“It would be completely unethical to give the drug to someone else,” he said, “but if you’re in a marriage and want to maintain that relationship, you might take a little booster shot yourself every now and then. Even now it’s not such a far-out possibility that you could use drugs in conjunction with marital therapy.”
posted by badego on Jan 13, 2009 - 42 comments

How the president-elect tapped into a powerful—and only recently studied—human emotion called "elevation." Dacher Keltner, a professor of psychology at the University of California-Berkeley, studies the emotions of uplift, and he has tried everything from showing subjects vistas of the Grand Canyon to reading them poetry—with little success. But just this week one of his postdocs came in with a great idea: Hook up the subjects, play Barack Obama's victory speech, and record as their autonomic nervous systems go into a swoon....It was while looking through the letters of Thomas Jefferson that Haidt first found a description of elevation. Jefferson wrote of the physical sensation that comes from witnessing goodness in others: It is to "dilate [the] breast and elevate [the] sentiments … and privately covenant to copy the fair example." (via Geek Press) [more inside]
posted by caddis on Dec 20, 2008 - 50 comments

Brain's 'Hate Circuit' Identified. "People who view pictures of someone they hate display activity in distinct areas of the brain that, together, may be thought of as a 'hate circuit', according to new research by scientists at UCL (University College London)."
posted by homunculus on Oct 29, 2008 - 34 comments

"Pulse", a project by Markus Kison, "...is a live visualisation of the recent emotional expressions written on the private weblogs of blogger.com. These emotional expressions are parsed according to a list of synonyms and transform a physical shapeshifting object...." (QT video) (via) [more inside]
posted by Kronos_to_Earth on Jul 14, 2008 - 4 comments

Facial Expression Simulator Apparently it's useful for helping autistics learn facial expressions, among other things. Related.
posted by shivohum on Apr 1, 2008 - 33 comments

A mouse has been genetically engineered to no longer fear cats. Surely this is now only a matter of time. [more inside]
posted by leibniz on Nov 8, 2007 - 29 comments

Stress-fi: Women need cuddles, men need kudos
posted by johoney on Jun 12, 2007 - 28 comments

Impaired emotional processing affects moral judgements. People with damage to a key emotion-processing region of the brain also make moral decisions based on the greater good of the community, unclouded by concerns over harming an individual.
posted by semmi on Mar 27, 2007 - 48 comments

"A Console To Make You Wiip: How the Nintendo Wii will get you emotionally invested in video games." Exploring the Wii from the aspect of William James' essay, "What is an emotion?" James contends that all emotions are rooted in one's physical state, e.g. goosebumps when spooked, and blushing while embarassed. Can the overt physicality of playing the Wii make it a more emotional experience?
posted by frecklefaerie on Nov 17, 2006 - 31 comments

The Bio Mapping tool allows the wearer to record their Galvanic Skin Response, which is a simple indicator of emotional arousal, in conjunction with their geographical location. By sharing this data we can construct maps that visualise where we as a community feel stressed and excited.
posted by jack_mo on Nov 13, 2006 - 16 comments

Using a physiological sensor called the SenseWear by BodyMedia, researchers at the University of Maryland, Baltimore County (UMBC) have created the XPod. The XPod "learns" a user's preferences, activities and even emotions, and then selects the most appropriate music to accompany any given situation. The mood ring for the new millennium.
posted by terrapin on Oct 24, 2006 - 14 comments

Face to Face: The Science of Reading Faces. Transcript(and video)of a 2004 interview with psychologist Paul Ekman, who is known for his research on facial expression and the development, with associates, of the Facial Action Coding System (FACS). Includes a few facial expression photos. Part of the "Conversations with History" series at the Institute of International Studies, University of California, Berkeley .
posted by hortense on Dec 10, 2005 - 10 comments

I Feel, Therefore I Am. Consider the work of Dr. Antonio Damasio, humanist and neuroscientist, who has turned the Mind and Body debate between René Descartes and Benedictus de Spinoza upon its head--or at least the heads of Phineas Gage and one Elliott--via his research and writings such as The Feeling of What Happens: Body and Emotion in the Making of Consciousness, Descartes' Error: Emotion, reason, and the human brain and Looking for Spinoza: Joy, Sorrow, and the Feeling Brain. He's influenced writers like Ian McEwan and David Lodge, and via his thoughts on the perception of music, inspired a composition. (More Inside)
posted by y2karl on Apr 19, 2003 - 21 comments

An aesthetics of inadequacy. "Despite Aeschylus's statement, 'All knowledge comes from suffering,' all that came from my suffering was suffering." An interview with Alan Shapiro, the author of Song and Dance, about poetry as an attempt of mourning.
posted by semmi on Aug 16, 2002 - 3 comments

Bush's bullhorn speech The most genuine public show of emotion I think I've seen from the president. There has been a lot of criticism of his cue-card reading, but to me this was a refreshing change!
posted by smt on Sep 14, 2001 - 34 comments

Next generation emoticons or another step in tearing down cultural (and man-machine?) walls?
posted by rushmc on Sep 8, 2001 - 15 comments

Eric's Emotions is what you get when you combine a bored college kid and a webcam. He's got a list of emotions on the left pane, hyperlinked to hilarious photos of him illustrating the emotions. My favorites include: "Soylent Green is made out of people," "Fantasizing about Ricky Martin," "New Shoes!," "Han, hold on," and "Mr. Burns' Excellent Face." You can submit new emotion requests, and see his pending requests. [thanks Dan]
posted by mathowie on Jan 30, 2000 - 3 comments