The Emotion & Self Lab
In the Emotion and Self Lab at the Department of Psychology at the University of British Columbia, we study the evolutionary function, nonverbal expression, and psychological structure of emotions and self. Much of our research is focused on the place that self and emotions meet: the self-conscious emotions of pride, shame, embarrassment, and guilt. But we also study more basic level emotions, such as anger, fear, sadness, and happiness. We use a wide range of methods to study emotional processes, including behavioral observation and coding, social-cognitive techniques (e.g., reaction time assessment, eye-tracking), cross-cultural and cross-species comparisons, narrative assessment, and physiological (e.g., hormone) assessment; and we use experimental, cross-sectional, and longitudinal designs. In an effort to improve the study of self-conscious emotions, we have developed several measurement tools that are available to other researchers. These tools can be downloaded from this website. In all of our research, we tend to take a functionalist perspective, asking why questions about emotions and self, and seeking both ultimate and proximate answers.
Featured Media »
How Nonverbal Displays of Power Influence Politics
Zak Witkower was recently interviewed about his work on nonverbal displays of power and how these behaviors can influence political outcomes. Check out this article in Vancouver Magazine, and Zak's live TV appearance on BC Global News.
Why Did People Vote for Donald Trump?
Nobody likes a bully. And yet, as exemplified by the recent US presidential election, bullies tend to accrue power.
Donald Trump got to the White House by angrily and aggressively attacking everyone who dared challenge him. He resorted to childish name-calling (“Little Marco,” “Crooked Hillary”), insulting women’s appearances, and mocking the disabled. Social and evolutionary psychology can help us understand why voters rewarded him for it...
Get Yourself to Do Stuff by Appealing to Your Own Sense of Pride
A story at the start of Take Pride, a forthcoming book by University of British Columbia psychologist Jessica Tracy, is a typical one of youthful aimlessness, at least at first. Tracy writes about her post-college life in the late 1990s, when she moved across the country to San Francisco and got a job as a barista in a cozy cafe. It was a pleasant life, filled with lots of people to talk to and lots of time to read, along with few anxieties or responsibilities. But after about a year, she started missing something she’d had in college…
Featured Project »
How are Emotion Expression Honest Signals?
Emotion expressions can be understood as a form of social communication between a sender and a receiver: a signal. [...]
Read more »The Emergence of Status Hierarchies
Status differences are universal in all known human societies, and they partially determine patterns of resource allocation, conflict, mating, and group coordination. However, there’s little systematic research into questions of why and how hierarchies emerge. [...]
Read more »Latest News »
Jess’ book, Pride: The Secret to Success, is now available in paperback!
Take Pride was named one of 12 Books for Ambitious Women Entrepreneurs, by StartUp Mindset
New paper from the lab published in JPSP, showing that humility is comprised of two facets–one pro-social and “other-appreciating”, and the other anti-social and “self-abasing.” Read the paper here.
Zak and Jess’ paper reviewing the literature on bodily (or, extra-facial) nonverbal displays of emotion now in press at Emotion Review.
Now published in Emotion: Aaron, Conor, and Jess’ paper documenting problematic measurement practices in research on distinct momentary emotional states.
Upcoming Talks »
Zak Witkower, Two signals of social rank: Prestige and dominance are associated with distinct nonverbal displays.
Nonverbal Behavior Pre-Conference, SPSP
Atlanta, GA
March, 2018
Joey Cheng, Dominance and prestige: Debates, misunderstandings, and new evidence. In the symposium, “An Integrative Perspective on Social Rank.”
SPSP, March, 2018
Atlanta, GA
Zak Witkower, The Illusion of a Facial Action Unit: How Head Pitch Rotation Influences Perceptions of Dominance from an Inactive Face. In the symposium, “Faces in Social and Personality Psychology.”
SPSP, March 2018.
Atlanta, GA.
Jess Tracy, From Pride to Social Rank
Social/Personality Research Group, Department of Psychology, University of Toronto.
March 27, 2018
Toronto, ON
Jess Tracy, Keynote Address
Positive Emotions Pre-conference, Society for Affective Science
April, 2018
Los Angeles, CA
Jess Tracy, Chair, 30 years of affective science in the Bay Area: A look at how far we’ve come, and where we should go next.
Invited symposium featuring talks from Bob Levenson, Ann Kring, Dacher Keltner, Barbara Fredrickson, James Gross, and Wendy Mendes
APS Annual Convention, May, 2018
San Francisco, CA
Jess Tracy, Hot shit/piece of shit: The directly opposing impact of pride displays on social judgments and decision-making. In the symposium, “The Self-Conscious Emotions: Theory, Data, and Open Questions.”
APS, May, 2018
San Francisco, CA
