**7. The modulation of proprioceptive perception and emotions**

In research on emotions, we find a diversity of explanations that involve descriptions of different mechanisms that affect the emotional states of a human being, which respond to different dimensions of the phenomenon: physiological, psychological, relational, behavioral, as well as cultural. Thus, in 1991, Plutchik in his book Emotions [25] indicates more than 57 definitions that arise from various authors in the field of physiology and psychology, such as W. James, S. Freud and B. Skinner, to mention a few. This fact shows the multiplicity of non-linear variables that characterize an emotion, so we can conclude that it is a complex phenomenon, which is naturally observed in the behavior of an individual, and that each person perceives in his experience.

Given this last point, we will understand "emotions as specific sequences of movement of an organism in structural coupling with the environment that an observer distinguishes". We approach emotional phenomena as the distinction of a specific configuration of a coherence in behavior. In this way we distinguish the phenomena that occur in the different operational domains of behavior: body, relation and language, and correspondingly we observe the correlations of the modes of movement, relationship and interpretation of an individual's experience.

These specific sequences of movement that constitute modes of movement define possible dynamics of action of the individual in his or her present, and with this the type of interactions that are generated in his or her relational contexts, as well as the distinctions of perceptual objects that originate his or her attentional movements in language, generating his or her interpretations.

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essential, life.

*Proprioceptive Perception: An Emergence of the Interaction of Body and Language*

In the human being two orders of emotional phenomena are observed that respond to the origin of sensorimotor learning, we find the basic emotions of phylogenetic origin, those -fear, rage, joy and sadness, on which the ontogenetic learning constitutive of the secondary or social emotions are interwoven [26], in the present

In the basic emotions, patterns of movements generate the activation of specific

nucleus, which sends projections to the cerebellum and therefore, would possibly be involved in the activation of specific sensorimotor patterns and the quality of movement of each basic emotion. These findings show that each emotion has a physiological configuration of the nervous system and the motor system that is unique to each state, which correlates with a global cognitive operation that gives rise to the

The specific movement sequence patterns we are talking about, correlate with specific sensorimotor patterns that come from a phylogenetic learning, that is, they are sensation-movement patterns that we can identify even in primitive unicellular organisms. Thus, the simple expansion and contraction movements of living bodies are indicative of the approach-avoidance behavioral pattern observable from a cell to the human being [28]. Therefore, from the sensory-motor operation of the organism in its structural coupling with the environment, emerges "the knowing" that is evidenced by the autonomy of the body to determine its effective or adequate behaviors to the maintenance of its living and social identity. That is to say, "knowing" emerges with the minimum living unit that moves and feels, feels and moves constituting the basic emotional movements that preserve the way of being of a

Therefore, these emotions that underlie every secondary emotion are related to the conservation of the individual's living identity, so that in continuous flow of the changes of state of the organism in its structural coupling with the environment, an emotional state of a cognitive nature can be identified, through the identification of the movements that generate the muscular synergies that are activated autonomously by the physiological operation of the organism. From here we speak of these emotions as a living knowledge that guides our actions in relation to preserving the

These basic emotional movements correspond to fear, anger, joy and sadness, which are differentiated by a set of qualities of the sequence of their movements and the activation of muscular synergies [29]. A recent study by Shafir et al. [30], from the analysis of the movement of each one of these emotional states, identified those crucial motor elements that distinguish each emotion and that in turn, in their repetition are capable of evoking an emotional sensation. The results showed that each emotion is predicted by a single set of motor elements and that each motor element is a predictor of a single emotion, suggesting that the 4 emotions under study

These motor patterns for each emotion delimit the possible movements of the individual, determining specific dynamics of action in its structural coupling with the environment, which in turn determine the individual's modes of relationship. Therefore, in the observation of an individual's mode of movement it is possible to characterize these modes of relationship from the flow of postural movement dynamics generated by each emotion. These dynamics are distinguished in the

muscular synergies that are triggered from the autonomic nervous system, and therefore correspond to physiological and cognitive states of the organism. Damasio et al. [27], studied the activity of the central nervous system during the evocation of memories of the 4 basic emotions. In this they observed a specific activation pattern at cortical and subcortical level for each one of the emotions. Furthermore, they observed that the emotional states evoked activate the anterior pontine

*DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.95461*

study only the first ones are approached.

