Interested in Threats: Exploring How Emotional Interest Shapes Security Studies Scholarship

Abstract

Security studies scholars are, by definition, interested in threats. But how does interest shape their knowledge production? We draw on contemporary psychological literature to theorize interest as an emotion and use abductive logic combined with illustrative examples to show how such theorization relates to knowledge-generating dynamics in security studies scholarship. Emotional interest explains how real-world affairs (fail to) become subjects of scholarly inquiry, why scholars persist in studying specific subjects despite the changes in real-world affairs and how that study changes them, and how prior scholarly interests influence subsequent development of other interests. Our findings address a theoretical gap in the existing security studies scholarship and present opportunities for enhancing personal and collective research and teaching practices.

Resumen

Los académicos del campo de los estudios de seguridad tienen, por definición, interés en estudiar las amenazas. ¿Pero cómo influye este interés sobre su producción de conocimiento? Partimos de la literatura contemporánea sobre psicología con el fin de teorizar el interés como una emoción. También utilizamos la lógica abductiva combinada con ejemplos ilustrativos con el fin de mostrar cómo dicha teorización se relaciona con la dinámica generadora de conocimiento en el campo académico de los estudios de seguridad. El interés emocional explica: cómo los asuntos del mundo real (no logran) convertirse en sujetos de investigación académica, por qué los académicos persisten en estudiar temas específicos a pesar de los cambios en los asuntos del mundo real y cómo ese estudio los cambia, y cómo los intereses académicos previos influyen sobre el desarrollo posterior de otros intereses. Nuestras conclusiones abordan un vacío teórico en la literatura académica existente en el campo de los estudios de seguridad y presentan oportunidades para mejorar la investigación, tanto personal como colectiva, y las prácticas docentes.

Résumé

Par définition, les chercheurs en études de sécurité s'intéressent aux menaces. Mais comment cet intérêt façonne-t-il leur production de connaissances ? Nous nous fondons sur la littérature psychologique contemporaine pour théoriser l'intérêt telle une émotion et employons l'abduction combinée à des exemples d'illustration pour montrer le lien entre cette théorisation et les dynamiques de production de connaissances dans la recherche en études de sécurité. L'intérêt empirique explique pourquoi les affaires du monde réel deviennent des sujets d’étude académique (ou pas), pourquoi les chercheurs continuent d’étudier certains sujets malgré les modifications du monde réel et comment cette étude les modifie eux, et enfin, comment des intérêts académiques antérieurs influencent le développement ultérieur d'autres intérêts. Nos conclusions viennent combler une lacune théorique dans la recherche existante en études de sécurité tout en offrant des possibilités de renforcement des recherches et pratiques d'enseignement personnelles et collectives.

Introduction

Security studies scholars often note that interest permeates their research practices but seldom explore interest's psychological logic (Walt 1991; Kraus and Williams 1996; Barkawi and Laffey 2006; Newman 2010; Wibben 2011). Instead, they treat interest as a synonym for attention. However, contemporary psychology reveals that interest is a complex phenomenon, manifesting either as a brief emotional state or a long-term emotional trait (Silvia 2006). Since emotions shape cognitive processes such as thinking and reasoning (Frijda, Manstead, and Bem 2000; Damasio 2005; Lerner et al. 2015), the relationship between interest and knowledge production dynamics in security studies deserves scrutiny.

To explore this issue systematically, we combine insights from psychological literature with illustrative examples. Psychological research serves to identify interest's emotional characteristics, trace their presence in published works, explain the dynamics of security studies scholarship, and propose practical recommendations. Illustrative examples include primarily excerpts from the work of Colin Gray, though experiences and observations of other scholars are also discussed. Gray's work, with its remarkable depth and scope, alongside the openness of Gray, his family, colleagues, and students about his personal experiences, provides a suitable starting point for illustrating how the symptoms of emotional interest can be identified and how different forms of interest interact to shape knowledge production in security studies. In constructing the argument, we rely on the abductive logic of reasoning (Halas 2015), proposing emotional interest as a feasible and useful explanation for observed research instances.

While interest as an emotion likely matters to all academic fields, its relation to security studies deserves special attention. Interest belongs among “epistemic emotions” that are particularly relevant to education and research (Muis, Chevrier, and Singh 2018; McPhetres 2019).¹ However, as others have pointed out, security studies is not a typical academic field (Waever 2015). It is a broad interdisciplinary field dedicated to the study of threats, especially, but not exclusively, those associated with war (Walt 1991, 212–3). This makes the field closely related to the policy world and responsive to real-world affairs (Buzan and Hansen 2009, 46). Given the field's peculiarities, we expect the role of interest in security studies to be complex, and thus worthy of exploration. Moreover, since security studies scholars are those primarily responsible for making sense of the deteriorating security around the world, the role of interest in the construction of their expertise warrants serious investigation (Libiseller 2024).

