The Emotion Wheel: Exploring a Compass for Feelings

Do you know how many emotions a human can experience?

A study by Cowen and Keltner (2017) suggested there are at least 27 distinct emotions, and that does not include combinations of emotions.

With so many emotions, how can we navigate the turbulent waters of feelings without getting lost?

One helpful tool for navigating this complexity is the emotion wheel.

In a world with a vast array of emotions, the emotion wheel makes it easy to narrow it down to the appropriate “primary emotion” and go from there. Read on to learn about how this valuable tool can help your clients identify and manage their emotions.

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What Is the Emotion Wheel? Understanding Plutchik’s Model

First, let’s talk about emotions.

Emotion researchers describe them as “episodes” involving changes in five internal subsystems in response to internal or external stimuli (Scarantino, 2015).

Below is a table from the International Handbook of Emotions in Education showing the relationship between the various factors and subsystems, as well as their presumed functions (Shuman & Scherer, 2014).

Emotions influence our actions through five components.

1. Subjective feeling

This is where we simply experience the feelings. An emotion is felt by monitoring the internal universe and recognizing what is being experienced at that time.

2. Action tendency

Once the emotion is identified, the body prepares for action. Emotions facilitate certain actions rather than others, meaning that while some are normally unconscious, like jerking a hand away from a hot iron, others are within our control.

3. Appraisal

By analyzing the emotion, we can identify the situations, actions, environments, or individuals that are causing it. This helps us to track how these stimuli impact our wellbeing. It is also necessary for informing the next component.

4. Motor activity

This is the communicative function of expressing what we are experiencing through means like facial expressions, hand gestures, body movements, and more.

5. Physiological

This component supports all others and is the chemical reaction that our body experiences. For instance, the rush of blood to the face occurs when we experience anger.

While the components of the emotions we feel are present in all individuals, the intensity and expression of these emotions differ from one person to another. There are also social factors like gender, culture, and race that explain why people may feel emotions differently despite experiencing similar situations.

For example, hearing words like, “I am afraid,” “I feel jittery,” “I don’t want to be here,” or “I just don’t have enough time to prepare for the final” are all different components of a similar emotion (Shuman & Scherer, 2014).

“I am afraid” belongs to the subjective feeling component; it describes the feeling of fear.
“I feel jittery” belongs to the physiological component, referring to the way the body feels.

“I just don’t have enough time to prepare for the final” belongs to the appraisal component, as it includes a cognitive appraisal of the situation and what is causing the emotion.

“I don’t want to be here” fits into the motor activity component, referring to an action that may or may not be carried out in response to the emotion.

Based on his many years of studying emotions, psychologist Robert Plutchik (1991) proposed that there are eight primary emotions that serve as the foundation for all others: joy, sadness, acceptance, disgust, fear, anger, surprise, and anticipation.

The eight primary emotions that he identified are grouped below as polar opposites:

• Joy vs. sadness
• Acceptance vs. disgust
• Fear vs. anger
• Surprise vs. anticipation

The foundation of his emotions theory stems from the following 10 postulates (Changing Minds, 2016):

1. Animals and humans
   The midbrain, or limbic system, of a human is similar to that of other mammals. Animals and humans experience the same basic emotions.
2. Evolutionary history
   Emotions came into being as part of the evolutionary process, long before there were apes or humans.
3. Survival issues
   The most influential role of emotions is to help us survive.
4. Prototype patterns
   These are the common identifiable patterns and elements that make up each emotion.
5. Basic emotions
   The most basic emotions are the primary ones: trust, fear, surprise, sadness, disgust, anger, anticipation, and joy.
   • Combinations
     Adding up these various primary emotions will produce new ones such as love = (joy + trust), guilt = (joy + fear), and delight = (joy + surprise).
   • Hypothetical constructs
     Emotions are constructs, or ideas, that help describe a certain experience.
6. Opposites
   Like many things in nature, there is a duality with emotions; hence, each one has its polar opposite:
   • Sadness is the opposite of joy
   • Trust is the opposite of disgust
   • Fear is the opposite of anger
   • Surprise is the opposite of anticipation
7. Similarity
   The degree of similarity determines which emotions are more closely related and which are complete opposites.
8. Intensity
   This degree of change in intensity, from weak to strong, produces the diverse number of emotions we can feel. The emotions range in intensity as follows:
   • Trust: acceptance to admiration
   • Fear: timidity to terror
   • Surprise: uncertainty to amazement
   • Sadness: gloominess to grief
   • Disgust: dislike to loathing
   • Anger: annoyance to fury
   • Anticipation: interest to vigilance
   • Joy: serenity to ecstasy

Elements of the wheel

Plutchik’s emotion wheel includes several structural elements that can help clients interpret emotional relationships. There are three main aspects to pay attention to.

