p. 1

emotions recognizing faces and feelings to improve communication and emotional life revealed paul ekman author of telling lies

[close]

p. 2

a dvancepraise for emotions revealed no one in the world has studied facial expressions as deeply as paul ekman in emotions revealed he presents clearly vividly and in the most accessible way his fascinating observations about the overt or covert expressions of emotions we all encounter hundreds of times daily but so often misunderstand or fail to sec there has not been a book on this subject of such range and insight since darwin s famous expression of the emotions more than a century ago oliver sacks author of uncle tungsten paul ekman is one of those rare thinkers who can connect what scientists have learned with what the rest of us wonder about in our everyday lives if you read this book you ll never look at other people in quite the same way again emotions revealed is a tour de force malcolm gladwell author of the tipping point ever since darwin no one has contributed more to our understanding of how humans go about communicating emotions than paul ekman in this masterful overview he reviews how emotions are communicated and the implications for topics ranging from mental health and interpersonal relationships to law enforcement and violence a fascinating and important book robert m sapolsky professor of biology stanford university and author of why zebras don t get ulcers paul ekman is the master of emotional expression and this is a masterful account of his field he even suggests how we can use findings about emotional expressions to guide and improve our lives joseph i.edoux professor of neural science new york university and author of synoptic self and the emotional brain what a pleasure to have paul ekman a pioneer of detailed facial analysis help us to see what others feel frans de waal professor of psychology emory university and author of the ape and the sushi master emotions revealed showcases paul ekman s forty years of academic research and great common sense providing a fascinating and enormously helpful picture of our emotional lives john cleese emotions revealed will leave everyone who reads it more intelligent about their emotional life a charming sound sane map to the world of emotions the perfect guide daniel goleman author of emotional intelligence psychology isbn 0-8050-7275-6 52500 9 780805 072754

[close]

p. 3

continued from front flap filled with groundbreaking research illuminating anecdotes and exercises emotions revealed is a practical mind-opening and potentially life-changing exploration of science and self paul ekman is a professor of psychology in the department of psychiatry at the university of california medical school san francisco an expert on expression the physiology of emotion and interpersonal deception he has received many honors most notably the distinguished scientific contribution award of the american psychological association and is the author or editor of thirteen previous books including telling lies he is a frequent consultant on emotional expression to government agencies such as the fbi the cia and the atf to lawyers judges and police and to corporations including the animation studios pixar and industrial light and magic he lives in northern california jacket photographs © 2003 paul ekman jacket design by lisa fyfe www.emotionsrevealed.com www.henryholt.com times books henry holt and company 115 west 18th street new york new york 10011

[close]

p. 4

s25.00 $36.95/canada a fascinating exploration of how we interpret and experience emotions and how we can improve our emotional skills by a pioneering psychologist what triggers emotions how docs our body signal to others whether we are a bit down or deeply anguished peeved or enraged can we learn to distinguish between a polite smile and the genuine thing can we really ever control our emotions renowned expert in nonverbal communication paul ekman has led a renaissance in our scientific understanding of emotions addressing just these questions now he assembles bis research and theories in emotions revealed a comprehensive look at human emotional life drawing on ekman s fieldwork investigating universal facial expressions in the united states japan brazil and papua new guinea his analysis of the prognosis of hospital patients based on their emotional attitude and dozens of other studies emotions revealed explores the evolutionary and behavioral essences of anger sadness fear surprise disgust contempt and happiness for each emotion ekman describes the universal themes that undergird our feelings the automatic reactions that unfold within microseconds and the actions that are actually under our control ekman then takes us on a visual tour of each emotion s unique signals exploring some of the most subtle and easy-to-miss expressions that can signal when a person is just beginning to feel an emotion or may be trying to suppress it learning to identify emotions in their early stages or when they are masked can improve our communication with people in a variety of situations both at home and at work and help us to manage our own emotional responses continued on back flap 0403

