Final answer:
The statement is false as photographs and images can have a profound psychological effect just as emotional language can. Both visual imagery and language can evoke a wide range of emotions, often relying on pathos to connect with viewers or readers.
Step-by-step explanation:
The statement that photographs and images cannot psychologically affect us as powerfully as emotional language does is false. Both visual and verbal cues can evoke strong emotional responses. Photographs can be incredibly impactful, sometimes even more so than words because they capture and convey complex realities and emotions instantly. The juxtaposition of images in a photo essay, for example, can increase the emotional impact and tell a compelling story of events like war, which might leave 80 percent of a city uninhabitable. Through metacognition, we realize that strong visual stimuli trigger memories and feelings just as significantly as emotional language.
Emotional language and visual elements like photographs both have the power to target and elicit a wide range of emotions such as fear, pity, love, or aversion. Emotional appeals and the use of images in storytelling, particularly in photo essays, rely heavily on pathos to invoke the emotions of viewers. Design elements such as color, texture, and lighting are additional tools that can enhance the emotional response to images, whether in photography or on stage.
Additionally, it is a universal human trait to produce and recognize facial expressions of emotion, which photographs can capture and relay effectively. Also, emotional expressions in photographs can be culturally universal, although specific rules about their display may vary. They serve as direct channels for conveying emotional states, even in the absence of language.