Minding Emotions: The Embodied Nature of Emotional Self-Regulation

The client undergoing psychotherapy declares, "I can't help feeling angry." Are such emotions outside a person's control, or is it possible for persons to regulate their own behavior--including their emotions? This seemingly simple question and its seemingly obvious answer has become less obvious as mainstream psychology and neuroscience have moved away from a dualist position toward a more unified or monistic view of body, mind, and soul. A dualist account that separates bodily actions from an immaterial mind and/or soul provides a relatively simple account for how emotions might be controlled. Rene Descartes viewed the processes of reason and will as the exclusive purview of the mind-soul. Emotions were viewed as being part of both body and soul. Primitive emotions, such as fear and anger, were reflexive or mechanical responses to sensory stimulation; more noble emotions, such as contentment and courage, were the willful acts of the soul, and could override or regulate more primitive responses. (1) Therefore, not only was soul separable from body, but mental activity was divided into higher (i.e., controlling and willful) and lower (i.e., mechanical and passive) components.