I came across an essay from Boston magazine (website) by Shannon Fischer, titled "About Face", published July 2013. Here, she questions a popular theory about the way we experience and express emotions, by Paul Ekman, one that I've been an admirer of, whether its wrong.
She begins by explaining how Ekman proved a theory by Charles Darwin, one that states that people from ages and races, from all over the world express emotions in the same way. A brief outline how Ekman went about this is given, and the story of his and his work rise to fame and popularity, before questioning the theory itself.
First up, she quotes a professor of psychology Lisa Barrett, who describes it as "cartoonish", and according to whose research, the results were naturally the opposite - each one of constructs emotions in our own ways from various sources. Her basic argument against Ekman's theory was that he had given options to his subjects when asking them to identify the emotions shown on faces they were presented with, which limited the ways in which people were allowed to think.
The writer says: "think of how impossibly distracting the regular act of blinking would be if the brain consciously processed every piece of information that came its way. Instead, it pays attention to what you need to pay attention to, then raids your memory stores to fill in the blanks", and it may be how emotions are developed as well. She mentions how Barrett's further research papers, that went against Ekamn's theory, received both praise and condemnation.
The writer then describes Barrett's experiment that took on Ekman's theory directly, an experiment that Barrett considered as her most important, and one that was rejected by the magazine Science. She then concludes with a few quotes from the last time she met Barrett, and it appears as if she was frustrated naturally, and at the same time philosophical - while she could still be wrong, the data will always point in the right direction.
While the argument put forward is detailed, the conclusion is left hanging in mid air - there is still no definite proof against Ekman, perhaps only just the beginnings of it. The writing style is analytical, using points from one major research source - Lisa Barrett's work. The essay appears to be neatly organised with a couple of paragraphs making up a section to make one point, before moving on to the next section. While the essay may have successfully implanted doubts, it hasn't changed my overall perspective of Ekman's work.
She begins by explaining how Ekman proved a theory by Charles Darwin, one that states that people from ages and races, from all over the world express emotions in the same way. A brief outline how Ekman went about this is given, and the story of his and his work rise to fame and popularity, before questioning the theory itself.
First up, she quotes a professor of psychology Lisa Barrett, who describes it as "cartoonish", and according to whose research, the results were naturally the opposite - each one of constructs emotions in our own ways from various sources. Her basic argument against Ekman's theory was that he had given options to his subjects when asking them to identify the emotions shown on faces they were presented with, which limited the ways in which people were allowed to think.
The writer says: "think of how impossibly distracting the regular act of blinking would be if the brain consciously processed every piece of information that came its way. Instead, it pays attention to what you need to pay attention to, then raids your memory stores to fill in the blanks", and it may be how emotions are developed as well. She mentions how Barrett's further research papers, that went against Ekamn's theory, received both praise and condemnation.
The writer then describes Barrett's experiment that took on Ekman's theory directly, an experiment that Barrett considered as her most important, and one that was rejected by the magazine Science. She then concludes with a few quotes from the last time she met Barrett, and it appears as if she was frustrated naturally, and at the same time philosophical - while she could still be wrong, the data will always point in the right direction.
While the argument put forward is detailed, the conclusion is left hanging in mid air - there is still no definite proof against Ekman, perhaps only just the beginnings of it. The writing style is analytical, using points from one major research source - Lisa Barrett's work. The essay appears to be neatly organised with a couple of paragraphs making up a section to make one point, before moving on to the next section. While the essay may have successfully implanted doubts, it hasn't changed my overall perspective of Ekman's work.
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