"knowing" of the organism in relation to its environment.

living being within an environment that it does not know.

are discrete and have a biological substrate (see **Table 2**).

#### *Proprioceptive Perception: An Emergence of the Interaction of Body and Language DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.95461*

In the human being two orders of emotional phenomena are observed that respond to the origin of sensorimotor learning, we find the basic emotions of phylogenetic origin, those -fear, rage, joy and sadness, on which the ontogenetic learning constitutive of the secondary or social emotions are interwoven [26], in the present study only the first ones are approached.

In the basic emotions, patterns of movements generate the activation of specific muscular synergies that are triggered from the autonomic nervous system, and therefore correspond to physiological and cognitive states of the organism. Damasio et al. [27], studied the activity of the central nervous system during the evocation of memories of the 4 basic emotions. In this they observed a specific activation pattern at cortical and subcortical level for each one of the emotions. Furthermore, they observed that the emotional states evoked activate the anterior pontine nucleus, which sends projections to the cerebellum and therefore, would possibly be involved in the activation of specific sensorimotor patterns and the quality of movement of each basic emotion. These findings show that each emotion has a physiological configuration of the nervous system and the motor system that is unique to each state, which correlates with a global cognitive operation that gives rise to the "knowing" of the organism in relation to its environment.

The specific movement sequence patterns we are talking about, correlate with specific sensorimotor patterns that come from a phylogenetic learning, that is, they are sensation-movement patterns that we can identify even in primitive unicellular organisms. Thus, the simple expansion and contraction movements of living bodies are indicative of the approach-avoidance behavioral pattern observable from a cell to the human being [28]. Therefore, from the sensory-motor operation of the organism in its structural coupling with the environment, emerges "the knowing" that is evidenced by the autonomy of the body to determine its effective or adequate behaviors to the maintenance of its living and social identity. That is to say, "knowing" emerges with the minimum living unit that moves and feels, feels and moves constituting the basic emotional movements that preserve the way of being of a living being within an environment that it does not know.

Therefore, these emotions that underlie every secondary emotion are related to the conservation of the individual's living identity, so that in continuous flow of the changes of state of the organism in its structural coupling with the environment, an emotional state of a cognitive nature can be identified, through the identification of the movements that generate the muscular synergies that are activated autonomously by the physiological operation of the organism. From here we speak of these emotions as a living knowledge that guides our actions in relation to preserving the essential, life.

These basic emotional movements correspond to fear, anger, joy and sadness, which are differentiated by a set of qualities of the sequence of their movements and the activation of muscular synergies [29]. A recent study by Shafir et al. [30], from the analysis of the movement of each one of these emotional states, identified those crucial motor elements that distinguish each emotion and that in turn, in their repetition are capable of evoking an emotional sensation. The results showed that each emotion is predicted by a single set of motor elements and that each motor element is a predictor of a single emotion, suggesting that the 4 emotions under study are discrete and have a biological substrate (see **Table 2**).

These motor patterns for each emotion delimit the possible movements of the individual, determining specific dynamics of action in its structural coupling with the environment, which in turn determine the individual's modes of relationship. Therefore, in the observation of an individual's mode of movement it is possible to characterize these modes of relationship from the flow of postural movement dynamics generated by each emotion. These dynamics are distinguished in the

*Proprioception*

of the proprioceptors coming from the skin, the joints and the muscles that are projected towards the primary somatosensory cortex and the primary motor cortex, to then converge in higher order somatosensory regions [20]. The integration and comparison of proprioceptive activity with the activity of other sensory modalities (and the reflective capacity of the human being) triggers the perception of the size of the body parts, which is relative to the perception of other body parts, as well as to the environment in which the individual is coupled in a present. Thus, in situations where the activity of the nervous system presents a change in the relationships that are generative of its structure, as is the case of a vascular accident, epilepsy, anesthesia or migraine, the perception of size and shape of body parts will be modulated by this configuration, which is commonly understood as a perceptual "illusion" of the body. This phenomenon has also been observed by applying an external vibration in specific muscle regions [22]. Since the afferent activity of the muscle is modulating the sensation of the position of the limb, when performing such stimulation, it is possible to generate the "illusion" of the perception of the

movement of the limb or the whole body in a desired virtual direction.