Our article contributes to the literature on how emotions influence knowledge production processes more broadly. Security studies have a history of reflecting on the many factors influencing its development, including emotions (Cohn 1987; Prins 1998; Buzan and Hansen 2009; Zilincik 2022; Cristiano 2023; O'Sullivan and Krulišová 2023). The influence of emotions on knowledge production has also recently been explored in international relations, peace and conflict studies, migration studies, sociology, philosophy, history, and even mathematics (see respectively, Rüsen 2008; Parker and Hackett 2014; Eligio 2017; Hedström 2019; Ballard 2021; Genova and Zontini 2023; Gustafsson and Hagström 2024).

Our work differs from the existing literature in terms of its focus and methodology. While previous research has prioritized what psychologists consider to be negative emotions (Jauhola 2015; Parashar 2015; Sauer 2015; Mälksoo 2018; Eberle and Daniel 2022), we focus on a positive emotion (Silvia 2006). This shift draws attention to the epistemological relevance of positive emotions, especially their detrimental influence on individual and collective knowledge production. For example, emotional interest may constitute a complementary explanation for “ignorance” and “silencing” usually ascribed to systemic forces and the field's composition (Rappert 2015; Jamar and Chappuis 2016; Howell and Richter-Montpetit 2019; Behera, Hinds, and Tickner 2021; Brenner and Han 2021; Paul, Vanderslott, and Gross 2022).

Methodologically, we draw on the so-called appraisal theories of emotion (Moors 2013) rather than on psychological constructivism or philosophical/sociological theories popularized by previous security studies scholarship (Sylvester 2011; Zalewski 2015; Buitrago 2019; Brown 2020; Tinti 2024). Appraisal theories posit that distinct emotions emerge, and are composed of, particular patterns of cognitive interpretation (Moors 2013). While comprehensive understanding of other people's emotional experiences is always challenging (Koschut et al. 2017; Van Rythoven and Sucharov 2019), appraisal theories enable systematic investigation of at least some aspects of that experience (Markwica 2018; Zilincik 2024). In our case, these theories enable abductive tracing of interest's cognitive appraisals and motivational features in published work, and using these emotional aspects to explain instances of security studies scholarship. Additionally, these theories can explain how personal feelings interact with real-world affairs, which is overlooked in sociological reflections of security studies scholarship (Waever 2010).

Our argument is also relevant to scholars advocating the use of autoethnographic inquiries in security studies (Brigg and Bleiker 2010; Dauphinee 2010; Doty 2010; Löwenheim 2010; Solomon 2023; Taylor 2024). These scholars draw on their experience, including emotions, to explain how personal and social factors interact to forge scholarly identities (Löwenheim 2010; Solomon 2023; Taylor 2024), and even how to make research more interesting to the others (Doty 2010). Our exploration of interest through the lens of emotional psychology enables distinguishing different forms of interest, differentiating interest from other emotions, and studying the interaction of interests and other emotions in shaping the character of security studies scholarship. Moreover, by breaking down emotional interest into its constituent cognitive appraisals, our research offers comprehensive guidelines on how to make one's own scholarly writing more interesting to the audience. Additionally, our research addresses previous skepticism toward establishing “predetermined criteria”…or “a priori standard of reference” for the conduct of autoethnographic research (Brigg and Bleiker 2010, 792). Psychology has now reached the stage where its concepts can serve as a basis for standardized exploration of emotions, and to meaningfully generalize beyond one's subjective experience. Research rooted in established psychological concepts may, in turn, become more interesting to mainstream scholars with positivist leanings.

Considering interest from an emotional perspective also has a practical value. It highlights how emotionally driven and biased our research practices can be, prompting us to be more reflective about the “affective” (Brennan 2004; Austin 2019) underpinnings of our knowledge production. This perspective also opens up new avenues for making the most of interest's influence. If interest is inherently emotional, then security studies scholars can regulate it, just like any other affective phenomena (Gross 2015). Recognizing interest as an emotion is then an opportunity to improve our individual and collective research and teaching practices.

In the next section, we review psychological literature to derive key characteristics of emotional interest. Subsequently, we briefly engage with the work of Colin Gray to illustrate manifestations of different forms of emotional interest. Using Gray's case as a starting point, we then explore dynamics between different forms of emotional interest and knowledge production in security studies. In the penultimate section, we discuss practical implications of treating interest as an emotion for research and teaching in security studies. In the conclusion, we summarize our argument and propose avenues for further research.

Interest as an Emotion

Psychological literature indicates that interest can be considered an emotion, characterized by distinct facial expressions, physiological changes, feelings, cognitive aspects, and behavioral motivations (Izard 2007, 261–4). Interest belongs to a narrow group of “epistemic emotions,” along with surprise, curiosity, confusion, wonder, and awe (Noordewier and Gocłowska 2024). These “knowledge” emotions generally increase “people's willingness to explore and update existing information” (Noordewier and Gocłowska 2024, 1). Emotional interest can take the form of mild curiosity, sporadic situational interest, deeper individual interest, and even passion and obsession (O'Keefe and Harackiewicz 2017, x–xi). The most important distinction exists between short-term situational interest and long-term individual interest, or simply between interest (short-term) and interests (long-term) (see respectively, Hidi and Renninger 2006; Silvia 2006).² In line with the literature, we understand situational interest as a brief, mainly externally stimulated emotional state, while individual interest is a long-term and largely internally stimulated emotional trait or sentiment (Hidi and Renninger 2006; Silvia 2006).³ Although most interests begin as situational, some may turn into individual ones, contingent on finding the subject meaningful and enjoyable to explore (Hidi and Renninger 2006; Silvia 2006; Ainley and Hidi 2014).

