Revising that conception of emotion isn't just good science, Barrett shows it's vital to our well-being and the health of society itself. Emotions arent universally pre-programmed in our brains and bodies rather they are psychological experiences that each of us constructs based on our unique. This new view of emotions has serious implications: when judges issue lesser sentences for crimes of passion, when police officers fire at threatening suspects, or when doctors choose between one diagnosis and another, they're all, in some way, relying on the ancient assumption that emotions are hardwired into our brains and bodies. Emotions aren't universally pre-programmed in our brains and bodies rather they are psychological experiences that each of us constructs based on our unique personal history, physiology and environment. But what if it is wrong? In How Emotions Are Made, pioneering psychologist and neuroscientist Lisa Feldman Barrett draws on the latest scientific evidence to reveal that our common-sense ideas about emotions are dramatically, even dangerously, out of date - and that we have been paying the price. This understanding of emotion has been around since Plato. The thrill of seeing an old friend, the fear of losing someone we love - each of these sensations seems to arise automatically and uncontrollably from within us, finding expression on our faces and in our behaviour, carrying us away with the experience. Many scientists believe that emotions come from a specific part of the brain, triggered by the world around us. The Sussex-based cognitive philosopher Andy Clark provides an engaging overview of what he slightly over-claims to be this new theory of predictive processing.

When you feel anxious, angry, happy, or surprised, what's really going on inside of you? It took a subject I thought I understood and turned my understanding upside down' - Malcolm Gladwell, author of The Tipping Point. 'How Emotions Are Made did what all great books do.

How emotions are made book review