality?
Emotions are integral part in the cognitive process of the reality construction. Consequently, substantiating the status of the emotional spectrum as a dynamic system with analyzing the functional peculiarities of its dimensions, there have been two major types of emotions revealed – operationally closed loop (the whole spectrum of emotions) and situationally dynamic (the spectrum of emotions which is inspired as the immediate emotional response to something (situation, etc.)/somebody(personality).
Exemplifying the difference between operationally closed loop emotions and situationally dynamic ones you should look through these sentences and comparing your past experience and present experience: “Let me feel my feelings because that’s how I have to do life. Let me be fascinated by the pastel tulips that popped up overnight. Let me study the patterns and touch the petals in admiration. Let me feel beautiful. Let me feel angry and heartbroken. Let me feel the pain, because it’s there, and pretending it’s not makes it far worse. Let me be frustrated. Let me cry about it”, etc. The past experience reveals operationally closed loop emotions (the whole spectrum of emotions) you felt and which are determined by the interpretative function of your cognition and the present experience vividly represents situationally dynamic emotions (the spectrum of emotions which is inspired as the immediate emotional response to something (situation, etc.)/somebody(personality).
What is emotional–cognitive correlation?
Our cognition is a polyfunctional system that can manifest any area of our experience, including emotions. With its important immanency of emotional deixis, the cognitive functional system is responsible for representing experiential knowledge, including experiential knowledge of emotions. What’s vital to remember is that all emotions actively participate in the structural and content dynamics of cognition, and their interaction is integrative.
Emotional–cognitive system is constantly working with different stimuli, different frames or reference at the same time and the information/experience/knowledge, received through these interactions should have an adequate integrative mental–verbal representation. As we have already mentioned, FILTERING of emotional consciousness, ACTIVATING the inner balance of the cognizing system’s state and FIXING of certain states of the structural and content interrelatedness between different systems as a response to conscious experiences are the most valuable functions of the emotions.
Every single emotion, transmitted from the inner or outer world is represented in cognitive neural network by the EMOTIONAL CONCEPTS, which all together form the language of emotions. The language of emotions is a system of verbalized concepts and categories of emotions, where the emotions acquire specific meanings connected with language ones but considerably different from them. The dynamic aspect of conceptualizing emotions in terms of conceptual interaction is connected with revealing and representing objects, stimuli, events and their peculiar features as units of emotional knowledge right in the process of verbal interaction to communicate knowledge/emotions, to exchange information to get oriented in the world. In this case, it is amalgamated emotional–feeling event concept that become results of cognition as gestalt units of the operative ontology of the world, specific emotional concepts that are formed and communicated while interacting verbally, which we consider them to be situationally–dynamic. Such concepts are results of the functioning of various cognitive (profiling, (re)perspectivization, comparison, etc.) and language (nomination, word building, language metaphor and metonymy, syntactic structures, etc.) mechanisms of processing received or already available emotional information. Correspondingly, as such concepts represent diverse ways of configurating accumulated experience and operating these cognitive schemes, it turns out to be efficient to research them in the direction of finding out both their content and relevant cognitive pattern schemes.
All the above explicates the language of emotions as a complex of verbalized concepts of emotions (each of which is an amalgamated emotional–feeling event concept as it mentally represents a network of interconnected thoughts and ideas, memories, feelings, sensations, cognitively determined expressive and spontaneous reactions, registering the results of impression, retention, actualization and pretence) and categories that are based on such concepts.
1.2. STRUCTURAL MODEL OF THE COGNITIVE PROCESS OF IDENTIFYING CONCEPTS OF INFERTILITY–RELATED EMOTIONS: NEURONETWORK DIMENSION
What is the basic component of any type of cognition?
The process of recognizing and identifying visual stimuli, emotional stimuli and verbal information are three components of any type of cognition, and it is necessarily connected with the process of acquiring new experience/knowledge, within the framework of cognitive sciences we define identifying as comparing the current perceptive (conceptual–verbal) image with the inner leading element which is represented in the central nervous system of a subject and includes receiving information (emotional information, in our case), its processing, comparing with memory models, classifying, informing about the fact of belonging of an object (a verbalized concept) to a certain category of objects.
