"Most of us believe emotions are easy to recognise. A frown means anger. Tears mean sadness. A trembling voice means fear. But neuroscience tells a very different story. Decades of research now suggest that emotions are not universal signals waiting to be detected. They are constructed experiences-shaped by our developmental history, the language we learn, and the cultural worlds we grow up in."
"For years, psychology taught that certain facial expressions reliably signal specific emotions. But research has steadily dismantled that idea. People do not scowl every time they feel angry. Sometimes they smile. Sometimes they go quiet. Sometimes their face shows very little at all. Even within the same person, emotional expression shifts across situations. In some small-scale societies with little exposure to Western norms, people don't interpret facial movements as emotional signals in the first place."
Emotions are constructed experiences formed by developmental history, language, and cultural context rather than universal signals. Facial expressions vary across individuals and situations, and the same person can display different expressions for the same emotion. In some societies, facial movements are not interpreted as emotional signals at all. The brain actively constructs emotion categories by predicting and interpreting bodily and sensory signals using past experience and cultural learning. Labels like "anger," "sadness," and "fear" function as concepts the brain applies to incoming sensations. Recognizing emotion as culturally shaped improves accuracy in understanding others and reduces misinterpretation.
Read at Psychology Today
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