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Emotional intelligence · a life skill

Simple Emotion Labeling

from “bad” to the word that fits

A feeling usually arrives with a rough name: bad, off, stressed, fine. Go one step finer, to its family, then one more, to the exact word, and say it in a sentence with a because. The rough word only tells you something's wrong. The exact one tells you what, and what to do about it.

  • Easy to start
  • Medium impact
  • Learn it: 1 week
  • About a minute each time
one feeling, pressed and labelled
A feeling drawn as a plant: the rough first word at the root, three families on the branches, exact words as leaves, and a label Friday, 7:40 pm: Sam's friend cancels dinner. The first word is “bad”. It branches into three families: sad (lonely, left out, let down, disappointed); angry (annoyed, resentful); afraid (uneasy, worried); Sam climbs the sad branch, tries the leaves and keeps “let down”. The label reads: “I feel let down, because I'd kept the whole evening free.” Friday, 7:40 pm: dinner's cancelled The exact word The family The first word “bad” lonely left out let down disappointed sad annoyed resentful angry uneasy worried afraid Pressed: Fri, 7:40 pm “I feel let down, because I'd kept the whole evening free.” 1 2 3 4

“Bad” told Sam something was wrong. “Let down” told them what: they'd wanted the evening, not a fight. So the reply could be “next week?” rather than a sulk.

The next time it happens

Try it now.

  1. Catch the first word

    Notice what you'd say if someone asked: bad, off, stressed, fine. That's the root, not the answer.

  2. Find the family

    Ask which is closest, even roughly: sad, angry, afraid, ashamed, glad or calm. Sad and angry feel alike at first and ask for very different things.

  3. Try two leaves, keep one

    Say two exact words under your breath: “left out?” “let down?” One will fit better. Keep that one.

    If none fit, the family's probably wrong. Go back one step.

  4. Say it with a because

    “I feel let down, because I'd kept the whole evening free.” Out loud, in a note, or in your head. The because is what you'll act on.

Sam's Friday: the text arrives at 7:40 pm. First word: bad. Family: sad, not angry, because Sam isn't cross with their friend. Left out? No, nobody else went. Let down? Yes. With that word, the reply writes itself: “No worries. Next week?”

This is a naming habit, not treatment. If a feeling has stayed heavy for weeks, or it's getting in the way of your days, talk to a doctor. If you might hurt yourself, call your local emergency number now.

Two steps and a sentence

Name one you're feeling now.

Pick the family first, then the word. If the list hasn't got it, type your own. Add what set it off, and the sentence builds itself. Press it to keep it, and over a week you'll see which words you reach for.

Step 1Which family is it closest to?

Step 2Which word fits best?

Pick a family and its words appear here.

Label

    Pressed labels stay in this browser and nowhere else. The word lists are a start, not a test: if your own word fits better, it's the right one.

    The research behind it

    Choosing the word calms the alarm.

    In 2007, Matthew Lieberman's lab at UCLA put 30 people in a brain scanner and showed them faces, most of them afraid or angry. Sometimes they picked the word for the face from two (“scared” or “angry”). Sometimes, for the same kind of face, they picked a name that fitted it from two names.

    Both tasks meant reading the face and choosing a word. But choosing the feeling word went with a smaller response in the amygdala, the brain's alarm for threat, and more activity in a patch of the right prefrontal cortex. The more that patch lit up, the quieter the amygdala.

    It's a scanner study of photographs, not of your Friday night. The everyday version is the same move, though: you stop just reacting and pick the word. Read the study's abstract.

    The design of Lieberman and colleagues (2007). One face; either pick the feeling word from two, or pick a fitting name from two. Picking the feeling word went with a lower amygdala response and more right ventrolateral prefrontal activity. Each trial, five seconds a photo: an angry face Pick the feeling word scared angry Pick a fitting name a name a name Picking the word, compared with picking the name: The amygdala responded less to the face Right ventrolateral prefrontal cortex more active; the two moved opposite ways 30 adults; most faces looked afraid or angry.
    The design and the direction of the result, no figures. Lieberman et al., “Putting feelings into words”, Psychological Science, 2007.

    “My first reaction was terrible sadness. . . . But the second reaction was that of anger, because you can't do anything with the sadness.”

    One person, 11 September 2001. Named: sadness, then anger, and what each was for.

    “I felt a bunch of things I couldn't put my finger on. Maybe anger, confusion, fear. I just felt bad on September 11th. Really bad.”

    Another person, the same day. Named: bad, really bad.

    Two people stopped by reporters on the same morning, quoted at the start of a review by Todd Kashdan, Lisa Feldman Barrett and Patrick McKnight (Current Directions in Psychological Science, 2015). The first had words that pointed somewhere; the second had “bad”.

    The idea

    Why it works.

    Researchers call this affect labeling, and the habit of using finer words emotion differentiation or granularity. Kashdan and colleagues put the reason plainly: a raw bad mood is “objectless and directionless”. Once it has a name, it's tied to something in front of you, and it tells you how to act there.

    “Bad” could mean rest, apologise, push back or ask for help. “Let down” means you wanted something and didn't get it, which points at a next week, not a quarrel. The family step matters because the neighbours in it ask for similar things.

    Next: say what the feeling is asking for with Simple Needs Translation.

    When it goes wrong

    Habits that help.

    • Name it, don't argue with it. “I feel let down” is the whole sentence. “…but I shouldn't” starts a second fight.
    • Your word beats the list's. If “homesick” fits and isn't there, it's still the right one.
    • Label yours, not theirs. “You're being defensive” isn't labeling; it's a guess said as a fact.
    • Try it small first. A late bus, a slow queue. The habit is easier to reach for on a big day if it's had practice on small ones.

    Go deeper

    Keep going.

    Practise this in HourLife.

    In Mood: Name the feeling. Log how you feel on a five-face scale, add a note and triggers, and see your days on a calendar, a year grid, and a 30-day trend.

    Download on the App Store Download on the Mac App Store How Mood works in HourLife