What is cognitive process? What stages does it have?
Cognitive process (especially, experiencing emotions) takes place under circumstances of an intensive interaction of a number of neurophysiological, psychological and language factors and the necessary condition for constructing information models and knowledge models should be the psychological and physiological reality basis we consider it to be rational to enrich the present structure by means of involving the stages of experiencing and post–identifying. It is determined by the polysystem nature of cognition which becomes obvious in the interaction of its perceptual, selective, mnemic and reason elements, which is crucial while identifying emotional concepts as verbalized mental representations of multi–aspect experiential emotional knowledge that cannot be comprehensively described by means of a simple range of obligatory and optional elements as knowledge of a matrix format, i.e. such knowledge that can be represented as a cognitive matrix or a synergetic system of interrelated contexts, each of which is a space of conceptualizing an object (emotions).
As a result, the structural model of the cognitive process of identifying concepts of infertility–related emotions comprises the stages of identification, comparing, classifying and post–identification.
Cognitive process of identifying concepts of infertility–related emotions
The identifying system is supposed to actively interact with the world, which allows to compensate lack of a priori information, being the basis for changing the algorithms of the identifying system functioning. At the same time, the neurobiological dimension of the comparing–classifying process is connected with the functional changes of nervous system structures, leading to creating a certain prototype that is represented in personality’s long–term memory. Neurophysiological memory, in its turn, can be observed on the level of systems of neurons, as it is realized synaptically and is connected with neuronetwork populations’ (including artificial ones’) acquiring peculiar properties that enhance mastering a new skill – to cope with infertility–related stress/infertility–related negative thinking etc. The neuronetwork perspective presupposes that the basis of COGNITIVE TRANSFER the emotional categories is formed by a sequence of improving reactions to a sequence of stimuli united by a definite objective. Consequently, we understand neuronetwork modelling as the process of the adaptation of a neuronetwork to presented samples of the corresponding psychological selection through modifications according to the modelling algorithms of the weight coefficients of correlations between neurons.
Infertility is a common, but very delicate problem, emotional and very personal, therefore it often lurks in the shadows. Despite the outstanding scientific breakthroughs, medical innovations, compassion, sympathy and understanding, infertility is still a taboo discussion. It causes many marriages to break up and creates a sense of isolation, anger and loss of self–worth. Many couples feel deeply frustrated and embarrassed about their inability to get pregnant because of veiled criticism, which can entail them in the future. If you’ve ever experienced infertility, you can understand the incredibly complex and maddening emotions that accompany the condition. Going through infertility experience can be cognitively represented by prevailing basic negative emotions, emotional combinations and feelings [continuous confusion, fear, frustration, nervousness, nervous breakdown], because the basis is the elaboration of the analogy between the structures of the cognitive process of identifying concepts of emotions and the activity directed at developing the corresponding neural networks, which enhances perfecting the neural network model of the research object in terms of broadening the analogy between the model and the prototype. There will be so many questions discussed and emotions involved, sometimes you will even feel yourself like a bundle of nerves, but visualization of having a charming baby cuddled up to you in the future turns all these emotions from negative into positive, turns tears of profound sadness into tears of the deepest happiness, which surpasses any pain or struggle you have to endure. Consequently, turning your utmost dream of having a baby into reality determines the development of a maximum efficient methodology for coping with infertility’s stress, based on the above–formulated emotional–cognitive paradigm and its practical implementation. Fertility issues don’t get better when you wait them out, therefore, two main things you need are (1) time management and (2) accurate strategy for coping with infertility’s stress through its implementation into reality.
Together with this, the problem of coping with infertility’s stress can be represented by the coding as converting one emotion into another with the help of the inner code (mental language) or the outer code (existing verbally and non–verbally) which is now so essential in the theory and practice of cognitive science, emotiology and psychology.
Thus, the infertility’s stress in our research is identified as the language of emotions [a complex of verbalized concepts of emotions], which mentally represents a network of interconnected thoughts and ideas, memories, feelings, sensations, cognitively determined expressive reactions, registering the results of impression, retention, actualization and pretence and categories and categories that are based on such concepts.
