title: Feeling down: idiom or nature?
abstract: Different emotions activate different parts of the brain, and different parts of the brain direct actions-intentions as well as attention (AIA) to different portions of space. This pilot study attempted to learn how different emotions elicited by emotional memories altered the voluntary spatial allocation of AIA. Twenty normal participants were asked to mark a large sheet of paper in any place of their choosing following recollection of seven types of emotional memories. The results suggest that different emotional memories-experiences can influence the spatial allocation of AIA with positive emotional memories inducing a distal or superior bias and sad memories inducing a proximal or inferior bias. Although these results support the hypotheses that emotions can influence the spatial direction of AIA, these preliminary results need replication and further exploration.
authors.affiliation: Department of Neurology, McKnight Brain Institute at UF, 100 S. Newell Dr., Rm. L3-100, PO Box 100236, Gainesville, FL 32610-0236, USA. valeria.drago@neurology.ufl.edu
authors.forename: Valeria
authors.initials: V
authors.lastname: Drago
authors.forename: Kenneth M
authors.initials: KM
authors.lastname: Heilman
authors.forename: Paul S
authors.initials: PS
authors.lastname: Foster
mesh_terms: D000328:Adult; D000704:Analysis of Variance; D001288:Attention; D004644:Emotions; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D009483:Neuropsychological Tests; D010865:Pilot Projects; D013028:Space Perception