[close]

p. 5

also by paul ekman telling lies face of man why kids lie

[close]

p. 6

emotions revealed

[close]

p. 7

emotions revealed recognizing faces and a n d feelings to improve lifecommunicationemotional paul ekman times henryholtand books newyorkcompany

[close]

p. 8

times books henry holt and company llc publishers since 1866 115 west 18th street new york new york 10011 henry holt® is a registered trademark of henry holt and company llc copyright © 2003 by paul ekman all rights reserved distributed in canada by h b fenn and company ltd library of congress cataloging-in-publication data ekman paul emotions revealed recognizing faces and feelings to improve communication and emotional life paul ekman 1st ed p cm includes index isbn 0-8050-7275-6 1 expression 2 emotions 3 interpersonal communication i title bf591 .e35 2003 152.4 dc21 2002029036 henry holt books are available for special promotions and premiums for details contact director special markets first edition 2003 designed by debbie glasserman printed in the united states of america 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1

[close]

p. 9

to bert boothe steve foote lynne huffman steve hyman marty katz steve koslow jack maser molly oliveri betty pickett eli rubinstein stan schneider joy schulterbrandt hussain tuma and lou wienckowski from the national institute of mental health and robert semer and leo siegel

[close]

p. 10

acknowledgments xi introduction xiii 1 emotions across cultures 1 2 when do we become emotional 17 3 changing what we become emotional about 38 4 behaving emotionally 52 5 sadness and agony 82 6 anger 110 7 surprise and fear 148 8 disgust and contempt 172 9 enjoyable emotions 190 conclusion appendix notes 241 living with emotion 213 reading faces the test 219 illustration credits 2 5 6 index 258

[close]

p. 11

acknowledgements some of the people at the national institute of mental health to whom this book is dedicated took an interest in my career back when i was a beginning graduate student in 1955 the others joined in over the years it has been an amazing span 1955 to 2002 of encouragement advice and in the early years considerable faith i would not have become a research psychologist a university professor and would not have learned what i write about without their help the writing of this book was supported by senior scientist award k05mh06092 i also dedicate this book to my two maternal uncles leo siegel and the late robert semer when i was eighteen untried and for the first time on my own in the world they enabled me to continue my education sine qua non wally friesen and i worked together for twenty-five years nearly all of the research that i write about we did together i am grateful for his help and friendship david littschwager provided very useful advise on the photographic setup i used for the pictures of eve that appear in chapters 5 through 9 my daughter eve had the patience and the talent to make the faces that appear in this book and the thousands more that i shot wanda matsubayashi who has been my assistant for more than twenty-five years organized the text and the references david rogers did the photoshop image manipulations and was of great help in getting the permissions for the commercial photographs.

[close]

p. 12

psychologists richard lazarus and philip shaver gave me helpful feedback on an early draft of the first half of this book phil also provided detailed insightful line editing and useful challenges to my thinking philosopher helena cronin encouraged and challenged much of my thinking psychiatrist bob rynearson and psychologists nancy etcoff and beryl schiff gave me useful suggestions on an early draft among the many students who gave me feedback jenny beers and gretchen lovas were especially generous with their time my friends bill williams and paul kaufman gave me useful suggestions and criticisms toby mundy now publisher of atlantic press london in an earlier incarnation encouraged me to broaden the scope of my endeavor and tackle the issues i consider in chapters 2 through 4 claudia sorsby provided criticism suggestion and editorial help in an earlier draft and my editor at times books robin dennis was very helpful in pushing me to consider issues i sometimes neglected and contributed some fine line editing my agent robert lescher has been a wonderful source of encouragement and advice.

