Interoception: Why Emotions Feel the Way They Do

Feelings are extremely important indicators of our wellbeing, whether they’re purely physical internal sensations (like a stomach ache) or emotional feelings (like the upset stomach you might get before you give a big presentation). Interoception is the sense of the inside of the body, and it provides the basis for both types of feelings. In this video, we’ll see how bodily sensations are turned into emotional feelings in the brain, and vice versa. The most important brain region in this regard is the so-called “interoceptive cortex,” which spans the insular and anterior cingulate cortices, but many other brain regions are important as well.

If you want to learn more about the neuroscience of emotions, check out the most recent episode of “The Social Brain,” my podcast with neuroscientist Taylor Guthrie (@The Cellular Republic) : https://youtu.be/i7xziZn4OUw

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Sources:

• Craig, A. D. (2016). Interoception and Emotion: A neuroanatomical perspective. In L. F. Barrett, M. Lewis, & J. M. Haviland-Jones (Eds.), Handbook of Emotions (4th ed., pp. 215–234). essay, Guilford Press.
• Damasio, A. (2019). The strange order of things: Life, feeling, and the making of cultures. Vintage.
• Barrett, L. F. (2017). How emotions are made: The secret life of the brain. Pan Macmillan.
• Panksepp, J., & Biven, L. (2012). The archaeology of mind: neuroevolutionary origins of human emotions (Norton series on interpersonal neurobiology). WW Norton & Company.

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