want to read bringing out the best in people and i think every once in awhile it is good to get a new perspective how you lead a team you lead people and manage assets. >> i am wrapping up a terrific novel moving into the narrow road and the six extinction . >> lisa feldman barrett is

here tonight in celebration of her book "how emotions are made" a is distinguished professor of psychology in northeastern university she received a national of institutes of health directors pride in your award for her ground breaking research with the motion in the brain and to be elected member of the royal society of canada. in a review library journal says to present a new era scientific explanation that there were swayed by feelings and fax and also has an intuitive theory that does not only against a popular understanding of traditional research

emotions do not arrive rather reconstruct them on the flight furthermore they're not universal or located in specific bear the -- brain regions the results from girl that works "scientific american" calls the of book remarkable in the wall street journal calls a fascinating. and another star reviewed touse day the selfie of the brain is brilliant please help me to welcome lisa feldman barrett. [applause] >> it is very special for me to be here to talk about the home bookstore we have been coming here and then we have

friends and family here as well but what i will do is read a couple of selections from the book then open to questions. so i will start with the passage about a birthday party i true for my daughter when she was 12 years old with the theme of gross foods so i ate -- i made pizza to make it look like it was moldy like fuzzy cheese and vomit jell-o i used peach jell-o with chopped up pieces of vegetables and apple juice in urine sample cups so the game that we had after one juror to a baby food like

mashed carats or beef and i would smear that on to diapers bin said kids had to hold that up to their nose to identify the food by small. even though they knew it was a baby food many of them had a full body gag with they went to smell the diaper of this shoe print than joyful discussed in the leader not this holds the key to understanding how emotions are made. it is filled with an intuitive detail very counr intuitiv each debris experience the delight of happiness, the dread of the year, the burn of thinker -- anchor and

surrounded by those who are caught up in the throes of their emotions. they don't actually reveal what is going on inside your brain or body because the brain is a master of deception it has magician skill to reveal how would does several but the whole time making is a false sense of confidence that the experiences the products revealed the inner workings with the motions because that is how we experience the motion so we assume that joy day and a sadness and fear and danger have a separate causes inside of us

the way we experience the motion so with a brave like ours it is easy because we are a bunch of brains trying to figure out how brains work. so i would start at first principles look around the room ucb and the book shows me and each other but the of visual information to enter the retina of here i -- of your eye but that is not what is happening so to demonstrate i will invite up my lovely assistant. [laughter]

concedes a light square in the middle of the image? there is no white square on that page. so what is your brain doing to ponder that image where it is just open space? this is something we talked about in the book the bullet -- the book explains what is happening and explains what this has to do with how the brain makes the motion. basically is adding staff looking now prior experience is. and is constructing a the square that you saw.

with the visual cortex that constructed that image for you to create lines so you could see a shape that was not visibly their sole in a manner of speaking you were hallucinating the everyday type that your experience has insight the gesture of past experiences photos give meaning to your present sensations no matter how hard you tried you cannot experience yourself constructing that square so many bad example to show that it is occurring in your

brain but it is so habitual in fact, it is harder for them not to see a square so this little magic trick is called simulation and indians your brain is changing the firing of its owner runs of the absence of it coming sensory information. there were no lines to cause you to see a square. your neurons were firing. so it could be visual so have you ever heard a song in your head you cannot get rid of? that audio hallucination is also a simulation.

think of the last time somebody hits did you a red juicy apple? you took a bite, during that moment neurons in the sensory and motor part of your brain or firing motor neurons fire to produce movement so you could process of sensations from the apple so when you bit into that so other neurons, as your mouth to water in them prepare your bader f t sugs in the apple in the be made your

stomach turn a little bit suggest now when they said the word out all your brain responded as if it was present it combined bits and pieces of knowledge of previous apples you have tasted and change the firing to construct a mental image of an apple. your brain simulated a nonexistent apple so who can imagine and apple? and you can hear the crunch of the apple? and you can taste the apple? and to salivate

in jeans the firing of the sensory neurons and so this kind of simulation and doing it very deliberately it was business as usual in my book "how emotions are made" i explained how that is no different from what you're doing right now you make the cure listening to me speak in reacting but in fact your brain is creating simulations that are predicting every single word that comes out of my --

mouth. [laughter] so your break right now is doing something remarkable neurons in some part of the brain for changing the firing and other parts to anticipate what is coming next. in this is how i like to think about it your brain works like a scientist always making a slew of predictions just like a scientist makes a hypothesis. and then you use and how each prediction was true and then compare them to incoming sensory input so if