In the connection with the above, the strategy for coping with infertility’s stress can be illustrated by the NEURAL NETWORK MODELLING that allows to draw a tentative outline of understanding the dynamic recursion of interrelation of the emotions and cognition:
THOUGHT + EMOTION [COGNITION–EMOTION INTERACTION]
or
EMOTION+THOUGHT [EMOTION–COGNITION INTERACTION]
The structural model of the cognitive process
of identifying concepts of infertility–related emotions
(1) IDENTIFICATION of repetitive negative thought (2) COGNITIVE TRANSFER [replacement] from negative emotional category to positive one through questions’ paradigm (3) COGNITIVE MODELLING: formulating the new meaning
2. PRACTICAL IMPLEMENTATION OF THE SCIENTIFIC BREAKTHROUGHTS
2.1. First basic constituent IN NEURAL NETWORK IS EMOTIONAL–COGNITIVE INTERACTION [COGNITION–EMOTION – EMOTION–COGNITION] –COGNITIVE/EMOTIONAL REPRESENTATION OF THE CONCEPT [your thought, categorized by the word]: CHANGE the way you imagine your infertility problem and the way you think about it
In general, the emotional–cognitive interaction in neural network modelling is represented by the interaction of its perceptual, selective and reason elements, which is crucial while identifying EMOTIONS, caused by a thought and EMOTIONAL CONCEPTS as verbalized mental representations of multi–aspect experiential emotional knowledge that cannot be comprehensively described by means of a simple range of obligatory and optional elements as knowledge of a matrix format, for instance, such knowledge that can be represented as a cognitive matrix or a synergetic system of interrelated contexts, each of which is a space of conceptualizing a thought (emotions). Every single THOUGHT is always mentally represented not only by the CONCEPT in the neural network, but also as an EMOTIONAL CONCEPT, because it causes the appearance of an emotion, interconnected with its meaning. There has been substantiated and explicated the potential of the approach under consideration, whose basis is the elaboration of the analogy between the structures of the cognitive process of identifying concepts of emotions and the activity directed at developing the corresponding neural networks, which enhances perfecting the neural network model of the research object in terms of broadening the analogy between the model and the prototype. As a result of studying the cognitive representation of basic emotions and emotional combinations, there have been two major types of EMOTIONAL CONCEPTS revealed – operationally closed loop and situationally dynamic ones – in accordance with the aims, the object and the results of conceptualizing emotions as a cognitive process. A special emphasis is on the interaction of the representative and interpretative dimensions of operating knowledge through the language of emotions by the neural network as the result of realizing their core cognitive and interpretative functions: THE WAY YOU THINK influences the way you FEEL yourself [COGNITION–EMOTION INTERACTION] and the way you FEEL yourself influences the way you THINK [EMOTION–COGNITION INTERACTION], therefore, being emotionally distressed all the time can lead to acute nervous break–down, neuro–cardiovascular dysfunction and, moreover, it is vital to understand that very extreme stress can disrupt the endocrine system, triggering infertility, that is why, you should STOP THINKING NEGATIVELY about yourself and your infertility. Identify your negative emotions and negative thoughts. When we experience mental or emotional tension, feelings of nervousness, acute nervous tension and ongoing stress, it’s usual for our thoughts to take on a negative tone. It is not a surprise that all negative thinking is fear–based, but did you know that chronic negative thinking that goes on day–after–day creates stress that can damage the body and mind, resulting in disease or worse? Therefore, it is extremely essential to CHANGE THE WAY YOU IMAGINE YOUR INFERTILITY PROBLEM AND THE WAY YOU THINK about it. Our life is what our thoughts make it and what you feel now is what you’re going to attract. THOUGHTS BECOME YOUR REALITY, that is why, it is vital to clarify several aspects of negative thinking:
(1) Judgment of anything is negative thinking because you are focusing on what you do not like or desire.
(2) Self–judgment is negative thinking where you are focusing on what you don’t like about yourself — and reinforcing it.
(3) While self–doubt is negative thinking, negative thinking creates more self–doubt.
