Is pain an emotion?

Got into an argument with some of my friends today. One says pain is an emotion while my friend an I say it's a physical response. What do you guys think?

Well the scientific definition of pain is: a typical sensory experience that may be described as the unpleasant awareness of a noxious stimulus or bodily harm.

So yes, it is a physical response. Your friend could be arguing about emotional pain, but that still doesn't make it an emotion really...

Pain is in no way an emotion. When someone asks how you are or how you're feeling, you don't say "I'm feeling painful". Pain is a physical or mental response to a threatening or unfriendly situation.

Emotion can be painful, but pain is a reaction and in no way an emotion.

No pain is not an emotion. Pain is a feeling. The emotion is crying, screaming. those are emotions. Things you do. You do not do pain.

Pain is a sensation, not an emotion.

Crying is also not an emotion... Nor is pain, nor is smiling...

These are all responses to our emotions. Emotions are how we are feeling.

eg. Crying > sadness
Pain > Hurt
Smile > Happiness/Limber

It is definitely not an emotion. Pain comes as a result of an emotion, or a physical action.

Midnight Beat; said:

Pain is a physical or mental response to a threatening or unfriendly situation.

Click to expand...

I do believe you just refuted your own point there, Midnight Beat. Any mental response to something would be considered an emotion and therefore pain can, indeed, be an emotion.

You see, English is a confusing language.
We often use the same words interchangeably that really shouldn't be so. By definition, pain is a sensory response to a stimulus, heat or a prick to the skin for example. However, we have grown to make the feelings we have inside such as depression, empathy, guilt, and the like synonymous with the sensation we feel after responding to a physical stimulus.

Pain can be an emotion if looked at in the correct manner. If nothing else but a substitute for a feeling the beholder does not know how to accurately describe in words.

Hiidoran said:

I do believe you just refuted your own point there, Midnight Beat. Any mental response to something would be considered an emotion and therefore pain can, indeed, be an emotion.

Click to expand...

Maybe I typed that incorrectly. What I meant was.....UGH, I don't know how to explain what I meant. You're probably right. >>

Hiidoran said:

I do believe you just refuted your own point there, Midnight Beat. Any mental response to something would be considered an emotion and therefore pain can, indeed, be an emotion.

You see, English is a confusing language.
We often use the same words interchangeably that really shouldn't be so. By definition, pain is a sensory response to a stimulus, heat or a prick to the skin for example. However, we have grown to make the feelings we have inside such as depression, empathy, guilt, and the like synonymous with the sensation we feel after responding to a physical stimulus.

Pain can be an emotion if looked at in the correct manner. If nothing else but a substitute for a feeling the beholder does not know how to accurately describe in words.

Click to expand...

A mental response is not an emotion.
An emotion is a state of mentality that causes such a response.

However, it is also true that one can respond mentally to something and change their emotion, but the response itself is not the emotion being felt.

Ah, but now we are being argumentative and straying from the original query.
The question: Is pain an emotion or physical response.

I simply stated that by modern English standards the two can sometimes be one and the same. However, you must also consider the fact that an emotion can be a response. If you were told that a relative of yours died, you might feel sad. That's a response to a stimulus.

Stimulus: Derogatory remark.
Response: Feeling the emotion of sadness.
(Which could also be described, at least in laymen terms, as pain.)

This process is also completely within the mental realm and no other physical interactions occurred except for verbal speech and I dare say that is valid in this circumstance.

Hiidoran said:

I simply stated that by modern English standards the two can sometimes be one and the same. However, you must also consider the fact that an emotion can be a response. If you were told that a relative of yours died, you might feel sad. That's a response to a stimulus.

Stimulus: Derogatory remark.
Response: Feeling the emotion of sadness.
(Which could also be described, at least in laymen terms, as pain.)

Click to expand...

Stimulus: Derogatory remark.
Response: Feeling the emotion of sadness.

If we want to get really technical, in your example, the response is not "sadness," but "feeling" (since response implies action). Therefore, the response is not the emotion itself, but the change of mentality (and the change of behavior to reflect it). What you are trying to argue is that an emotion is a direct response to stimuli, but that is not the case in your illustration.

Now when you say that sadness is equivalent to pain, I think you are skipping a step. Pain is more of a result of the sadness than the emotion itself. It may or may not be easier to understand this if we replace the word "pain" with "discomfort." Sadness is not discomfort, but rather a type of discomfort. Likewise, discomfort can arise from sadness.

Regarding pain as a physical / mental response, I believe that what Midnight Beat was getting at before was that pain can be both physical and mental, nothing more.

Stimulus: Blow to the back.
Response: Experiencing pain, physically + shift of emotion to anger, etc.
Result: Mental discomfort from emotion.

Pain wouldn't be seen as an emotion in my book, but a response.
Simply because pain has to be triggered, and you could pull out an emotion whenever you feel like it, but pain could be triggered by the emotion called anger, which would make people hit you, which allows the pain to take place.

Pain can never bee emotion...
I mean you can like hide your emotion, something like that but you cant do that with pain...
And pain... its like painful sooo yeah.

Mental anguish is manifested as physical discomfort, therefore I don't think pain can be an emotion. It is the body's response to stress or the like: the body basically goes into the "fight or flight" mode, thanks to your mental state, and is harmed if this lasts for a long time. It can also cause chemical imbalances and other things, which also have the ability to feel bad.

So mental state effects body, body feels sensation of pain depending on what that effect is.

txteclipse said:

Mental anguish is manifested as physical discomfort, therefore I don't think pain can be an emotion. It is the body's response to stress or the like: the body basically goes into the "fight or flight" mode, thanks to your mental state, and is harmed if this lasts for a long time. It can also cause chemical imbalances and other things, which also have the ability to feel bad.

So mental state effects body, body feels sensation of pain depending on what that effect is.

Click to expand...

This thread should be locked, since there is no discussion,just people unanimously agreeing, pain is not an emotion, it is a stimuli/sensation/reaction/etc.

But the bolded part is the clearest definition IMO on this thread about what pain is. Hiidoran was just confusing, not to call him out, but he just complicated things by bringing up literary defintions.

Yes —grammatically— used in the context of psychological hurt.
Properly though, pain is nought but an extension of the touch sense, along with temperature.

Wow, this is quite an immense thread considering it's quite a simple straight forward question.

I'd say that pain is not an emotion, it is a feeling. Because it is a defense mechanism for the body to recognize that something is wrong. That's pretty much all it is. The nerve endings are what makes things receptive. Feeling is a sense, a sense to feel. You also feel hot and cold, these are not emotions, they are actual states of matter.

Emotions are happiness, sadness, angriness, etc. Say for example, you break up with someone and they are upset. You haven't exactly stabbed them in the heart have you? It's an emotional experience, not physical pain.

But judging by the length of this thread and reading responses, strong arguments stand for both. You'd have to find a real doctor person to tell you the exact answer. :)