Knowing Your Actual, Literal Heart Reduces Anxiety and Betters Decisions
Given its distance from the brain, neuroscience hasn’t had much to do with the heart quietly thumping in your chest. But to get a fuller picture of the mind, you need to start looking below the neck. These matters of the heart are University of Sussex researcher Sarah Garfinkel’s speciality. Her recent work has built a strong case that both emotion and cognition are “embodied”: Over the past several years, she’s found evidence that the beats of your heart — and your awareness