06/26/2015

Meet Inside Out’s Emotion Coach

17:27 minutes

Anger, Disgust, Joy, Fear, and Sadness pose inside “headquarters” in 11-year-old Riley’s mind, in the new movie Inside Out. Image courtesy of Disney/Pixar
Anger, Disgust, Joy, Fear, and Sadness pose inside “headquarters” in 11-year-old Riley’s mind, in the new movie Inside Out. Image courtesy of Disney/Pixar

Most of us would prefer to ignore or deny negative emotions like fear, anger, sadness, and disgust. But Pixar’s new hit film Inside Out asks viewers to get up close and personal with uncomfortable emotions. That, says the film’s science advisor Dacher Keltner, could be a good thing. Inside Out takes place almost entirely inside the mind of 11-year-old Riley, a happy-go-lucky kid whose life is thrown into an emotional tailspin by her family’s move. Keltner, a professor of psychology and an emotion researcher at the University of California, Berkeley, talks with Ira about the value of sadness, and how he helped Inside Out’s filmmakers navigate a child’s mind.

 

Segment Guests

Dacher Keltner

Dacher Keltner is a psychology professor and co-director of the Greater Good Science Center at the University of California, Berkeley in Berkeley, California.

Meet the Producer

About Annie Minoff

Annie Minoff is a producer for The Journal from Gimlet Media and the Wall Street Journal, and a former co-host and producer of Undiscovered. She also plays the banjo.