We present an anaphoric conception of the content of emotions as the key for a proper understanding of their normativity. Assuming an adaptive theory of emotions, they are characterized as a kind of differential responsive disposition involving an evaluative perceptual dimension and an expressive action-oriented dimension. Normativity of emotions mean they are subjected to correction criteria, which are satisfied if and only if the emotional valence assigned to the perceived situation is preserved throughout the expressive process. The preserved valence may be thought of as a kind of nonconceptual content individuated according to an anaphoric recurrence structure. The anaphoric model makes it possible to put the scope of the analysis of emotions on episodes of social interaction among emotional agents and yields explicative benefits in relation to heterogeneous cases, such as those of social referencing.