How movements and muscles influence our emotions

I just read a very interesting article in the latest Psychology Today (May/June 2009, page, by Matthew Hutson) entitled “The Muscle is the Message”. There doesn’t seem to be a link to it, so with all credit given to Matthew Hutson, I’d like to summarize it here. It really demonstrates the connections our brains make between body and emotion.

1. If you want to like a painting more, nod your head while looking at it. We associate certain actions with the judgments that tend to produce them.
2. Which comes first, crying or being sad? Research shows that placing fake tears under your eyes increases feelings of sorrow.
3. Botox erases both wrinkles and emotions. (I knew it!). Since your face can’t express fear and anger, apparently you are less able to feel them as well.
4. Pushing away on your desk, or walking away, triggers a mind-set of avoidance and vigilance. This also enhances attention, inhibition, and analytical reasoning.
5. Hold a pencil horizontally between your teeth, and the comics will seem funnier. Why? You’re grinning. See, your mother told to smile and you’ll feel better. She was right!
6. Pressing up on the bottom of your desktop flexes muscles used to bring things closer. This signals a benign, rather than dangerous, situation and boosts your creativity.

The article is basically telling us that as far as our brains are concerned, making a muscle movement that is connected to an emotion is the same as feeling an emotion. So, making that movement will trigger that emotion. Now, our thought process may then over-ride this more basic feedback loop. But it’s still powerful.

So next time you want to feel better, try putting on a positive expression or moving in a way that is connected with positive feelings. Next, notice your thought processes and see what happens.

Incidentally, this same sort of feedback loop is what’s behind the idea of “mental rehearsal” for sports performance improvement. In fact, it works for all types of behavior improvement. Once again, the brain doesn’t distinguish between imagining yourself running, and actually running. The same motor neurons are active in both situations. So you can actually improve your tennis game by lying on the couch! It won’t do anything for the strength of your swing, but it could help you keep your eye on the ball better!

For an interesting look at this topic, take a look here.

Tagged as: Emotion, Psychology Today