Understanding Basic Emotions: What Carroll Izard and Jaak Panksepp Teach Us About How We Feel

 The truth is that emotions are the heartbeat of our human experience. They help us understand the world, connect with others, and make choices that shape our lives. When we feel joy, sadness, fear, or curiosity, our brains and bodies are sending messages that help us grow, survive, and bond. Two scientists, Carroll Izard and Jaak Panksepp, spent much of their lives studying these feelings to answer a fascinating question: What are the basic emotions that all humans—and even animals—share?

💫 Carroll Izard: The Ten Building Blocks of Emotion

Carroll Ellis Izard (1923–2017) was an American psychologist who believed that emotions are not random or simple reactions, but fundamental parts of who we are. His theory, called the Differential Emotions Theory (DET), suggests that there are ten basic emotions that exist in every healthy human being across all cultures (Izard, 1991). These are: Joy, Sadness, Anger, Fear, Disgust, Shame, Contempt, Interest, Surprise, and Guilt.

Izard explained that these emotions are universal, meaning that children in Japan, farmers in Kenya, and students in Brazil all express and feel them in similar ways. You can think of them as the primary colours of our emotional world. Just as red, yellow, and blue can mix to form all other colours, these ten emotions combine to create the rich, complex experiences we feel every day.

For example:

• When you feel both fear and interest, you might experience curiosity—that exciting feeling when something is both scary and fascinating.
• When anger mixes with shame, it can turn into frustration or regret.

Izard also showed that even babies as young as ten weeks old express several of these emotions through facial expressions (Izard, 1991). Think of a baby smiling when seeing a parent (joy) or crying when hearing a loud noise (fear). These early signs reveal how deeply wired emotions are in the human brain.

According to Izard, emotions aren’t just reactions, they help shape our personality. They interact with our thinking, our movements, and even our body’s balance systems. In other words, emotions are the glue that holds our minds and bodies together.

🧩 Jaak Panksepp: The Seven Emotional Systems of the Brain

While Izard studied emotions through behavior and facial expressions, Jaak Panksepp (1943–2017), an Estonian-born neuroscientist, explored them from the inside out—through the brain itself. He founded a field called Affective Neuroscience, which studies how emotions arise from brain structures shared by all mammals (Panksepp, 1998).

Panksepp discovered seven basic emotional systems, which he found by studying both animals and humans. These are: SEEKING, FEAR, RAGE, PANIC/GRIEF, PLAY, LUST, and CARE.

Each one is like a separate “energy system” in the brain that drives how we act and feel:

• SEEKING – makes us curious and motivated to explore, like when you can’t wait to open a mystery box.
• FEAR – protects us from danger, helping us stay alert and safe.
• RAGE – gives us energy to fight back when something feels unfair or threatening.
• PANIC/GRIEF – appears when we lose someone or feel alone, pushing us to reconnect.
• PLAY – brings joy and friendship; think of laughing with friends or playing tag.
• LUST – connects to attraction and the continuation of life.
• CARE – makes us want to nurture and protect, like how a parent feels toward a child.

The truth is that Panksepp’s findings were revolutionary. He showed that these emotional systems live deep in the subcortical regions of the brain, in areas that developed long before humans even existed. This means that our emotions are not only human—they are biological and shared with other animals. For example, rats “laugh” in high-frequency sounds when they play, and their brains show the same activation in the PLAY system that humans experience when having fun (Panksepp, 2007).

Panksepp also warned that modern psychology once ignored emotions because of behaviourism (which focused only on what can be observed) and cognitivism (which focused only on thinking). His work brought feeling back to the heart of science. Emotions, he said, are not side effects—they are the roots of consciousness and the foundation of who we are.

💖 Bridging the Two Theories

Both Izard and Panksepp believed that emotions are innate (we are born with them) and universal (everyone experiences them). Yet they looked from different angles:

• Izard focused on how emotions appear and influence personality.
• Panksepp focused on where emotions live in the brain and how they drive behaviour.

Together, they show us that emotions are both psychological and biological—they shape our thoughts and are shaped by our brain’s chemistry. For example, the FEAR system Panksepp found in the brain matches Izard’s description of fear as a universal emotion. Likewise, JOY in Izard’s theory connects with Panksepp’s PLAY and CARE systems, revealing how love, play, and bonding share deep neural roots.

🌈 Why Understanding Emotions Matters

Understanding these ideas helps us recognize that our emotions are natural allies, not enemies. When you feel scared before a big test, your brain’s FEAR system is helping you prepare. When you laugh with a friend, your PLAY system builds trust and connection. And when you feel sad, your GRIEF system reminds you how deeply you care.

By learning to identify and name emotions—our own and others’—we become more empathetic, resilient, and self-aware. As Panksepp beautifully put it, emotions are “the roots of the mind,” the invisible bridge between biology and the human soul (Panksepp, 1998).

📚 References

Izard, C. E. (1991). The psychology of emotions. New York: Plenum Press.

Panksepp, J. (1998). Affective neuroscience: The foundations of human and animal emotions. Oxford University Press.

Panksepp, J. (2007). The archaeology of mind: Neuroevolutionary origins of human emotions. Oxford University Press.