(4) Worry is also another form of negative thinking because you are imagining the worst.
(5) Even negative questions are a form of negative thinking because they produce negative answers. If you ask yourself, “What will happen if I don’t succeed?” your mind will sort for all the terrible things that might happen, and you will be focused on what you don’t want.
2.2. Second basic constituent in NEURAL NETWORK IS IDENTIFICATION.
IDENTIFY recurring negative thoughts about the cycle or about infertility, their cognitive representation in emotional concepts [or verbal explication–representation of emotions] and MAKE COGNITIVE TRANSFER [REPLACEMENT] from negative emotional category to positive one by asking yourself simple and transparent questions, for instance, NEGATIVE EMOTIONS [ANGER, FEAR, FRUSTRATION, GUILT, SADNESS, SELF–CONTEMPT], which can be vividly illustrated by your COGNITIVE MODELLING in such phrases as:
IDENTIFICATION of repetitive negative thoughts:
(1.1) “My heart is breaking every month wanting it to happen soon;”
(1.2) “I’ll never have a baby, deep down, I know that might never happen;”
(1.3) “Nothing will ever eradicate the deep sadness that another negative pregnancy test presents or the frustration that overcomes my consciousness as I look toward another month of trying;”
(1.4) “The romantic idea I’d had of bringing a baby into the world from our successful marriage sounds unreal after five years of trying. Each month I lost a little more hope. Each month I learned some hard lessons. I don’t deserve my dream about a baby coming true;”
(1.5) “What is different now to lead me to believe the IVF procedure will work this time?”
(1.6) “If I don’t get pregnant this in–vitro fertilization cycle, it will never happen;”
(1.7) “If I get pregnant, I’m sure I’ll have a miscarriage again;”
(1.8) “If I get multiple pregnancy, and there will be the death of one fetus, what should I do;”
(1.9) “If more than one embryo be transferred during an IVF cycle, because of miscarriage or because of the death of a twin or multiple, what should I do;”
(1.10) “I’ve read a pregnancy announcement and felt a surge of uninhibited joy, muddled almost immediately by crushing anger. My husband has found me in a puddle of tears as I tell him through heaving sobs how guilty I feel for a terrible thought I’ve had about someone I know who is expecting. Yes, it is as exhausting as it sounds;”
(1.11) “It looked like a hurdle I’d face alone and would overcome with patience and commitment;”
(1.12) “What if it happens again? What if the next cycle doesn’t work? Is it sadder to have a failed cycle or a cycle that works but the pregnancy doesn’t last?” etc., you should CHANGE through the questions’ paradigm.
2.3. Third basic constituent is TWO–STAGED COGNITIVE TRANSFER [REPLACEMENT].
2.3.1. FIRST STAGE OF COGNITIVE TRANSFER [REPLACEMENT] from negative emotional category to positive one through the questions’ paradigm: after you have identified the repetitive negative thoughts, ask yourself simple questions, which can represent transparency and inclusiveness of your attitude in cognitive and emotional aspects:
–Is this thought true or logical?
–Is this thought my desirable one?
–What I feel when I am thinking about it?
–What can be explicated by this thought?
–Is this thought helping me right now or makes things more complicated and difficult to understand?
Negative thought patterns are repetitive and directly cause negative emotions. Negative thinking includes the words that you think and say [cognition –representation of your knowledge in your mind, and verbalization –representation of your knowledge in language], and it also includes negative visualizations, self–talk and metaphors, as well as, mentally replaying unhappy memories. Negative thinking transforms into negative feelings. Any thought that makes you feel bad is a negative thought. Negative thinking causes negative feelings like anger, despair, guilt, frustration, sadness, etc. In fact, negative feelings are your inner guidance system telling you that you are thinking negatively and imagining what you do not want. Your feelings are telling you that your thoughts are out of control, and you’re going away from what you desire in life. Even though depression numbs feelings, those feelings are still very much present and persistent. To PREVENT negative visualizations, self–talk, metaphors and mentally replaying unhappy memories, ask yourself additionally these questions:
–What is the basic emotion I have felt of this thought?
–Which emotions followed the basic emotion? [Which emotions were inspired by this thought?]
