l Part One: Mood board
A mood board is a type of visual presentation or 'collage' consisting of images, text, and samples of objects in a composition. It can be based on a set topic or can be any material chosen at random. A mood board can be used to convey a general idea or feeling about a particular topic. They may be physical or digital, and can be effective presentation tools. Graphic designers, interior designers, industrial designers, photographers, user interface designers and other creative artists use mood boards to visually illustrate the style they wish to pursue.
Amateur and professional designers alike may use them as an aid for more subjective purposes such as how they want to decorate their bedroom, or the vibe they want to convey through their fashion.
Mood boards can also be used by authors to visually explain a certain style of writing, or an imaginary setting for a story line. In short, mood boards are not limited to interior decorating purposes, but serve as a visual tool to quickly inform others of the overall "feel" (or "flow") of an idea. In creative processes, mood boards can balance coordination and creative freedom.
A mood board is a collection of visual materials that evoke a certain style or concept. Designers, illustrators, photographers, filmmakers and all types of creative professionals create mood boards to communicate the "feel" of an idea. They can be a powerful starting point in a creative project—a visual reference for the team and a springboard for new ideas. But mood boards have come a long way since the days of attaching printouts to physical boards or creating static PDFs. Digital mood boards have the ability to include video, bring together a remote team, and evolve over time—unlocking a whole new world of creative possibilities.
l Part Two: Alexithymia
There are really some "people who can't tell their emotions" in this world. They are not indifferent or selfish; they just can't recognize their own feelings and can't express their emotions, whether they are good or bad. They are emotionally "color-blind" and have a hard time really fitting into social groups, even though they are lonely and don't want to be alone. They may enter into a marriage, but there is no love in it and most likely no sex. Their problem is called Alexithymia.
Emotional "color blindness"
Although the Chinese name is "disorder," Alexithymia is not a mental illness as listed in the DSM-5 manual. It is a personality trait. When the concept of affective disorder was first introduced in 1972, it was thought to be a mere inability to express emotions verbally, rather than a failure to feel them. Researchers at the time speculated that this was because the connection between the two hemispheres of the brain was broken, resulting in a loss of contact between the area dominated by speech and the area dominated by emotion.
When the concept of narrative affective disorder was first introduced in 1972, it was also thought to be a mere inability to express emotions verbally, rather than a failure to feel them. Researchers at the time speculated that this was because the connection between the two hemispheres of the brain was broken, resulting in a loss of connection between the area dominated by speech and the area dominated by emotion.
Later, the researchers realized that there was nothing wrong with their body's ability to perceive, to receive signals from the outside world, to generate feelings, and possibly to trigger emotions (emotion), but their brain mechanisms could not be aware of the presence of these emotions, much less process and think about them, and could not generate further feelings (feeling) about them. These emotions cannot enter their brains.
As the name suggests, the most typical manifestation of people with narrative affective disorder is the inability to perceive and express their own or others' emotions. On the one hand, they cannot understand contexts and events that are rich in emotions, cannot recognize different emotions, have difficulty interpreting emotions from other people's expressions, and cannot understand the triggers of various emotions; on the other hand, they cannot express emotions, and when communicating with people, they have a single expression and speak in a very flat tone. People with narrative affective disorder are often perceived as deliberately distancing themselves from people, which is not the case; they do not really not want to feel and express, but they do not have the ability to do so.
Due to the absence of emotions, they basically focus only on factual information about the external world, have a lack of imagination and are very realistic; and are usually very good at logical thinking, they think in rational terms.
The flip side of the absence of emotions is that they can be highly sensitive in terms of their physical senses, experiencing sensations that are magnified compared to the norm; due to this hypersensitivity, many have chronic, long-lasting physical pain.
Caleb is a person with narrative disorder. In the preparation of a theater performance, because he did not tune the sound effects for a long time, the leader finally could not control his emotions and began to scold him. Faced with the leader's criticism, he had a violent physiological reaction, feeling tense all over and his heart beating wildly. But strangely, his mind could not focus on the matter at hand, nor could he experience an emotional reaction.
"It was as if nothing could pierce that calm." Even when faced with things that would make a normal person feel scared like a doctor's appointment, an injection, an operation, etc., he does not experience nervousness, fear, or anxiety, despite the fact that his body is in great pain. "But it's not a good thing that it's not just these bad emotions that disappear, there are also happy, pleasant, surprises."
In the population, there is about a 10 percent prevalence of narrative disorders, with men more likely to have them than women. Narrative disorders are associated with many psychiatric disorders; for example, about 50 percent of people with autism have narrative disorders. In addition, schizophrenia, depression, somatoform disorders, post-traumatic stress disorder, and others may also produce affective disorders, and in some cases, affective disorders may even be a sign that people have these mental illnesses.
l Part Three: References
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Frye-Cox, N. E., & Hesse, C. R. (2013). Alexithymia and marital quality: The mediating roles of loneliness and intimate communication. Journal of Family Psychology, 27(2), 203-211.
Humphreys, T. P., Wood, L. M., & Parker, J. D. (2009). Alexithymia and satisfaction in intimate relationships. Personality and Individual Differences, 46(1), 43-47.
Karukivi, M. (2014). Development of alexithymic personality features. World Journal of Psychiatry, 4(4), 91.
Kerr, L. K. (2012). Alexithymia, Emotional Neglect & Capitalism: How are they related? Retrieved January 28, 2016.
Samur, D. et. al. (2013). Four decades on research on alexithymia. Moving towards clinical implications. Frontiers in Psychology, 19.
Serani, D. (2014, April 3). The Emotional Blindness of Alexithymia. Scientific American.
Schwartz, A. (2011, December 11). The Loneliness of Alexithymia. Mental Help.
Taylor G. J., Bagby, M. R., Parker, J. D. A. (1999). Disorders of Affect Regulation: Alexithymia in Medical and Psychiatric Illness. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.