As with all emotions, interest emerges through our interpretation of situations rather than from simple sensory interactions with external stimuli (Silvia 2006; Moors 2013). The relevant literature indicates that a combination of four appraisals, or interpretations of the world, is necessary for interest to emerge. The first, shared with all emotions, is the stimuli's relevance to one's concerns (Scherer 2013). Simply put, we must care about the subject to find it interesting (O'Keefe, Horberg, and Plante 2017, 64). The other three appraisals, identified by Paul Silvia (2008a), are peculiar to interest and include novelty, complexity, and comprehensibility.⁴ In order to stimulate interest, the object has to be interpreted as somewhat new, reasonably sophisticated, and easily understandable (Silvia 2008a, 58).

Previous research suggests interest affects cognition by coloring judgment and directing attention. First, all emotions propagate and possibly intensify cognitive appraisals that give rise to them (Frijda 1988; DeSteno et al. 2000, 354–5; Kuppens and Tong 2010; Lerner et al. 2015, 806–7). Based on the research reviewed in the paragraph above, interested people should see the stimuli as relevant, novel, complex, and comprehensible.⁵ Interest, just like other emotions, then becomes an emotional filter through which people judge their subsequent interactions with stimuli (Keltner, Oatley, and Jenkins 2014, 237). Second, all emotions deploy attention (Lundqvist and Ohman 2005). In most cases, interest narrows down attention to the subject people find interesting (Ainley 2006, 402; Gable and Harmon-Jones 2008; Sung and Yih 2016; O'Keefe, Horberg, and Plante 2017, 53–4; Valerand 2017). However, it can also broaden attention when the interested people encounter an issue they are unsure how to tackle (O'Keefe, Horberg, and Plante 2017, 54).

Behaviorally, interest motivates learning and exploration by making the process feel good (Noordewier and Gocłowska 2024, 11). Interest motivates people to learn more about the subject “for its own sake,” not necessarily for a broader instrumental purpose (Silvia 2008a, 57). Interest can be “self-propelling,” motivating people to gain new knowledge that, in turn, enables broader understanding and allows for more things to become interesting (Silvia 2008a, 59). The motivation for learning and exploration is generally evolutionary adaptive; allowing people to improve their understanding of environments (Silvia 2017, 98–9). However, interest's propensity for engagement with one subject may cause people to feel bored by other subjects, and thus avoid the latter (Shin and Grant 2019). Overall, the knowledge generated in the pursuit of individual interests shapes subsequent understanding of the world, influencing people's interaction with other subjects and their development of further interests (Rotgans and Schmidt 2017).

Finally, interests are not fixed but malleable ( Thoman, Sanson, and Geerling 2017, 29) and can be purposefully regulated, like all the other emotions (Gross 2015). People can regulate emotions by altering their real-world situations but also by directing their attention to specific aspects of the situation or changing the meaning they derive from a particular situation (Gross 2015). The reviewed research thus suggests people have a considerable and continual influence on what and how they find interesting.

Tracing Emotional Interest

To illustrate how emotional interest manifests in security studies scholarship, this section turns to the work of Colin Gray. Gray wrote on a variety of subjects, many of which can be conceived as either situational or individual emotional interests.⁶ We propose that Gray's situational interest in nuclear power turned into an individual one, while his interest in cyber power remained situational.

Gray's publications suggest he developed situational interest in nuclear weapons at the latest in the early 1970s (Gray 1971). At this time, external stimuli capable of inspiring situational interest abounded: nuclear weapons dominated academic debates, they figured prominently in the ongoing US–Soviet tensions, and the associated technology kept evolving (Freedman and Michaels 2019, 452–4). Gray's writings from this period betray interest's cognitive appraisals. In 1973, Gray (1973a, 38) proclaimed “the problems relating to nuclear weapons are too important to be regarded as matters closed to further enquiry,” thus highlighting the subject's relevance. He appraised the then-contemporary nuclear challenges as sufficiently new to deserve further exploration (Gray 1973a, 38) and focused on new nuclear weaponry (Gray 1975). Gray criticized previous strategic theories for being too simplistic to explain the issues of nuclear strategy, implying the latter is complex (Gray 1973a). Gray saw himself as sufficiently knowledgeable to engage with the subject; even his early writings include comprehensive assessments of the existing scholarship (Gray 1973b).

