Do emotions happen inside separate hearts and minds, or do they operate across the spaces between individuals? This book focuses on how emotions affect other people by changing their orientation to what happens in the social world. It provides the first sustained attempt to bring together literature on emotion's social effects in dyads and groups, and on how people regulate their emotions in order to exploit these effects in their home and work lives. The chapters present state-of-the-art reviews of topics such as emotion contagion, social appraisal and emotional labour. The book then develops an innovative and integrative approach to the social psychology of emotion based on the idea of relation alignment. The implications not only stretch beyond face-to-face interactions into the wider interpersonal, institutional and cultural environment, but also penetrate the supposed depths of personal experience, making us rethink some of our strongly held presuppositions about how emotions work.

Winner, 2020 Choice Outstanding Academic Title

'Twenty-first century affective science has become a sprawl of studies and theories that resisted any unified treatment - until now. Brian Parkinson brings reason to emotion in a tour de force of patient and deeply analytical scholarship that is nonetheless personal and highly approachable. This volume is indispensable for anyone who does emotion research.'

Alan J. Fridlund - University of California

'This is an impressive scholarly monograph … In his theoretically challenging way, the author reverses the traditional inside-out approach and rethinks the heart of emotions as relational processes. Every emotion researcher should read this book.'

Agneta H. Fischer - Universiteit van Amsterdam

'Brian Parkinson, a pioneer in the social psychology of emotions, weaves a tale of the social facets of emotion in this new book. He masterfully covers decades of research, while transcending disciplinary boundaries. It is a truly important resource for any researcher interested in emotions.'

Arvid Kappas - Jacobs University Bremen, Germany

'Welcome to a Copernican view of emotion that sees emotions from ‘outside and beyond’, rather than from ‘inside out’. Brian Parkinson achieves a skilful balance between didactic clarity and deep thoughtfulness, while providing an enlightening review of the social role of this scientific mystery called emotion.'

José-Miguel Fernández-Dols - Universidad Autónoma de Madrid, Spain

'When people reflect on their emotions, they tend to assume that these are private events, individual in nature, that happen to them. In this eloquently written and persuasively argued book, Brian Parkinson, the leading proponent of the view that emotions are fundamentally social, systematically undermines each of these assumptions.'

Antony Manstead - Cardiff University

'Providing a comprehensive review of the major contemporary issues in emotion research, this book recasts emotions first and foremost as a social lynchpin. Doing In doing so, it provides an important framework that promises to advance the study of this complex and fascinating phenomenon called emotion.'

Shlomo Hareli - University of Haifa, Isreal

'Comprehensive, provocative in parts and delightfully written, this book addresses a perennially timely question in emotion psychology: are emotions primarily intrapsychological or primarily social phenomena? I very much enjoyed reading the book.'

Ursula Hess - Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin

'Claims that ‘emotions are social constructions’ are all the rage, but they are often divorced from both rigorous argumentation and empirical data. Brian Parkinson’s monograph puts flesh around the slogans of the social constructionist movement, making a powerful case that emotions are strategies of relationship realignment rather than passive feelings to be explained in strictly physiological terms.'

Andrea Scarantino - Georgia State University

'As a longstanding proponent of the social approach to emotion, Brian Parkinson provides an insightful account of state-of-the-art theories and research on emotions’ inherently social constitution. This book is invaluable for anyone who wishes to understand emotion’s impact on our social lives.'

Gerben van Kleef - Universiteit van Amsterdam

'In this comprehensive, theoretically rich, accessible treatise, Parkinson (Univ. of Oxford, UK) challenges and reverses traditional psychological and individualistic accounts of emotions' origins. In a wholesale paradigmatic shift, he presents an approach to their understanding that is interpersonal, interactive, relational, and fundamentally social in nature, beginning from birth … The overall result is a thought-provoking study that will certainly extend emotion research into several new directions for years to come.’

J. R. Mitrano Source: Choice