The interview has been edited for length and clarity. Lisa Feldman Barrett spoke to Shots about her alternative theory of emotions. There's a lot of evidence which challenges this view from every domain of science that's ever studied it.' 'But the problem with this set of ideas is that the data don't support them. The 'classical view' of emotions as innate and limited in variety, she says, 'matches the way that many of us experience emotion, as if something's happening outside of our control,' she tells Shots. In it, she argues for a new theory of emotions which is featured in the latest episode of NPR's program and podcast Invisibilia. She's also the author of a book called How Emotions Are Made: The Secret Life of the Brain. 'They happen to us, almost,' says Lisa Feldman Barrett, a professor of psychology at Northeastern University and a researcher at Harvard Medical School and the Massachusetts General Hospital. We are born with them, and when things happen to us, our emotions wash over us. For instance, fear might make some people cry while for others, it could elicit laughter.Įmotions, the classic thinking goes, are innate, basic parts of our humanity. Lisa Feldman Barrett has written two books, Seven and a Half Lessons About the Brain (2020) and How Emotions are Made (2017), as well as hundreds of peer reviewed scientific papers appearing in Science, Nature Neuroscience and other top journals in psychology and cognitive neuroscience.A psychologist argues people experience emotions differently. Lisa’s work has over-turned this age-old model which shapes everything from our current beliefs about emotional intelligence to facial recognition software widely being deployed around the world. Since the ancient philosophers, and into our last century of scientific endeavor, emotions have been seen as hard-wired responses to external stimuli, located in specific regions of the brain. University Distinguished Professor of Psychology at Northeastern University, and Chief Science Officer for the Center for Law, Brain and Behaviour at Harvard, Lisa Feldman Barrett, is profoundly changing our understanding of the brain and in particular, our emotions. This episode is part one of a two part conversation that Jean and Scott had with neuroscientist, Dr Lisa Feldman Barrett.

How emotions are made