Human Emotions Explained In 60 Short Interviews

NPR:

In some sense we’re all experts in emotion. We experience emotion every day, all the time. We constantly observe the emotional responses of others, and we often make decisions based on anticipated emotions: we pursue something because we think it will make us happy, or avoid something because we worry it will anger someone else.

Despite living intimately with emotion, there’s a lot we don’t know. Sometimes we’re baffled by our own emotional responses, or those of others. Sometimes we wish we could change our emotions, but don’t know how.

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The participants are a diverse bunch, including some well-known psychology popularizers and writers (such as Steven Pinker discussing emotion and violence and Dan Gilbert on happiness), as well as experts across a range of psychological disciplines. Topics vary from crying and embarrassment to sex and laughter , with quite a bit in between.

I’ve only had a chance to watch a few videos so far, but here are a few highlights.

In a video measuring emotion, Dr. Iris Mauss, a colleague here at UC Berkeley, discusses some paradoxical effects of seeking happiness.

Read the whole story: NPR