Although there is a common biological basis of emotion in humans, different aspects of emotional life are emphasized in different cultures. These differences find reflection in emotion language. How is emotion talked about across different cultures? What are the shaping forces of cross-cultural diversity in emotional meaning? In my research, I explore these questions in egalitarian hunter-gatherer communities of Thailand: Maniq and Mlabri. Given the key role of emotion in smell, my work on olfaction is also naturally linked to the broader issues within the emotion domain.
PUBLICATIONS
Wnuk, Ewelina, and Jan Wodowski. 2024. Culture shapes how we describe facial expressions. Scientific Reports, 14: 21589.
Wnuk, Ewelina and Yuma Ito. 2021. The heart’s downward path to happiness: Cross-cultural diversity in spatial metaphors of affect. Cognitive Linguistics 32 (2): 195–218.
Speed Laura, Hannah Atkinson, Ewelina Wnuk, and Asifa Majid. 2021. The sound of smell: Associating odor valence with disgust sounds. Cognitive Science 45 (5): e12980.
Arshamian, Artin, Richard C. Gerkin, Nicole Kruspe, Ewelina Wnuk, Simeon Floyd, Carolyn O'Meara, Gabriela Garrido Rodriguez, Johan N. Lundström, Joel D. Mainland, and Asifa Majid. 2022. The perception of odor pleasantness is shared across cultures. Current Biology, 32 (9): 2061-2066.e3