Where do our emotions come from? From our thoughts? Or do they begin somewhere else - like in our bodies? This week we look at the work of James-Lange, Cannon-Bard, and Schachter and Singer. Also, I review two classic studies in the history of psychology: the Suproxin study and the Suspension Bridge study. This week the Good, the Bad and the Ugly….Betty of emotions. Oh yes, and what does the TV show Ugly Betty have to do with all this? Find out this week on The Psych Files.
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Resources for this episode

• Jonah Lehrer’s article from Seed Magazine about how Nintendo’s Wii video game creates strong emotions in players and brings some validation to the James Lange Theory of Emotions.

• The Feelings Book: The Care & Keeping of Your Emotions (American Girl)

• I referred to the January episode of the TV show Ugly Betty in which she was spraying herself with a perfume which was causing her to have unexplained heart racing, sweaty palms and heightened energy - the same kind of physiological arousal as in the Suproxin study. You can watch back episodes of Ugly Betty on the ABC website. There are commercials. If you want to get straight to the parts that are relevant to the Suproxin study, skip to 10:45 (the effects of the perfume is explained), 16:40 (she feels in love with her boyfriend), 22:15 (she’s angry at Gio) and 24:30 (can’t understand why she’s angry at Gio).

• The Story of Psychology

• The "Suspension Bridge Study": Dutton, D. G. and Aron, A.P. (1974) Some Evidence for Heightened Sexual Attraction Under Conditions of High Anxiety. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 30, 510-517.

• The "Suproxin" study: Schachter, S. and Singer, J. (1962). Cognitive, Social, and Physiological Determinants of Emotional Stage. Physiological Review, 69, 379-399.

• Question: did you figure out what the problem is with the Suspension Bridge Study??

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Popularity: 36% [?]

The Psych Files podcast started one year ago this week, so I thought I’d share some emails I’ve received over the past year. I just want to thank all of you for being listeners and for sharing your encouragement and your suggestions for the podcast. I plan to go full speed ahead for 2008 and in this episode I share a some of the ideas I have for episode topics for the upcoming year.
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Past Episodes Mentioned in This Podcast

• The MAPPR program - Make A Personal Psychology Review - can be found here.

• The episode explaining the model behind the book The Explosive Child by Ross Greene can be found here.

• The interview with Dr. Christenfeld on the history of the Hudson River Psychiatric Center can be found here.

• If you liked the idea one listener had of sending her class to a toy store to investigate the gender specificity of the various toys, check out this episode on the psychological research used in your local grocery store to get you to buy.

• Teachers and students: don’t forget to check out the ideas I’ve put together for how you might use the podcasts in class. Check out my resources for psychology teachers and students.

Websites Mentioned During This Episode

• From the OERCommons homepage: OER Commons is a teaching and learning network, from K-12 lesson plans to college courseware, from algebra to zoology, open to everyone to use and add to.

• From the MERLOT homepage: Find peer reviewed online teaching and learning materials. Share advice and expertise about education with expert colleagues. Be recognized for your contributions to quality education.

• Amy Sweetman’s wonderful Intro Psych Resources site contains lots of helpful resources for teachers and students of psychology.

• Marianne Miserandino’s wiki website Personality Pedagogy contains many great resources on the topic of personality.

• Jeremy Dean is a very active blogger, and his blog, called PsyBlog is highly recommended. For even more resources, check out his series of posts in which he lists other excellent psychology blogs.

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Are you taking Introduction to Psychology? General Psychology? Or are you looking for online lectures in psychology? You’ve come to the right place. The Psych Files podcast is 1 year old this month and I wanted to tell all the new listeners a little bit about the podcast. Also, I’ve got two "secrets" for success in your psychology class, as well as two "Psychology In Everyday Life" tidbits about blaming the victim and our need for personal control. Welcome to The Psych Files.

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Resources For This Podcast

Previous Episodes of The Psych Files Which Are Helpful to Psychology Students:

• History of Psychology: Hudson River Psychiatric Center Interview

• Research and Statistics in Psychology: Why Statistics Make Us Queasy

• Research and Statistics in Psychology: What is Falsifiability?

• BioPsychology: Brain Development During Erikson’s Eight Stages

• Learning: Positive and Negative Reinforcement Defined

• Learning: Reinforcement and Your Bowling Style

• Development: Erik Erikson and his Eight Stages of Life

• Motivation: Intrinsic Vs. Extrinsic Motivation

• Therapy: Freud's Defense Mechanisms

• Social Psychology: Blaming the Victim

• Social Psychology: Cognitive Dissonance Explained

• Social: What Really Happened to Kitty Genovese?

Those two "secrets" to doing well in psychology or any other learning task are:

• Distributed Practice - spread out your study time!

• Organize - use concept maps, outlines, re-write your notes, personalize the material, etc. In other words, be active with the material and it will stick in your brain.

The research article on how organizing the material we need to learn resulted in higher test grades than just reading it or reviewing it is called, "Effect of Quality and Quantity of Study on Student Grades" by Donald J. Dickinson and Debra Q. O’Connell and it appeared in the Journal of Educational Research, v83 n4 p227-31 Mar-Apr 1990.

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Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing - what is it about this type of psychotherapy that draws such criticism? In this episode I interview Dr. Scott Lilienfeld of Emory University. Dr. Lilienfeld has been a critic of EMDR and in this episode he explains his reasons why. He also talks a little bit about how exposure therapy works. A fascinating interview with a leading critic and author of a new textbook in Psychology.

Resources for this episode

Authors critical of EMDR:

• Dr. Scott Lilienfeld, who wrote the article on EMDR, has a website here at Emory University where he is a Professor of Psychology.

• You can learn more about Dr. Lilienfeld’s new textbook, “Psychology: From Inquiry to Understanding” here.

• Here is where you can find the full article that Dr. Lilienfeld wrote regarding his criticisms of EMDR treatment. The full title of the article is EMDR Treatment: Less Than Meets the Eye? and it originally appeared in the January/February 1996 issue of the Skeptical Inquirer.

• Another article that is critical of EMDR can be found here on the New England Skeptical Society website.

Authors supportive of EMDR:

• The Perkins Center for Counseling has an article by Byron R. Perkins and Curtis C. Rouanzoin which attempts to address the critics of EMDR.

• The EMDR Institute maintains an FAQ page containing information supportive of the treatment.

• Here is the link to the interview I conducted with Jamie O’Neil, a practitioner of EMDR. This is episode 19.

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