Reflecting interest's motivation for long-term and focused study, Gray continued to write on nuclear strategy until his passing in 2020 (Gray 2020). This sustained engagement despite ongoing real-world changes indicates development of individual interest. In 1999, amid a shift in security studies toward other topics, Gray published his The Second Nuclear Age book, admitting to a “lengthy obsession” with nuclear strategy Gray (1999a, ii). He emphasized the relevance of nuclear strategy to contemporary issues, describing nuclear weapons “as a source of major menace” neglected by the Western defense community (Gray 1999a, i, 1). Gray kept appraising the nuclear challenges of this time as somewhat new, particularly due to shifts in the international security environment (Gray 1999a, 1, 6, 22). In fact, he confidently aimed at taking “a fresh look at the somewhat overstudied subject of nuclear proliferation” (Gray 1999a, 4) and argued the second nuclear age may be more complex than the first, given the variability of possible nuclear confrontations, actors, and geographies (Gray 1999a, 10). He felt qualified to engage with the subject based on the experience from the first nuclear era, existing scholarship, and his personal experience as a professional advisor on nuclear matters (Gray 1999a, 2).⁷

Gray's individual interest in nuclear strategy led him to explore other subjects, some of which turned into new individual interests. For example, he wrote extensively on issues such as strategic history, general strategic theory, geopolitics, and sea power.⁸ In contrast, he only engaged other subjects sporadically, suggesting these interests remained situational. A key example of Gray's situational interest that never evolved into individual interest was cyber power. Gray only engaged with this subject in response to external stimuli, first addressing it in his 1999 book Modern Strategy during discussions about the Revolution in Military Affairs (Gray 1999). He revisited cyber power in 2013, coinciding with heightened academic interest in the subject (Gray 2013b).⁹ His other engagements with cyber power were sporadic and brief, despite the subject's growing prominence.¹⁰ Gray did not publish a substantial work on cyber power after 2013, and his 2015 book on the Future of Strategy contained only a handful of skeptical remarks about the hype surrounding the subject (Gray 1015).

Gray's contrasting cognitive appraisals further illustrate his situational interest in cyber power. Gray understood digital technology's importance regarding information and communication and as an “enabler of joint military operations” (Gray 1999b, 13, 249; Gray 2013b, x). However, he downplayed the cyber power's relevance by observing that “cyber power is only information” and that “there is a great deal more to conflict and actual warfare than information…” (Gray 2013b, x). While he appraised some aspects, such as tactics and technology, as new (Gray 2013b, 16), he also questioned the novelty of cyber power as such, pointing out that information interactions always mattered to political conflicts (Gray 2013b, 19–20). Gray (2013b, 31, 38–9) also appraised cyber power, especially its infrastructure, as somewhat complex, yet he argued cyber power is simple when viewed through the prism of information rather than through digital technology (Gray 2013b, 19, 20). Gray felt confident in understanding cyber power through the lens of general strategic theory and his familiarity with the relevant scholarship (Gray 2013b, ix, 2, 4). These conflicting appraisals suggest Gray did not find cyber power meaningful enough for prolonged exploration, viewing it as “interesting but overblown…” (Gray 1999b, 229).

Of course, this brief overview does not prove that interest explains all of Gray's scholarship. Gray's situational and individual interests undoubtedly varied in intensity and other emotions likely played an important role in igniting and sustaining his research efforts. For example, Gray frequently disagreed with his colleagues (Gray 1999b, xii), meaning he probably felt frustrated with some ideas. Still, given the traceable symptoms of interest's influence in Gray's published work, and the absence of evidence for Gray's overall disinterest in security affairs, his case is a good starting point for assessing what dynamics in security studies scholarship interest explains.

What Can Emotional Interest Explain?

Gray's case suggests that emotional interest can explain at least three dynamics relevant to knowledge production in security studies. First, situational interest forms a mechanism through which real-world affairs (fail to) become the objects of security studies inquiry. Real-world affairs have the capacity to inspire situational interest by becoming more relevant, novel, complex, and comprehensible to a particular scholar. As reviewed, Gray's initial interests in nuclear and cyber power were stimulated externally; by political, technological, and academic trends that conveyed relevance, novelty, and complexity linked to Gray's concerns. In contrast, subjects that did not possess these qualities vis-a-vis Gray's concerns did not inspire his interest. More broadly, this observation aligns with previous findings that found strong correlation between a subject's real-world relevance and the amount of scholarly attention it receives (Aris 2021, 476). Treating interest as a primarily externally stimulated and brief emotional state composed of a mixture of appraisals explains how exactly real-world affairs become interesting, and how specific appraisals relate to the quality of knowledge produced in security studies.

Per this understanding, situational interest has an ambivalent impact on knowledge production in security studies. Since it relates to ongoing changes in real-world affairs, situational interest can be beneficial by deploying scholarly attention to issues of individual or collective concerns, helping the field maintain its policy relevance. For example, the Russian–Ukraine war became more interesting to the Western security studies community after 2022 because it became more relevant to NATO's security and more complex than it was before. The subsequent torrent of security studies scholarship on the subject has been policy-relevant precisely because it was mediated by an interest in a politically urgent subject (Gady and Kofman 2023; Lupovici 2023; Porter 2023).

