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Why the brain talks to itself: sources of error in emotional prediction
Open accessAbstract
People typically choose pleasure over pain. But how do they know which of these their choices will entail? The brain generates mental simulations (previews) of future events, which produce affective reactions (premotions), which are then used as a basis for forecasts (predictions) about the future event's emotional consequences. Research shows that this process leads to systematic errors of prediction. We review evidence indicating that these errors can be traced to five sources.
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“Returning to Figure 1, each preview is associated with emotional arousal described as a “premotion”.”
From Extension of the Transdiagnostic Model to Focus on Intolerance of Uncertainty: A Review of the Literature and Implications for Treatment (2014) · cites this paper as Gilbert & Wilson, 2009
In the citing paper
“The premotion occurs as a direct consequence of the preview the individual has made (Gilbert & Wilson, 2009).”
From Extension of the Transdiagnostic Model to Focus on Intolerance of Uncertainty: A Review of the Literature and Implications for Treatment (2014) · cites this paper as Gilbert & Wilson, 2009
In the citing paper
“These estimates may be drawn from cognitive biases in our memories of past experiences (see further Gilbert & Wilson, 2009).”
From Extension of the Transdiagnostic Model to Focus on Intolerance of Uncertainty: A Review of the Literature and Implications for Treatment (2014) · cites this paper as Gilbert & Wilson, 2009
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Metadata
- Authors
- Gilbert, D. T., & Wilson, T. D.
- Affiliations
- Harvard University (US)
- University of Virginia (US)
- Corresponding author
- Gilbert, Daniel T.
- Venue
- Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences
- Publisher
- The Royal Society
- Published
- 2009-05-12
- Volume
- 364
- Issue
- 1521
- Pages
- 1335-1341
- ISSN
- 0962-8436 (ISSN-L)
- 1471-2970
- PMC
- PMC2666705
- OpenAlex
- W2112835752
- Cited by
- 150
- References
- 62
- Citations by year
- 2026: 5 · 2025: 6 · 2024: 18 · 2023: 4 · 2022: 8 · 2021: 4 · 2020: 10 · 2019: 8 · 2018: 8 · 2017: 3 · 2016: 15 · 2015: 14 · 2014: 11 · 2013: 8 · 2012: 10
- FWCI
- 0.68
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- green
- www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov
- Locations
- Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society B Biological Sciences (publishedVersion)
- PubMed Central (publishedVersion)
- PubMed (publishedVersion)
- Digital Access to Scholarship at Harvard (DASH) (Harvard University) (submittedVersion, cc-by)
- Funders
- National Science Foundation (0722132)
- Topics
- Life Sciences › Neuroscience › Cognitive Neuroscience › Neural and Behavioral Psychology Studies
- Social Sciences › Decision Sciences › General Decision Sciences › Decision-Making and Behavioral Economics
- Life Sciences › Neuroscience › Cognitive Neuroscience › Embodied and Extended Cognition
- Keywords
- prediction error, mental simulation, affective forecasting, pleasure and pain, decision-making, cognitive biases
- MeSH terms
- Affect, Brain, Concept Formation, Emotions, Humans, Imagination, Mental Processes
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