How the Brain Makes Emotions

James-Lange, Cannon-Bard, two-factor, basic emotion circuits and constructed emotion: a century of theories about where feelings come from, and what brain research says now.

Few questions in neuroscience are as old — or as unsettled — as what an emotion actually is.

Body first?

In 1884 William James, and independently the Danish physician Carl Lange, proposed something counterintuitive: we don't tremble because we're afraid; we feel afraid because we tremble. Emotion is the perception of bodily changes triggered by a situation. This is the James–Lange theory.

Brain first?

In 1927 the physiologist Walter Cannon and his student Philip Bard objected: bodily responses are too slow and too similar across emotions (the heart races in both fear and excitement) to explain distinct feelings, and animals with their body feedback cut still show emotional behaviour. The Cannon–Bard theory proposed that the brain (they focused on the thalamus) triggers feelings and bodily responses simultaneously.

Arousal plus interpretation

In 1962 Stanley Schachter and Jerome Singer proposed the two-factor theory: emotion = physiological arousal + a cognitive label based on context. In a famous (though imperfectly replicated) experiment, people injected with adrenaline reported feelings that matched the mood of a stooge in the room.

Basic emotion circuits

The psychologist Paul Ekman argued for a small set of basic emotions — such as happiness, sadness, fear, anger, surprise and disgust — with universal facial expressions. The neuroscientist Jaak Panksepp described subcortical circuits in mammals for primal emotional systems he labelled SEEKING, RAGE, FEAR, LUST, CARE, PANIC/GRIEF and PLAY.

Constructed emotion

The psychologist and neuroscientist Lisa Feldman Barrett argues that there are no dedicated circuits or universal "fingerprints" for each emotion. Instead, the brain constructs emotions by predicting and interpreting body signals (interoception) using learned concepts and culture. Meta-analyses of brain imaging have found that emotions activate widespread, overlapping networks rather than one region per emotion.

Where things stand

Most researchers agree emotions involve the body, subcortical structures such as the amygdala, hypothalamus and brainstem, and cortical regions such as the insula, anterior cingulate and prefrontal cortex. How they combine — and whether emotions are natural kinds or constructions — remains a lively debate.