**7. The modulation of proprioceptive perception and emotions**

In research on emotions, we find a diversity of explanations that involve descriptions of different mechanisms that affect the emotional states of a human being, which respond to different dimensions of the phenomenon: physiological, psychological, relational, behavioral, as well as cultural. Thus, in 1991, Plutchik in his book Emotions [25] indicates more than 57 definitions that arise from various authors in the field of physiology and psychology, such as W. James, S. Freud and B. Skinner, to mention a few. This fact shows the multiplicity of non-linear variables that characterize an emotion, so we can conclude that it is a complex phenomenon, which is naturally observed in the behavior of an individual, and that each person

Given this last point, we will understand "emotions as specific sequences of movement of an organism in structural coupling with the environment that an observer distinguishes". We approach emotional phenomena as the distinction of a specific configuration of a coherence in behavior. In this way we distinguish the phenomena that occur in the different operational domains of behavior: body, relation and language, and correspondingly we observe the correlations of the modes of

These specific sequences of movement that constitute modes of movement define possible dynamics of action of the individual in his or her present, and with this the type of interactions that are generated in his or her relational contexts, as well as the distinctions of perceptual objects that originate his or her attentional

movement, relationship and interpretation of an individual's experience.

movements in language, generating his or her interpretations.

correlations of the basic emotions.

perceives in his experience.

In these cases, the perception of the body is modified by unintentional factors on the part of the individual. However, the human being, through his reflective capacity, has the ability to direct his attention to the perception of his body and with it modulate the perception of the relative size and shape of his body parts. The evidence shows how paying attention to proprioceptive sensations (directing attention to movement during the execution of a task) generates a change in the sensitivity of the muscle spindle [23, 24], which would be modulating the perception of movement of the individual in its structural coupling with the environment. In this sense, training the proprioceptive perception we can modulate the muscular physiological activity, which as we will see, modulates in turn the sensorimotor

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**Table 2.**

*Emotions and movement qualities (adapted from [30]).*

experience from the proprioceptive perception, because the quality of the movements in which they generate the dynamics of activity of the muscular synergies, − speed and direction of the movement, force and muscular tone- are specific in each emotional disposition, for such in the lived experience patterns of emotional perceptions are evoked registered from proprioceptive perceptions that are correlated with the states of the evoked body.

Thus, the human being with his capacity of reflection, can recognize an emotional state in himself through the proprioceptive perception of the sensationmovement of the body of his emotion, in a present. From the study of the emotional experience, it was shown how the proprioceptive perception plays a central role in the identification of the sensations associated with global states of the body, giving emergence to the emotional experience [31]. The execution of specific body movements evokes emotional states related to those movements [32]. In turn, an emotional state modulates afferent muscular activity, modifying the patterns of sensation-movement. These observations confirm that the continuous modulation of the behavior and experience of a human being is constituted in a joint and disjointed operation of the three operational domains: body, relation and language.

In the study of Shafir et al. [30] they show that the repetition of a movement is capable of evoking an emotion, the attention is directed to the execution of that movement or sequences of movements, therefore, proprioceptive perception is active. In this way, if from the reflective movement of the attention, proprioceptive perception is intended in a present, the emotion is modulated in relation to the immediate environment and not to the flow of evocative associations of a past or future, generating a greater congruence in the structural coupling with the environment in which the living body exists, in a present.

The aforementioned is confirmed by the results of our studies about emotional plasticity in people who practice the cognitive body integration method (CBI), which correspond to a movement-based contemplative practice [33]. CBI practice is constituted from the model of the three-dimensionality of behavior to which we have made reference in this chapter. In the research we measured the autonomic response, through the pupil diameter, during the presentation of images with emotional content in a group of people who had experience in CBI practices and in a control group (CG). Our results showed that the CBI group presented shorter pupil recovery times than the CG group, showing a better emotional adaptation given the context of the individual, in a present [34].

