I study how people sense and make sense of their bodies.

Contemporary neuroscience is painting the picture of a brain which did not evolve to support a mind per-se. That is, the brain did not evolve to think, feel, or perceive but to regulate a body in motion. In fact, brain areas involved with regulating the body are some of the most well-connected: supporting diverse mental phenomena across areas of cognition, emotion, perception, and action. I believe that to understand the mind, we must understand the biological body.

  • All day, everyday, our brains are bombarded with sensations. These sensations come from intuitive sources like our eyes and ears, but also from the various tissues and systems of our bodies. I am interested in what the brain does with all this information.

    Representative Publication

    Feldman, M. J., Bliss-Moreau, E., & Lindquist, K. A. (2024). The neurobiology of interoception and affect. Trends Cogn Sci.

  • I am interested in how people relate to and make sense of their bodies. In particular, i’m interested in how perceptions of the body are influenced by our social identities (e.g., sex, gender, age, or socioeconomic status).

    Representative Publication

    MacCormack, J. K., Feldman, M. J., Bonar, A. S., & Lindquist, K. A. (2023). Aging Bodies, Brains, and Emotions: The Physiological Hypothesis of Emotional Aging. In U. Hess, R. B. Adams, Jr., & R. E. Kleck (Eds.), Emotion Communication by the Aging Face and Body: A Multidisciplinary View (pp. 54–82).

  • I am interested in how individuals use information from all their senses (including information from the body) to understand themselves and social others. I am interested in how these processes inform representations of “me” and “you” as well as representations of “us” and “them.”

    Representative publication

    Feldman, M. J., MacCormack, J. K., Bonar, A. S., & Lindquist, K. A. (2023). Interoceptive ability moderates the effect of physiological reactivity on social judgment. Emotion.