Neural correlates of the social emotions guilt shame and pride

Abstract

Brain research on emotions is generally focused on basic emotions such as anger, fear, sadness, joy, contempt, surprise and disgust. These basic emotions, are by far, the most well understood. They are easy to approach, presumably universal and linked to other primates and non human animals. These characteristics have permitted a broader search. Social emotions as guilt, shame, embarrasment and pride, nevertheless, remain largely unexplored, although our life is tainted with them,.Social emotions are different to basic ones. They require complex cognitive and evaluative aspects, and not only emotional. In experimental settings are usually studied stemming from imagining or remembering situations removed from social reality. Participants imagines him/herself acting in a precise situation, or tries to restore a memory, relatively recent, in which that emotion has been felt in a similar social context. This experimental setting is very different to social life, where social emotions emerge as a reaction to self predictions, precise contexts, standards and norms...