Evidence map›Paper›PMID 29389177›Full record

SynthesisPsychological bulletin2018

Emotion fingerprints or emotion populations? A meta-analytic investigation of autonomic features of emotion categories.

Erika H Siegel, Molly K Sands, Wim Van den Noortgate, Paul Condon, Yale Chang, Jennifer Dy, Karen S Quigley, Lisa Feldman Barrett

Registry-linked trialAbstract readMeta-Analysis
In one paragraph

Synthesis in Psychological bulletin, 2018. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. It is linked to trial NCT05654441 (Low-grade Inflammatory Challenge and Social Behavior), which is not on this map. Cited by 131 papers, 1 of them a synthesis that pooled it.

0numbers the graph read from it
0cells of the map it votes in
131citing papers in PubMed, 1 pooled it
–field-weighted citation impact
1 · What the graph read from it

What it found

Each row is one number read from the abstract, on the scale the paper reported it, with its interval. Left of the dashed line favours the treatment, right favours the comparator. Under each row is the sentence it came from. New to these charts? A ten-minute tutorial.

The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.

2 · The registry

The trial behind it

Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.

NCT05654441 phase4completednot on this mapstarted 2022, after this paper: background citation

Low-grade Inflammatory Challenge and Social Behavior

TypeinterventionalSponsorUniversity of North Carolina, Chapel HillRan2022 to 2023Enrolled104ConditionsPsychology, Social, Inflammation, Defeat, Social, Interaction, SocialArmsInfluenza vaccine, Placebo
3 · Its place in the literature

Who cites it

131 citing papers in PubMed, 1 synthesis or guideline pooled it.

  1. Pooled it
  2. Trial
  3. The impact of emotion regulation strategies on experiential and physiological responses to negative emotional videos.Philosophical transactions of the Royal Society of London. Series B, Biological sciences · 2026
    Article
  4. Article
  5. Review
  6. Putting Emotional Memories in Context: The Constructionist Model of Emotional Memory.Perspectives on psychological science : a journal of the Association for Psychological Science · 2026
    Review
  7. Distinct Brain Systems Support Afferent and Efferent Autonomic Activity.bioRxiv : the preprint server for biology · 2026
    Article
  8. Synchrony and Reciprocity in Rhythmic Interaction.Annals of the New York Academy of Sciences · 2026
    Review
  9. Article
  10. The circadian rhythm of heart rate variability in academic teachers with anxiety disorders.International journal of occupational medicine and environmental health · 2026
    Article
  11. Article
  12. Review
  13. Distinct brain systems support afferent and efferent autonomic activity.Social cognitive and affective neuroscience · 2026
    Article
  14. Article
  15. Article
  16. Article
  17. Article
  18. "Awe-scillations": EEG spectral and complexity representations of awe.bioRxiv : the preprint server for biology · 2025
    Article
  19. Article
  20. Article

71 more citing papers are in PubMed but not listed here.

4 · The record

Corrections and comments

PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.

5 · Who and what money

Authors and funding

8 authors.

Erika H SiegelDepartment of Psychiatry.
Molly K SandsDepartment of Psychology, Northeastern University.
Wim Van den NoortgateDepartment of Psychology and Educational Sciences, University of Leuven.ORCID 0000-0003-4011-219X
Paul CondonDepartment of Psychology, Northeastern University.
Yale ChangDepartment of Electrical and Computer Engineering, Northeastern University.
Jennifer DyDepartment of Electrical and Computer Engineering, Northeastern University.
Karen S QuigleyDepartment of Veterans Affairs, Edith Nourse Rogers Memorial VA Hospital.ORCID 0000-0001-8844-990X
Lisa Feldman BarrettDepartment of Psychology, Northeastern University.

Funding

Neural Mechanisms of Social Decision Making in AgingR01AG030311 · NIA · MASSACHUSETTS GENERAL HOSPITAL · PI BARRETT, LISA FELDMAN, DICKERSON, BRADFORD C · 2006 to 2016
$5.6M
Psychology & Medicine: Translational Research on Stress, Behavior and DiseaseT32MH019391 · NIMH · UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA, SAN FRANCISCO · PI ADLER, NANCY E, EPEL, ELISSA S. · 1991 to 2022
$4.4M
Emotions are emergent events constrained by affective and conceptual processes.DP1OD003312 · OD · NORTHEASTERN UNIVERSITY · PI BARRETT, LISA FELDMAN · 2007 to 2011
$3.9M
Fundamental subcortical mechanisms of affective processingU01CA193632 · NCI · NORTHEASTERN UNIVERSITY · PI BARRETT, LISA FELDMAN, SATPUTE, AJAY · 2016 to 2020
$3.0M
Army Research InstituteArmy Research Institute for the Behavioral and Social SciencesNational Science FoundationNCI NIH HHS U01 CA193632NIA NIH HHS R01 AG030311NIH HHS DP1 OD003312NIMH NIH HHS T32 MH019391
6 · The paper itself

Abstract

The classical view of emotion hypothesizes that certain emotion categories have a specific autonomic nervous system (ANS) "fingerprint" that is distinct from other categories. Substantial ANS variation within a category is presumed to be epiphenomenal. The theory of constructed emotion hypothesizes that an emotion category is a population of context-specific, highly variable instances that need not share an ANS fingerprint. Instead, ANS variation within a category is a meaningful part of the nature of emotion. We present a meta-analysis of 202 studies measuring ANS reactivity during lab-based inductions of emotion in nonclinical samples of adults, using a random effects, multilevel meta-analysis and multivariate pattern classification analysis to test our hypotheses. We found increases in mean effect size for 59.4% of ANS variables across emotion categories, but the pattern of effect sizes did not clearly distinguish 1 emotion category from another. We also observed significant variation within emotion categories; heterogeneity accounted for a moderate to substantial percentage (i.e., I2 ≥ 30%) of variability in 54% of these effect sizes. Experimental moderators epiphenomenal to emotion, such as induction type (e.g., films vs. imagery), did not explain a large portion of the variability. Correction for publication bias reduced estimated effect sizes even further, increasing heterogeneity of effect sizes for certain emotion categories. These findings, when considered in the broader empirical literature, are more consistent with population thinking and other principles from evolutionary biology found within the theory of constructed emotion, and offer insights for developing new hypotheses to understand the nature of emotion. (PsycINFO Database Record

Indexed as

Autonomic Nervous SystemDermatoglyphicsEmotionsHumansThinking

Identifiers

PMID29389177
PMCPMC5876074

What OpenQuestion holds

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Registered trials

Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.