Colors

The eight emotions are arranged by color, forming a set of similar emotions. Primary emotions are located in the second circle. Emotions with softer colors are a mix of two primary emotions.

Layers

Moving to the center of the circle intensifies the emotion, so the colors intensify as well. For instance, at the center of the wheel, the primary emotions change from:

• Anger to rage
• Anticipation to vigilance
• Joy to ecstasy
• Trust to admiration
• Fear to terror
• Surprise to amazement
• Sadness to grief
• Disgust to loathing

Moving to the outer layers, the colors become less saturated, and the intensity of the emotions lowers.

Relations

The polar opposite emotions are across from each other. The spaces between the emotions demonstrate combinations when primary emotions mix.

This is where we see the emergence of secondary emotions, including love, submission, optimism, aggressiveness, contempt, remorse, disapproval, awe, and submission.

Other Types of Emotion Wheels

Plutchik’s wheel is not the only tool available for understanding and interacting with emotions. There are other emotion wheels that help us understand and detect our emotions, such as the Geneva Emotion Wheel (GEW; Affective Sciences, 2017).

While both wheels focus on emotions and their intensities, the GEW uses a different approach. To start with, there are no primary emotions; rather, there is a set of 20 emotions that are evaluated by two sets of polar parameters (version 2.0 has 20 emotions, while the first model listed 16).

The two parameters are:

• Valence
  Describing a situation on a spectrum from unpleasant to enjoyable
• Control/power
  Concerned with the individual’s control over the situation and its outcomes

Another difference between the two wheels is how the intensity of the emotions is represented. The GEW has reversed its intensity, with the strongest emotions represented by large circles on the outer layers that decrease in size as they approach the center.

One of the biggest differences between these emotional intelligence tools is that the Geneva Emotion Wheel also allows individuals to select options for “no emotions” or “other emotions,” giving respondents more freedom to express themselves but potentially reducing measurement reliability (Sacharin et al., 2012).

Finally, Plutchik’s wheel does not express emotions such as pride and shame, while the GEW does.

Differences aside, both tools provide a great starting point for helping your clients consider and identify their emotions.

How to Use the Feeling Wheel in Psychology

The ability to identify our emotions is a skill related to emotional intelligence (Salovey & Mayer, 1990).

Those high in this skill can communicate more detailed emotional experiences and use a greater emotional vocabulary. Individuals who expand their emotional vocabulary can regulate their emotions more effectively (Kircanski et al., 2012).

The feeling wheel, designed by Gloria Willcox (1982), is a great starting point for those who find it challenging to identify their emotions.

You can use the emotion wheel to help your clients:

• Explore the emotions they are feeling at any given moment of the day
• Do a daily self-reflection where they identify the emotions they experienced throughout the day
• Explore deeper and longer-term emotions that may be affecting them
• Describe their experiences in greater detail

It must be noted that you can experience a diverse range of emotions simultaneously, and the wheel should not be used to avoid emotions or replace “negative” emotions with “positive” ones. Instead, the goal is to identify your emotional experience, accept it as it is, and communicate it if you wish.

The beauty of this tool is in its ability to simplify complex concepts. Understanding a situation is a crucial step in solving any dilemma. When the question concerns our emotions that we process on a subconscious level, it can be hard to first identify and then verbalize our needs.

This is why the tool is so useful. It enables clients to first visualize their emotions and then understand which combinations of emotions led to this outcome.

It’s especially useful in moments of intense feeling and when the mind cannot remain objective, as it operates from an impulsive “fight or flight” response (Watkins, 2014); in these cases, we can use the information the emotion provides to make better decisions about our next steps.

You can explain to your clients that once they identify and understand their emotions, they can empathize with themselves and channel their focus toward the emotions they actually want to feel.

