Modulation of behavior in communicating emotion

Abstract

King discusses many examples where two animals, as they bond, behave in ways we interpret as expressing love for one another. If one of the bonded animals then dies, signs of loving are replaced by signs we interpret as expressing grief by the animal who remains. I propose a pathway for emotional communication between an animal and an observer that can have a central role in these and other observations by King and in our overall ability to interpret observed behavior in relation to emotion. This pathway provides evidence of emotion in an observed animal by communicating evidence of emotion's effects on the behavioral activities of the observed animal. Initial findings from humans including those from music support and can begin to fill in the details for such a pathway. Martin F. Gardiner Martin_Gardiner@brown.edu has been studying how cognitive and emotional components of musical skill learning interact with and can affect more general human skill development and learning.