The concept of emotional plasticity alludes to the natural loss of generative behavioral plasticity in the epigenesis of the individual, due to the history of structural links with others and the environment in which they are placed. This generates ways of moving, doing, and interpreting that are proper to the way of life of the

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relative to their situation in space.

*Proprioceptive Perception: An Emergence of the Interaction of Body and Language*

with the present situation and not only of joy or enjoyment.

the ways of doing and relating of people in the current way of life.

**8. Conclusions**

family and culture in which the person lives, configuring in their behaviors modes of emotion that maintain a prevalence of a basic emotion, which over time restricts the domains of action of people, often reaching states of distress and loss of wellbeing within the current way of life. Thus, from the model we call "three-dimensionality of behavior", correlations between the three operational domains of behavior are distinguished, generating correlations between ways of doing, relating and interpreting of people; from which personalized practices are designed. These practices consist of exercises in which the movement of attention towards the body – in a recursive and frequently manner- is synchronized with dynamic recurrent and recursive movements that involve the master muscles of the muscular synergies of an emotion, with reflections of what occurs in the present. Thus, these practices are intended primarily to restore emotional plasticity in people, and generate learning to modulate their emotional states, from intentional attention to proprioceptive perception, which facilitates placing oneself in the space within the environment in which one exists, maintaining a state of presence in the here and now of the body, which gives an emotional autonomy that modulates the physiological states congruent with the present contingencies, maintaining well-being in the sense of coherence

The purposes of approaching the paradigm from which the reflexive logic of the explanations of our observations of the phenomena of human behavior and experience is generated are, on the one hand, to show how the explanatory models and their concepts configure the perceptual objects of the world that we perceive, in this case from the doing of science. And on the other hand, to show how the recognition of the autonomy and self-reliance of the body, which reveals the knowledge that results in the continuous structural coupling of the organism with its environment, gives us a look at how the harmonies or orders that are given in the co-evolutionary drift of living species are generated, which allows us to have new references to evaluate the incidences in the individual and collective well-being of

In relation to our study, we can conclude that, in the epigenesis of an individual, a structural congruence is generated -between proprioception as an operation of the body and the configuration of proprioceptive perception in the domain of language- generating a co-determination of both phenomena in the structural coupling of the individual with others and his immediate environment, in a present. This explains that proprioceptive perception is not a dual phenomenon, but emerges from the interaction of the three operational domains of behavior as a coherent and unified experience. Proprioceptive perception - as the perceptual object of the observer in language - modulates and in turn is modulated by the muscular physiology that from its structural changes specifies qualities of movement observed in individual behavior and that in its experience are configured as qualities of movement, volume, relative dispositions of parts of the body and

Proprioceptive perception has great implications for the modulation of an individual's mode of emotion, which are defined by specific physiological states. This occurs because the dynamics of specific movements of each base emotion which characterizes the way of moving -, are related to the conservation in adaptation of the individual within his changing environment, in a present, and not to the interpretations that he makes of his situation, which is the case of secondary or social emotions, those that do not present defined physiological and cognitive

*DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.95461*

*Proprioceptive Perception: An Emergence of the Interaction of Body and Language DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.95461*

family and culture in which the person lives, configuring in their behaviors modes of emotion that maintain a prevalence of a basic emotion, which over time restricts the domains of action of people, often reaching states of distress and loss of wellbeing within the current way of life. Thus, from the model we call "three-dimensionality of behavior", correlations between the three operational domains of behavior are distinguished, generating correlations between ways of doing, relating and interpreting of people; from which personalized practices are designed. These practices consist of exercises in which the movement of attention towards the body – in a recursive and frequently manner- is synchronized with dynamic recurrent and recursive movements that involve the master muscles of the muscular synergies of an emotion, with reflections of what occurs in the present. Thus, these practices are intended primarily to restore emotional plasticity in people, and generate learning to modulate their emotional states, from intentional attention to proprioceptive perception, which facilitates placing oneself in the space within the environment in which one exists, maintaining a state of presence in the here and now of the body, which gives an emotional autonomy that modulates the physiological states congruent with the present contingencies, maintaining well-being in the sense of coherence with the present situation and not only of joy or enjoyment.