Situational interest serves to refresh security studies scholarship. Since changes in real-world affairs can inspire situational interest simply by becoming new, the latter can bring unexplored subjects of inquiry into the orbit of security studies inquiry. For example, translations can make original works more accessible, thus revealing their relevance, novelty, and complexity to non-native speakers. Hew Strachan has pointed out that translation of Carl von Clausewitz's (1976) On War made the Prussian's work more interesting to the Western security studies scholars, and revitalized their scholarship (Strachan 2022). Translations of the Frankfurt School's texts have inspired situational interest and shaped scholarship among some critical security studies scholars (Wyn Jones 1999). Furthermore, advances in other fields can inspire situational interest, motivating the conduct of interdisciplinary research, and enriching security studies scholarship (Lebow 1988). For example, the 1960s deterrence scholarship benefited greatly from situational interest inspired by the advances in cognitive psychology (Stein 2017).

However, situational interest can disrupt security studies scholarship, notably by polluting it with popular but poor ideas. Because of its close relationship to real-world affairs, the field is particularly vulnerable to ideational “fashions” that can undermine its conceptual foundations (Libiseller and Michaels 2023, 757). Ideas often become fashionable merely by receiving a new label. Buzzwords, such as “hybrid warfare,” are prime examples here (Libiseller 2023). A new term attached to an old phenomenon is often all it takes to make the subject at hand seem more relevant, novel, complex, and understandable, thus rendering it more situationally interesting to a wide audience (Bensaude Vincent 2014). While such buzzwords can mobilize collective efforts, they are often tied to low-quality concepts that disrupt rather than enhance our understanding of contemporary security challenges (Bensaude Vincent 2014; Wicker 2023). Therefore, while inevitable and often practically beneficial, academic trends that originate in fashionable situational interests endanger the conceptual rigor of security studies scholarship.

Situational interest also contributes to asymmetry in produced knowledge. Previous research has found that security studies scholars study wars in certain geographic locations more than in others (Brenner and Han 2021; Phillips and Green 2022) and that they focus on recent wars rather than those in the more distant past (Halle 1977, 216–7; Kalyvas 2001; Duyvesteyn 2004; Heuser 2020, 118). These asymmetries are reinforced by funding initiatives prioritizing subjects perceived as politically significant at the expense of others (Bright and Gledhill 2018, 142; Michaels and Ford 2023). This uneven distribution of scholarly attention aligns with the characteristics of situational interest. The asymmetry results from the interaction between the “objective” qualities of real-world affairs (their relevance, novelty, complexity, and comprehensibility), and scholar's culturally-shaped concerns. The more culturally homogenous the field, the more situational interest drives focus toward what mainstream scholars find relevant, novel, complex, and comprehensible. Unsurprisingly, the dominant Western-centric security studies scholarship (Hendl et al. 2024) does not find all wars equally interesting. From this perspective, wars do not only vary in their actual relevance, novelty, complexity, and comprehensibility, but these qualities also get mediated through the Western scholars’ geographic, temporal, and funding priorities. This unequal distribution of attention inevitably generates gaps in knowledge about temporarily distant events or underrepresented regions. The problem is this missing knowledge could help us better understand contemporary security affairs (Bilgin 2017).

Second, individual interest explains why scholars persist in studying a subject despite the changing real-world affairs, and how this sustained engagement influences their perspective toward the subject. The reviewed emotion research suggests individual interest motivates prolonged engagement by narrowing attention, perpetuating the appraisals of relevance, novelty, complexity, and comprehensibility, and by making the exploration feel good. Gray's long-term study of nuclear power exemplifies this tendency: he focused much of his attention on this particular subject and continually viewed nuclear issues as relevant, new, complex, and comprehensible, regardless of prevailing political, technological, or academic trends. Approached through an emotional lens, individual interest seems to make security studies scholars see their subject of inquiry as more relevant, novel, and complex than other scholars might, and possibly than the subject actually is. These appraisals have profound consequences on the character of security studies scholarship.

On one hand, individual interest seems beneficial, even essential, for security studies scholarship. High-quality knowledge requires prolonged and focused engagement with the subject, which individual interest facilitates through its cognitive and motivational characteristics. In this way, individual interest brings some continuity to security studies research, ensuring that the field does not only respond to real-world affairs but maintains an independent research agenda. Laura Sjoberg's work is a good example here, illustrating how the field can benefit from a long-term study of the gendered aspects of warfare despite the majority of scholars paying little attention to the subject (Sjorberg 2006, 2013; Sjoberg and Thies 2023). Similarly, Kaushik Roy's prolonged study of South Asian, especially Indian, warfare has changed the field for the better, not only by generating new knowledge but also by challenging common assumptions (Roy 2012; Roy 2022). Scholars sharing similar individual interests can also be motivated to collaborate because their appraisals of the subject align. Such collaboration is often essential in tackling research problems beyond the capacity of one individual. For example, Isabelle Duyvesteyn and Beatrice Heuser (2025) have recently managed to edit two enormous volumes of the Cambridge History of Strategy, and to overcome all the hurdles along the way, partly because they are both deeply interested in thinking about strategy from a historical perspective.