–Which emotional patterns [emotional combinations] can I feel thinking about it?
–Why should I feel ANGER/DESPAIR/GUILT/FEAR/FRUSTRATION/SADNESS/SHAME/etc. thinking about it?
–Do I feel emotional exasperation during the time I am thinking and rethinking about it?
–How can I describe this thought in other negative words [words with negative connotation]?
–What is the basic emotion I have felt of this thought after rephrasing it in other negative words?
–Which emotions followed the basic emotion? [were inspired by this thought?]
–Which emotional patterns [emotional combinations] can I feel thinking about it?
–What I feel when I am thinking about it in other negative words?
–How can I represent this negative thought in other words to make it sounded a little bit positive? [How can I reframe this thought to make it sounded a little bit positive?]
–What I feel about this thought after rephrasing it?
–Do I have the same emotions or my emotions have changed? [If you have different emotions after rephrasing the thought, you should continue rephrasing until you can feel positive emotional paradigm].
–Does this thought describe what I desire? Is it my desirable objective?
–Which opportunities do I have for its realization right now?
–Which problems can I have during the realization of this thought?
–Which solutions do I have?
–Which solutions are worth to focus on?
–Do I have the strategies for their realization? What should I start with? What I should do after the first step?
–Which result can this strategy bring me? Which consequences will it entail in the future?
2.3.2. SECOND STAGE OF COGNITIVE TRANSFER [REPLACEMENT] of conceptualized thought from negative emotional category to positive one [integrative understanding of emotion–cognition interaction]: COGNITIVE MODELLING –FORMULATING THE NEW MEANING [of the thought]
The question of studying cognitive modelling through the conceptual integration network is fundamental for transparent representation of principles when formulating the new meaning [of the thought]. The essence of the formulating of the new meaning of the thought itself, thus, consists in the fact that at every cognitive modelling cycle there is a multiplicity of potential meanings, categorized by negative emotional category to positive one.
Every conscious thought that you have is recorded by your subconscious mind. Your subconscious mind does not question or argue with the validity of a thought. It literally takes YOUR WORD for it. So, if you say, “I’ll never have a baby, deep down, I know that might never happen,” it just says, “Yes, you will never have –Yes, it will never happen,” and your thoughts are accurately recorded.
Your subconscious mind then communicates directly with the quantum mind that manifests your reality. Just like the subconscious mind, the quantum mind always says yes.
SO, IF YOU CATCH YOURSELF THINKING,
“My heart is breaking every month wanting it to happen soon;” “I’ll never have a baby, deep down, I know that might never happen;” “Nothing will ever eradicate the deep sadness that another negative pregnancy test presents or the frustration that overcomes my consciousness as I look toward another month of trying;” “The romantic idea I’d had of bringing a baby into the world from our successful marriage sounds unreal after five years of trying. Each month I lost a little more hope. Each month I learned some hard lessons. I don’t deserve my dream about a baby coming true”, etc.,
YOU COULD REFRAME THESE THOUGHTS TO,
–“Infertility is a medical condition, but it is also treatable. I should start my fertility journey with making an appointment at one of the city’s top fertility clinics;”
–“Though much about reproduction remains a medical mystery, many “unexplained” infertility cases can be explained with deeper sleuthing. My fertility expert has explained all possible treatment options not only transparently, but also inclusively and represented me the most effective ones”, etc.
–“I’m actively pursuing treatment and I will be able to have a wonderful baby;”
–“Despite IVF treatment is not covered by the majority of insurance plans — physically stressful and, of course, emotionally fraught, but every time [in the future] I will get to hold, embrace or smile at my charming baby, cuddled up to me, surpasses any pain or struggle I have to endure in the present;”
–“The very first embryo transfer will work, and soon we’ll become the proud parents of our baby;”
IF YOU CATCH YOURSELF THINKING,
“What if it happens again? What if the next cycle doesn’t work? Is it sadder to have a failed cycle or a cycle that works but the pregnancy doesn’t last?”; “What is different now to lead me to believe the IVF procedure will work this time?”; “If I don’t get pregnant this in–vitro fertilization cycle, it will never happen;” “If I get pregnant, I’m sure I’ll have a miscarriage again”, etc.
