In the Emotion and Self Lab at the Department of Psychology at the University of British Columbia, we study the evolutionary function, nonverbal expression, and psychological structure of emotions and self.
Lab alumnus Zak Witkower, Jess Tracy, and others found that holding a plush robot exhibiting "calm" breathing lowers a person's heart-rate during moments of fear. Read the article here!
Big congrats to Zak!
In research led by Zak Witkower, smile variation is shown to accurately leak personality. See here for the article in press at PNAS-Nexus.
Mercadante, E., & Tracy, J. L.
Journal of Experimental Psychology: General.
Tracy, J. L., & Witkower, Z.
Philosophical Transactions B
Jess was recently featured in an article published by the Globe and Mail where she outlines the utility of and differences between envy and jealousy. This article discusses the mechanisms behind social comparison as we move into a post-pandemic era, and whether envy and jealousy are helpful or detrimental to society.
Click the link to learn more about these emotions in the context of a pandemic!
Jess, Eric, and Zak published a new blog post in the Society for Personality and Social Psychology’s Character and Context Blog. In this post, they discuss the relationship between pride and social rank and their research investigating the causal direction of this association.
Check the post out in the link below!
Check out Jess’ feature on the second episode The Feelings Lab podcast, where she discusses the feeling of embarrassment alongside Dr. Alan Cowen, Dr. Dacher Keltner, Matt Forte, and Ali Kolbert!
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