Ecology of Relational-Embodied-Emotional Systems: A New Eco-Systems Theory of Emotion Beyond Biocultural Determinism and the Technocratic Gaze
Year: 2026
Type: article
Abstract: This work introduces the Ecology of Relational-Embodied-Emotional Systems (EREES), a systemic meta-model reconceptualizing emotions as emergent, self-organizing phenomena arising from dynamic feedback loops within ecological, relational, historical, and intersectional systems. Unlike traditional or reductionist models that treat emotion as biologically or cognitively determined, EREES draws on generalized complexity to explain how self-eco-reorganizing processes embed intergenerational oppression, including legacies of slavery and structural violence, in embodied responses. By critiquing biomedical reductionism and the technocratic gaze, the model frames emotional experience as a systemically organized process constituted through recursive interactions among embodied regulation, relational dynamics, and structured power relations. Analyses of parent-child, romantic, and hierarchical relationships show how emotional processes reproduce or reorganize inequities across interlocking systems. Emotional development and regulation are non-linear, historically mediated processes unfolding within relational ecologies shaped by attachment, hierarchy, and social stratification. By situating emotion within self-eco-reorganizing ecologies influenced by historical continuity and systemic inequality, EREES advances a theoretically integrated, systems-oriented framework for emotional health, well-being, and equity.
Source: Human Arenas
Author: Ezra N. S. Lockhart
Institution: National University
Language: English
Topic: History of Emotions Research
Subfield: History
Field: Arts and Humanities
Domain: Social Sciences
Open Access status: hybrid
Estimated APC paid: $2,390
Funder: Universitas Nasional
OpenAlex ID: W7160141129