YOU COULD REFRAME THESE THOUGHTS TO,
–“Two years passed and I realized that it’s not always as simple as I thought. Frustrated, scared and confused, I went through months of testing, procedures, the endless waiting and many disappointments, but I don’t think I ought to exclude anything necessarily. I am a bundle of nerves, but I understand, that turning my utmost dream of having a baby into reality is worth all these medical procedures and time. I can cope with my stress, despair and depression using the time–management technique and logical approach. This time the situation will be in my hands, and I am starting right now with a constructive strategy what to do and how to organize my time;”
–“The very first thing I should do is to change my fertility clinic. Finding a new fertility clinic and a new physician needs careful consideration. I know, that choosing new fertility clinic and fertility specialist takes additional time, because it should be not only an experienced physician with many awards and certificates, respected expert in his field, perfect and trustworthy professional I will be working with on an extremely personal level, but also patient, compassionate, caring and supportive person;”
–“I will make several appointments at several city’s top fertility clinics to find a new more experienced physician. Making comparative analysis of clinics, fertility specialists and their medical team, I will find the most experienced medical team, feel comfortable with and can trust their judgement;”
–“I should make a list of all my questions and write all variants of answers I would be given by fertility specialists. All treatment options should not only be inclusively represented on a high professional level but also discussed with me in the utmost detail, because I need to feel very knowledgeable of my whole IVF cycle and to compare different medical opinions, recommendations and options. I will compare everything, think, choose the most appropriate one and only after that I will start my IVF treatment. This time –without psychological pressure.”
IF YOU CATCH YOURSELF THINKING,
“If I get multiple pregnancy, and there will be the death of one fetus, what should I do;” “If more than one embryo be transferred during an IVF cycle, because of miscarriage or because of death of a twin or multiple, what should I do”,
YOU COULD REFRAME THESE THOUGHTS TO,
–“My thoughts about the death of my baby are not logical, because I have already done all the necessary medical tests and procedures –everything is normal and I can visit my fertility specialist more than one time a week to check how everything is going on: to schedule my visit I should only call or e–mail the reception;”
–“If I would have had any complications during IVF Cycle, I can feel absolutely secure in the talented and caring hands of my fertility specialist, because I can call anytime of the day and ask any questions I have;”
–“If it would be necessarily, additional ultrasound and other procedures would be done to show my baby’s tiny beating heart”.
In this connection, interpreting the process of COGNITIVE TRANSFER through the conception that “mental spaces can be modified dynamically as thought and discourse unfold” [2, p. 60], thus, “a particular process of meaning construction has particular input representations, inferences, emotions” [2, p. 135], we have arrived at the conclusion that NEGATIVE EMOTIONS as activators of the inner balance of the cognizing system’s state, on the one hand, and, on the other hand, as fixators of certain states of the structural and content interrelatedness between different systems CAN BE CHANGED to neutral or positive ones through SELF–QUESTIONING and SELF–ANSWERING.
CONCLUSION
This paper presents an enriched structural model of the cognitive process of identifying infertility–related emotions and the corresponding integrity of activities directed at creating a neuronetwork model of identifying, comprising the cognitive stages of training, preliminary identification, comparing, classifying and post–identifying. The key methodological implication of reconstructing the pattern of activities to create an artificial neuronetwork system of identifying infertility–related emotions is its analogy with the structure of the cognitive process of identifying and infertility–related thoughts, including verbalized concepts of emotions. There has been substantiated and explicated the potential of the approach under consideration, whose basis is the elaboration of the analogy between the structures of the cognitive process of identifying concepts of infertility–related emotions and the activity directed at developing the corresponding neural networks, which enhances perfecting the neural network model of the research object in terms of broadening the analogy between the model and the prototype. As a result of studying the cognitive representation of basic infertility–related emotions and emotional combinations, there have been two major types of EMOTIONAL CONCEPTS revealed – operationally closed loop and situationally dynamic ones – in accordance with the aims, the object and the results of conceptualizing emotions as a cognitive process.
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