However, individual interest can also be detrimental to our knowledge production practices. Individually interested scholars may continue researching a subject they appraise as relevant and new, even when little new and relevant knowledge remains to be uncovered. This has led to critiques that much of Gray's work merely reiterates previous ideas with little innovation (Mahnken and Potter 2020, 22). Individual interest can lead scholars to waste their efforts by generating knowledge with diminishing returns. Similarly, while appreciating a subject's complexity is usually beneficial, overly sophisticated writing may be incomprehensible to those less interested in the subject. Some of Gray's work could be seen as difficult to grasp, as he developed countless “dimensions” and “dicta” to capture all aspects of strategy (see respectively Gray 1999b and 2013a).¹¹

In this way, individual interest hinders scholarly communication. Producing research that other colleagues deem less relevant, novel, comprehensible, or more banal makes it difficult to publish one's work since the process involves evaluation of one's work by the scholar's peers. Individual interest imposes “curse of knowledge” on the affected scholars, making them blind to the fact that other people do not possess equal knowledge, and thus impede their ability to communicate effectively (Pinker 2014, Chapter 3). This communication problem might be most pronounced when conducting interdisciplinary research because the latter requires effective translation of knowledge across wholly different areas. For example, when we tried to publish this article in a different journal, one reviewer pointed out we failed to make the article interesting by effectively communicating its relevance. This oversight can be attributed to at least one of us having strong individual interest in emotions and assuming the subject is appraised as equally relevant by all our colleagues.

Even within security studies, individual interests can lead to conceptual conflicts. Scholars, driven by their individual interests, assign varying degrees of relevance to different research subjects. The concepts they develop then reflect this variance in appraised relevance. For example, those individually interested in traditional military power advocate for a narrow concept of war and for the preservation of war/peace dichotomy because they see violence as more relevant than all the other instruments of power (Stoker and Whiteside 2020). In contrast, scholars individually interested in digital interactions or economic statecraft tend to expand the concepts of violence/war or come up with new terms that challenge the war/peace dichotomy to highlight the relevance of their research areas (see respectively Kello 2017; Galeotti 2019; Shadlow 2020; Egloff and Shires 2023). At least some persisting conceptual disagreements in security studies then result from assuming that one's appraisals of relevance are universally shared (Milevski 2022, 68).

Third, previous individual interests explain scholar's subsequent engagement with other subjects, including their development of new interests. Per the reviewed psychological research, individual interest motivates prolonged exploration and learning, and the knowledge acquired in this way informs the scholars understanding of other issues, including their appraisals of relevance, novelty, complexity, and comprehensibility. As discussed, Gray's study of nuclear strategy, general strategic theory, and strategic history informed his skepticism of cyber power. Emotional perspective then suggests that previous interests shape, though not determine, our subsequent interests.

Like in previous cases, this mechanism is ambivalent with regard to the quality of knowledge produced in security studies. On one hand, previous interests can enrich security studies scholarship by expanding the pool of subjects that any particular scholar might find situationally and potentially individually interesting. By making other subjects seem more relevant and comprehensible, emotional interest broadens scholarly perspective and enables studying security in a more comprehensive manner. For example, in his biographical chapter, Paul van Riper (2006) described how his interest in military history gradually broadened his ability to find other aspects of history interesting. As he put it, “curiosity and an insatiable appetite caused me to expand my horizon even further in attempts to better understand the Greek and Roman civilizations, and then their art and architecture” (Riper 2006, 41). While van Riper ultimately considered this expansion to be a distraction from his focused study, the underlying mechanism can be understood as generally beneficial to knowledge production in security studies.

Somewhat ironically, previous interests may benefit security studies scholarship by inhibiting the development of interests rooted in flawed understanding of reality. Previous interests allow scholars to contextualize real-world affairs and thus not to be immediately swayed into long-term study of a phenomenon merely because of its novelty or career relevance. For example, scholars who are individually interested in general strategic theory and in broad military history tend to find contemporary wars less novel because they are aware of how diverse warfare can be while still maintaining strong similarities across ages (Strachan 2012). In contrast, scholars without such individual interests do not see much continuity in warfare and are thus likely to see more novelty in whatever form warfare takes today (Kaldor 2013). Since the empirical data favor the conservative position (Kalyvas 2001; Schuurman 2010), this case illustrates how previous interest can shield at least part of the field from adopting an inadequate view of contemporary security affairs.

However, and relatedly, the same mechanism can make scholars neglect subjects worth exploring. Since knowledge acquired through previous interests shapes scholars’ appraisals of other issues, former interests can effectively limit what one finds situationally and especially individually interesting. This limitation can manifest on both individual and collective levels. For example, John Mearsheimer's comments on the war in Ukraine illustrate that one's previous individual interest in a theory that treats states as rational and unitary actors may render them unable to see the complexity of real-world situations (Jacobson 2023). Similarly, individual interest explains Christian Nikolaus Braun’s (2024, 7) account of how reviewers dismissed his article because they were so entrenched in their established views of just war theory that they failed to become interested in a novel perspective on the subject. One of us has long struggled to become individually interested in modern military technologies because, through his previous interest in military history, he learned that technology's impact on strategy tends to be less relevant than commonly assumed.