your brain predicts well said your simulating the apple of i pulled one out to show a two year-old but no new information would enter into your brain but then it captured that visual information than there was a production error and jeans that prediction to respond to the data if it was slightly more green than what you had predicted your brain would change and so

that it would change so you'd see the apple differently we have a very fancy name for this in pshology called learning. [laughter] and then you can use it to predict better in the future. so then to maintain their predictions are a reality or win the quintessential scientists to imagine the world but in "how emotions are made" i explain the lower house simulations give

meaning to sensations that allow you to experience the world but in the outside world with that same process happens inside your body to how we motions are made so it is just another source of sensory input. so from though longer expanding these purely physical sensations inside your body have no objective

if you feel in a kid your stomach while sitting at the dinner table you make sid is a bad as under. it could be not judged in the courtroom as they get a feeling that the defendant cannot be trusted and then to give ventral sensations to your by a and happening simultaneously three-year life so consider the same stomachache can also occur when used with a diaper or

the eight when your lover on walks into the room with your waiting for the results of of medical test you may have been anxious feeling of disgust or wrongdoing or anxiety to major of the essence of your aching stomach this is how the brain construction experience this is our emotions are made. and then in terms of what was going on around you. and that was a prescription for action.

it was not reactions to a the world the fact more precisely your brain is is constructing the body in the world at any given moment that is the experience of the of ocean. so the book provides plenty of examples so then she is that period a very specific way not justice said of ideas but that hypophysis was backed up by a tremendous amount of evidence. so with how the brain works

and how it empowers zero and to improve the emotional intelligence and then with many domains afterlife but it also explains of theory is so counter intuitive and "how emotions are made" uses science of the motion as a flashpoint where a motion events are important between physical health and mental health to communicate across cultures and even addresses if animals have emotions. so one of my favorite topics

with understanding of what it means to be human so now i will take your questions or will listen to your comments and thoughts to have a close look at the book. >> how is this information?. >> there are a number of types of literature. bundy anatomical standpoint you can see that it is not wired for reaction but prediction. so we can see it is wired to use the past experience to make guesses about what will

happen next so looking at how it works predictably so they have electrical signals so firm physiology and brain imaging with those other brain lesions and evidence of observing and babies and children there was evidence row across cultural work that teams of my own of gone too remote cultures around the world and then but those

domains of science so to us it feels that we are reacting to the world working with the deep animalistic parts of the brain but they are not structured that way. >> it sounds like we have very with little control. i would assume that is a legitimate. >> so that is a great question so the ownership of your emotions so one of the things that becomes clearer when you snap your fingers to change a you feel.

not possible. to take a feeling of distress and to change that simulation to turn down the of volume is super hard to do but that being said this allowed issued to broaden the horizons so for example, of that is the case to use your past experience to construct what you are about to feel if you invest a little bit of effort to cultivate new experiences and the present to automatically make different emotions and the future.

and to broaden the repertoire and with very little effort and there are additional benefits like for school age children if you just teach them to broaden their vocabulary it isn't just the ability to communicate but it changes the climate of a classroom because you have more control over their experience. >> so we think of those

emotions with those uncontrollable actions that just happened? and then to recognize there is nothing about an erosion so that means in theory before you racked? so that is more liberating to change your emotions with those sensations around here. with different types of therapies to change the

sensations around you and to change a your simulating. >> so if people say how does this relate? so what you are describing is your brain is automatically constructing simulation as predictions so is using the sights and sounds and smells in the present moment to project what will happen in the next moment and to modify them and so one grey

but to be mindful of more details that give us your brain more freedom to stimulate new and different things. there is a very cool thing that their brains to they don't just search for a match and then retrieve favor every like a file but they take bits and pieces of past experiences and use them to assemble then in a brand new way to make predictions. that is how we daydream or make predictions but also making motions. sometimes we don't even have words so to have that

simulation on the fly. so does anybody know what this emotion is?. >> but even before we knew that word we could make that a motion in perceive that. and there is a scientific term for that. and with his misfortune to not only experience the context so you don't think

it was a horrible person and then you think what is wrong with her? but i have to give you the whole context and describe the feeling it would take a long time to say acing go word to conjure in your brain with many, many features. so the more detail that you pay attention to in the world, the more words or concepts or more control you have over your e version. that doesn't just mean not making some emotions or

making it -- others so i describe in instance where i was in graduate school there as a guy asking me out i kept saying no then eventually i said i will go out with him i didn't find him compelling but while we had coffee and realized i was feeling flashed and january with trouble concentrating. i thought i must be attracted to him. he asked me to go out again. i said okay. so then we parted ways and went home to put my keys in the door i ran to the

bathroom and rescind dead with the flu for a week. i was not faking that pat was using those sensations to create a feeling of attraction and i actually did date him for a couple of months but imagine how the alleged grief i would have saved myself if i had been able to not take those feelings to construct and the motion but of physical symptoms like airbus be coming down with the flu. so sometimes it is better not gerald so as a big emotional even hint. >>