[close]

p. 13

introduction emotions determine the quality of our lives they occur in every relationship we care about in the workplace in our friendships in dealings with family members and in our most intimate relationships they can save our lives but they can also cause real damage they may lead us to act in ways that we think are realistic and appropriate but our emotions can also lead us to act in ways we regret terribly afterward if your boss were to criticize the report you thought she would praise would you react with fear and become submissive rather than defend your work would that protect you from further harm or might you have misunderstood what she was up to could you hide what you were feeling and act professional why would your boss smile when she started to talk could she be relishing the prospect of chewing you out or could that be the smile of embarrassment could her smile have been meant to reassure you are all smiles the same if you were to confront your spouse with the discovery of a big purchase that he had not discussed with you would you know if it was fear or disgust he showed or if he was pulling the face he shows when he is waiting out what he calls your overly emotional behavior do you feel emotions the same way he does the same way other people do do you get angry or afraid or sad about matters that don t seem to bother others and is there anything you can do about that?

[close]

p. 14

would you get angry if you were to hear your sixteen-year-old daughter coming home two hours after her curfew what would trigger the anger would it be the fear you felt each time you checked the clock and realized that she hadn t called to say she would be late or the sleep you lost waiting for her to come home the next morning when you talked to her about it would you control your anger so well that she would think you really didn t care about the curfew or would she see your stifled anger and become defensive could you know from the look on her face if she was embarrassed guilty or a bit defiant i have written this book to provide answers to such questions my goal is to help readers better understand and improve their emotional life it still amazes me that up until very recently we both scientists and laymen knew so little about emotion given its importance in our lives but it is in the nature of emotion itself that we would not fully know how emotions influence us and how to recognize their signs in ourselves and others all matters i explain in this book emotions can and often do begin very quickly so quickly in fact that our conscious self does not participate in or even witness what in our mind triggers an emotion at any particular moment that speed can save our lives in an emergency but it can also ruin our lives when we overreact we don t have much control over what we become emotional about but it is possible though not easy to make some changes in what triggers our emotions and how we behave when we are emotional i have been studying emotion for more than forty years focusing primarily on the expression and more recently on the physiology of emotion i have examined psychiatric patients normal individuals adults and some children in this country and many other countries when they overreact underreact react inappropriately lie and tell the truth chapter 1 emotions across cultures describes this research the platform from which i speak in chapter 2 i ask the question why do we become emotional when we do if we are to change what we become emotional about we must know the answer to that question what triggers each of our emotions can we remove a particular trigger if our spouse tells us we are taking the long route to get to our destination annoyance

[close]

p. 15

or even anger may boil up within us at being directed and having our driving acumen criticized why couldn t we accept the information without getting emotional why does it get to us can we change so that such minor matters don t make us emotional these issues are discussed in chapter 2 when do we become emotional in chapter 3 i explain how and when we can change what we become emotional about the first step is to identify the hot emotional triggers that lead us to act in ways we subsequently regret we also need to be able to identify whether a particular trigger is going to resist change or be more easily weakened we won t always succeed but we can through understanding how emotional triggers become established have a better chance of changing what we become emotional about in chapter 4 i explain how our emotional responses our expressions actions and thoughts are organized can we manage irritation so it doesn t appear in our voice or show on our face why does it sometimes feel as though our emotions are a runaway train and as though we have no control over them we don t have a chance unless we can become more aware of when we are acting emotionally very often we are not aware until someone objects to what we have done or until we reflect later chapter 4 explains how we can become more attentive to our emotions as we have them so there is a possibility of behaving emotionally in constructive ways to reduce destructive emotional episodes and enhance constructive emotional episodes we need to know the story of each emotion what each emotion is about by learning the triggers for each emotion the ones we share with others and those that are uniquely our own we may be able to lessen their impact or at least learn why some of the emotion triggers are so powerful that they resist any attempt to lessen their control over our lives each emotion also generates a unique pattern of sensations in our body by becoming better acquainted with those sensations we may become aware early enough in our emotional response that we have some chance to choose if we like whether to go along or interfere with the emotion each emotion also has unique signals the most identifiable being in the face and the voice there s still much research to do on the vocal

[close]