Collectively, previous interests can create and perpetuate academic cultures that inhibit development of certain interests. Ken Booth (1994, 7–8) notes that it was difficult for an early career scholar in the 1960s to become individually interested in subjects unrelated to nuclear strategy in a narrow sense, presumably because most of the senior academics, who wielded the promotion power, were interested in nuclear power. Temel (2024) has found that IR scholars in Japan are generally not interested in ontological security studies, which contrasts with increasing attention the subject receives in the West. This lack of interest can be at least partly explained by previous interests of mainstream Japanese academics because, as Temel (2024, 16) notes, these scholars have mainly relied on traditional IR theories, which have made them suspicious of novel approaches. Likewise, Aris's (2021) observation that IR scholars tend to view area studies research as less relevant than IR theories can be explained by the previous theoretical interests of mainstream IR scholars.

So What? Implications for Security Studies Scholarship

The exploration above provides a basis for several ways in which security studies scholarship can be improved. First, scholars should recognize interest's emotional complexity. They need to realize that interest's emotional influence is neither inherently good nor bad but ambivalent and context-dependent. Being aware of the complexity of interest's influence allows scholars to reflect upon, and regulate their interests to produce better scholarship, both individually and on a collective level.

Second, scholars can improve their scholarship by regulating their situational interests, notably by reinterpreting real-world affairs (Gross 2015). Scholars do not have to passively respond to whatever happens but can alter each of interest's appraisals and shape the subsequent emotional experience. Whenever one encounters a fashionable idea, they should carefully examine whether the latter's appraised relevance and novelty are warranted. If the scholar realizes their appraisals are overblown, their motivation to jump on the fashionable bandwagon will decrease. Elkus (2015), for example, did not get on board with the so-called “Gray Zone” fashion because he found the label strategically irrelevant and the phenomenon old rather than new. By deliberately toning down their interest in fashionable ideas, scholars decrease the chance of endangering the field's conceptual landscape.

Conversely, scholars may actively seek to increase their situational interest in neglected real-world affairs. Penttinen (2017) has suggested that scholars can cultivate curiosity by paying attention to overlooked aspects of reality. We propose going one step further and searching for something relevant, new, and complex in the otherwise uninteresting subject, and learning the basics in order to find the subject comprehensible. For example, if the Western security studies scholars want to become interested in the current war in Sudan, they may have to tie the war to their security concerns or they may need to learn more about the region to understand the character of the war better. Interacting with those who are already interested in the subject may help with altering one's appraisals. Freedman (2024) has recounted how a short talk with an African charity worker inspired his situational interest in the wars in Sudan and Ethiopia simply by highlighting those wars’ relevance and complexity. This kind of situational interest expansion allows scholars to enrich their individual perspectives and contribute to the collective reduction of the field's biases.

Third and relatedly, academics can proactively seek to make a less popular subject more interesting to others by highlighting its relevance, novelty, and complexity, and by making it more comprehensible to others. To be sure, many scholars have already done so, even without explicit reliance on psychological science. For example, Barkawi (2016) and other decolonization scholars, have highlighted the relevance of non-Western experience and theorization of war, making the subject more interesting to the mainstream security studies scholarship. Similarly, the Copenhagen school scholars made non-traditional security threats interesting by highlighting the latter's relevance, novelty, and complexity, and by providing guidance for their study (Buzan, Waever, and Wilde 1998). Others have done the same service to the subjects of race and gender (Hensen 2000; Shepherd 2008; Sjoberg 2013; Anievas, Manchanda, and Shilliam 2014; Howell and Richter-Montpetit 2019; Mercer 2023). However, the understanding of interest's cognitive appraisals allows any security studies scholar to make their work interesting in a more systematic and effective manner. In this regard, security studies scholars could get some inspiration from management studies scholarship that has elevated “interestingness” as an important scholarly quality and, in consultation with the relevant psychological literature, developed specific guidelines on how to achieve it (Bartunek, Rynes, and Ireland 2006; Das and Long 2010).

A good example of how an interesting security studies research may look is Yaprak Gürsoy's article on Turkish narratives of the Gallipoli Campaign (WWI) and their political consequences. The article's novelty resides in applying an emotional perspective to analyze the campaign's impact, and from original archival research (Gürsoy 2022, 1042–7). Gürsoy maximizes the article's field-wide comprehensibility by briefing the reader on the historical context and explaining the core concepts (Gürsoy 2022, 1040, 1042–7). The article's complexity comes from its analysis of the interactive relationship between specific emotions, Turkish identity, and political priorities (Gürsoy 2022, 1048–56). The author underscores the subject's relevance by linking it with practical implications for Turkish society (Gürsoy 2022, 1050–1), as well as Australia, New Zealand (Gürsoy 2022, 1052), and Great Britain (Gürsoy 2022, 1055).