[inaudible] talk about seeing what is going non in the world but the visual cortex is constantly bombarded which it could not begin to possibly organized but in the sense would create a template you think you look your street but it is a generalization that your brain has made. in my going off the deep end ?. >> no. i don't the it creates generalizations' but there is a lot of sensory information in the world

that is very regular. so your brain is very efficient metabolic the efficient but is not metabolic the efficient it is a very expensive for get and. they take 20 percent of the metabolic budget. so it is important to be frugal and what allows you to be metabolic the efficient to have that redundancy so your retina was wired in such a way so only what is different right now the red that takes inspiration going into your

visual cortex but it removes all of those signals from the last moment. >> like a dog running across the street? but it is possible to purchase a to read yourselves the or luck with that generalization?. >> yes. a couple of years ago i wanted to paint. i wanted to learn. so what i learned is if you take a three-dimensional object transfer onto a two dimensional canvas you will

get a pretty crappy looking object. so you can train yourself to deconstructs the object and if you train yourself and trails for the pieces on to it can best you'll get a reasonably looking three-dimensional object but you can train yourself to see the world differently. but essentially do are assimilating differently. so another example might

answer your question. here is the image i will show you. if you have seen this before don't say anything. what you see in this image? anyone?. >> allotted people see blobs of black-and-white and if that is why you see the you are experiencing something called experiential blindness that your brain cannot predictor stimulate -- simulate what this is a you don't see anything so

now i will get the experience that will carry your blindness. are you ready to be cured? now how many of you can still see a snake? that works better when i have a computer but for many people they can still see their head over part of the body but it is very similar to the previous example with the square but i have given your brain and experience

that allows your brain to make predictions so if you see parts of the state you can simulate to change the firing to see an object where there is no object. but recently doing in any event, a woman came up after words to say tell me what is wrong with my brain. [laughter] winner will get those black-and-white photos i see a louisiana swamp then we looked at the snake and she said i saw the snake for the instant then i saw this wallboard is wrong? and i said nothing is working

perfect how long have you lived in the breezy and a? she had no accent she said my whole life so you spent urhole life lking at the swap your brain can assimilate that very well that i gave you an experience of the snake over 10 seconds sawyer breeds ability to modulate its older bronze to make that image in your head is much weaker. so you have to practice to make a new simulation a little bit so eventually it is very automatic so it is possible to change how you see things absolutely. >> this may be semantics but

talking about seeing the snake and a black-and-white picture you see the lines could you also say that you don't see it differently view interpret it differently?. >> you could but every thought and feeling and interpretation occurs in your brain so i have to tell you first saw this in just the interpretation there really is vision so i will give you an example as evidence of that debt and went to address your philosophical issue i would say that also ochres and the firing of your dear ron city

did not have those than you would that have the interpretation so every mentally event you experience is a confrontational moment in your brain but let me say this slightly differently. we can influence the kinds of predictions people make without their awareness so for example, it is a procedure that to one i -- eyeball we presented neutral face not making any expressions than maybe flash visual will raise or black-and-white squares so

there is a dynamic visual information being flashed including the the neutral face. in the other eye we presented formation that would make the person feel more pleasanter unpleasant so we change the physical state of their body without their awareness 7% to images your brain inco's both the koch is the only see one so the other is still captured yet the you are completely visually aware it does change the interpretation so when i make you feel more pleasant i change your physical sensation with the image that makes it more pleasant you see that

neutral face as more trustworthy, a likable, a confident, intelligent, attr active but without your weirdness change the feelings to be negative for a pleasant or as less trustworthy or likable that changes the interpretation of the face. but actually it changes the visual image of the face that people actually see the face as slightsly les pleasant depending on how lead manipulated their physical state so there is good evidence to show when you create a simulation with your brain you're changing the firing not just their regions that are thought to be important but of primary

sensor razor neurons that when we do these studies they lie completely still their eyes are closed and they are just listening to a brief prompt to create table simulated vintage in we scan them. we see massive activity in the sensory and motor cortex. . .