5
Bodily Changes and Emotions
CONTENTS
Parasympathetic and Sympathetic Branches
Cannon's Critique of Autonomic Specificity
The Search for Physiological Specificity
The Hypothalamic-Pituitary-Adrenal Axis
Parasympathetic Response and Positive Emotion
The Interplay Between Bodily Reaction and Emotional Experience
Bodily Action Generates Emotional Response
Reduced Input from the Body and Diminished Emotional Experience
Embodiment, Cognition, and Social Interaction
Embodied Cognition and Empathy
FIGURE 5.0 Bernini: St. Teresa. Of this sculpture Gombrich (1972, p. 345) says that Bernini has “carried us to a pitch of emotion which artists had so far shunned.”
A cold sweat covers me, and trembling seizes me all over.
Sappho (circa 580 BCE)
Williams James is perhaps the most famous American psychologist. He corresponded regularly with his brother, Henry, who became equally famous as a novelist. Their letters are filled with references to their physical ills and bodily sensations—vivid and personal descriptions of back pains, upset stomachs, bodily fatigue. Were these experiences a clue to why William James proposed, in 1884, a radical idea that would turn the field of research on ...
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