Fourth, scholars with teaching commitments should consider how their choices shape students’ interests in particular subjects. By framing topics as relevant, novel, and complex, and making them comprehensible, lecturers regulate student's situational and individual interest. In this manner, pedagogical practice can challenge or reinforce the field's biases (Booth 1994, 18). Previous literature has recognized that students’ perceptions of relevance can be increased by tying the subject to contemporary events or familiar locations (Alboshi 2021, 430; Carniel, Emmerson, and Gehrmann 2024, 312), and that comprehensibility can be maximized through practical exercises (Winger, Ellis, and Glover 2024) or popular culture references (Asal, Miller, and Vitek 2024; Cuadro 2024) or prior guidance (Gilbert, Paul, and Becker 2024). Since emotional interest results from a combination of four appraisals, pedagogues should think in terms of the mutual trade-offs among these appraisals. Attempts to maximize comprehensibility may rob the subject of much of its complexity and greater complexity can make the subject incomprehensible. For example, James Lacey (2016) recounts how he failed to inspire students’ interest by teaching Thucydides in an overly complex and thus incomprehensible manner.

Fifth, scholars should regulate their individual interests to avoid limiting individual and collective knowledge production. Scholars should periodically reassess their appraisals regarding any subject they study for a prolonged period of time, and be open to feedback from the less interested colleagues who are better positioned to identify instances of research with diminishing knowledge returns. We thus strongly support Booth's (1994, 19) recommendation that shifts in individual interests should be institutionally and collectively encouraged, especially for more senior scholars whose perspectives on novel subjects may be strongly biased by their previous interests. These shifts could be supported through grants and collective culture that praises intellectual requalification.¹²  Booth's (1994) own shift from strategic studies to critical security studies illustrates how abandoning an old interest in favor of a new one does not have to compromise academic career.

Finally, we should collectively diversify the field because diverse backgrounds lead to a broader range of issues the field finds interesting. The diversity of interests will challenge dominant trends, reduce biases, and maintain a healthy balance between conservative and radical perspectives. Grants can allow less economically privileged scholars to contribute with their unique perspectives to the collective knowledge production. Conferences, especially those held online, allow scholars with diverse backgrounds to interact (Smith 2024, 24–5), thus shaping each other's interests. By making security studies research seem more relevant and comprehensible to a broad audience, we can attract students with diverse backgrounds.

Conclusion

Emotional interest partly explains selected dynamics in security studies scholarship. Situational interest provides a mechanism through which real-world affairs become, and fail to become, the objects of security studies inquiry. Individual interest explains prolonged exploration of a subject despite the changing real-world affairs. Previous interests explain subsequent modes of engagement with other subjects, including the development, or lack thereof, of new interests.

Understanding interest as an emotion reveals its ambivalent influence on knowledge production in security studies. Situational interest is essential for refreshing our scholarship and keeping it policy-relevant, but it also makes our research susceptible to harmful fashions and biases. Individual interest is crucial for high-quality knowledge production and continuity but it can waste efforts, hinder communication, or create conceptual problems. One's previous interests can broaden scholarly perspective and guard against fashionable concepts but also lead to individual or collective neglect of subjects that warrant exploration. To make the most of interest's influence, security studies scholars should be aware of its emotional complexity, responsibly regulate their own and their colleagues’ and students’ situational and individual interests, and diversify the field.

Future research could explore circumstances that facilitate or hinder the development of individual interest. Milla Vaha has recently highlighted how a country's politics can limit the freedom to explore a particular subject, further disadvantaging scholars from the Global South in the intellectual competition with their more privileged colleagues (Vaha 2024). Yet, per the reviewed psychological research, even the most subtle interferences with any of the interest's appraisals shape the emotional experience, and these warrant more attention. Under what conditions are scholars more inclined to develop their individual interests? How do teaching load and administrative work affect one's capacity to develop individual interests? How does one's career stage matter to the development of individual interests?

Interaction of emotional interest with other emotions also deserves more attention. How do common emotions such as fear influence one's capacity to become situationally interested, or to develop individual interests? Both Löwenheim's (2010) and Solomon's (2023) works highlight that personal fears can shape one's choice of research subjects. Future research could identify conditions under which fear suppresses one's ability to find some subjects interesting. Appraisal theories of emotion allow scholars to break down both interest and fear into their respective appraisals and explore how these interact with each other. Autoethnography and qualitative textual analysis are both feasible methods for this purpose.

Acknowledgments

We thank Chiara Libiseller, Jan Daniel, and three anonymous reviewers for their constructive comments on the earlier versions of this article. We used ChatGPT (GPT-3.5) to refine the language and identify grammatical and stylistic errors in the article's final version.

Funding

This research was funded by Tomas Bata University under the project Assessment of Territorial Vulnerability to Current Security Threats (project code: RVO/FLKŘ/2024/02), and supported through the program “Creativity, Inteligence & Talent pro Zlínský kraj.”

Footnotes

References