There are two ways to use the wheel: either as a two-dimensional circle or a three-dimensional ellipse. Using it as a two-dimensional circle helps clients discover what primary emotions they are feeling, as well as how emotions combine to create secondary emotions, such as awe, remorse, aggression, and optimism.

When using it as a three-dimensional form, clients can also consider the emotional intensity of the primary and secondary emotions (Vaughan, 2011).

According to Plutchik’s Sequential Model, emotions are activated by specific stimuli, which trigger particular behavioral patterns (Krohn, 2007).

He identified the following survival behaviors that drive our actions and how they can help us achieve our goals (Plutchik, 2003):

• Protection: withdrawal, retreat (activated by fear and terror)
• Destruction: elimination of barriers to the satisfaction of needs (activated by anger and rage)
• Incorporation: ingesting nourishment (activated by acceptance)
• Rejection: riddance response to harmful material (activated by disgust)
• Reproduction: approach, contract, genetic exchanges (activated by joy and pleasure)
• Reintegration: reaction to loss of nutrient product (activated by sadness and grief)
• Exploration: investigating an environment (activated by curiosity and play)
• Orientation: reaction to contact with an unfamiliar object (activated by surprise)

This means that when our emotions are activated, they trigger one of these survival behaviors. Of course, all of this generally happens on a subconscious level — until you build your emotional self-awareness.

A Mood Wheel for Kids

While the emotional intelligence wheels we’ve covered so far can be used with kids, there are several more age-appropriate tools that can help children understand their emotions.

These tools include worksheets like board games, memory journals, and drawing activities that help children express their feelings with parents, teachers, and other caregivers (Mehlomakulu, 2015). You will find a wealth of these tools in our article Is Emotional Intelligence Relevant for Kids?

2 Emotion Wheel Worksheets (PDF)

To tap deeper into the mind and get to the root cause of these internal emotions, there are some handy worksheets that can assist you through the process.

Clear and brief: Emotions

This info sheet and visual provide a snapshot of emotions and describe how they are triggered in the mind. It also outlines how emotions develop through childhood and what it means to be emotionally intelligent.

Seeing emotions

Sometimes it helps to see a visual explanation of a word or concept. If your clients would benefit from seeing common facial expressions for each emotion, this worksheet is a great fit. Use it by having them browse the faces and identify the feelings that match the expressions.

Resources From PositivePsychology.com

If this article piqued your interest in the topic of emotional intelligence, we have you covered. For further reading on the subject, please see the following articles:

The Importance of Emotional Intelligence is an overview of emotional intelligence, why it’s important, and how it can improve your life.

How to Improve Emotional Intelligence Through Training is a guide to increasing your level of emotional intelligence and the methods through which it can improve.

Teaching Emotional Intelligence to Teens and Students is a great resource for parents, educators, mentors, and others working with teens and adults to help them build their emotional intelligence.

How to Improve Emotional Intelligence in the Workplace is a specific look at how to build greater emotional intelligence in the workplace, making it a great choice for managers, supervisors, and leaders.

Additionally, there is a simple, straightforward Feelings Wheel for adults (and kids) from our archives that is an easy tool for people who are brand-new to understanding their emotions.

If you’re looking for more science-based ways to help others develop emotional intelligence, this collection contains 17 validated EI tools for practitioners. Use them to help others understand and use their emotions to their advantage.

A Take-Home Message

This article covered the usefulness and application of Plutchik’s wheel of emotions, as well as other similar tools. For practitioners, the emotion wheel is not just a labeling tool but a gateway to deeper emotional insight.

This piece also uncovered some rules for cultivating a healthy emotional life.

You can share these golden rules with your clients:

• Learn to attend to your emotions.
• Become curious and patient with your emotions.
• Talk about them and show your real emotions to others.
• Learn to accept having different emotions.
• Learn how to change or adjust your emotions.

With the wheel of emotions and these golden rules in hand, life can become more manageable for your clients. Imagine a world where everyone had the language to pinpoint an emotion and understand what they felt. It would help communication in every field.

Do you use the wheel of emotions in your practice or daily life? If so, we would love to hear from you in our comments section below.

We hope you enjoyed reading this article. Don’t forget to download our five positive psychology tools for free.

ED: Updated February 2026