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exposing people to onions, which makes them cry, but that does not make them feel
sad. Therefore he proposed that the brain, especially the thalamus, controls emotions.
Philip Bard later expanded this theory. To Sternberg both these theories carry weight.
According to LeDoux (1997:45) Cannon came up with the concept of an
"emergency reaction" where the body is prepared for a physiological response through
blood flowing to the body areas, which will need to be activated during the response.
All this action is facilitated by the sympathetic nervous system, which is part of the
autonomous nervous system (ANS). Therefore the physiological responses to different
emotions should be the same. This was not true.
The Right Cerebral Hemisphere and Emotions
According to Joseph (1993:1) "Some people claim that they do not believe in an
unconscious or the possibility that our actions are sometimes influenced by feelings or
impulses that originate outside the conscious mind." They always claim to have full
control of their feelings and thoughts. However, it is true that there are many actions
that are mediated by the unconscious halfofthe mind and brain. To Sigmund Freud the
mind functions in three domains: the conscious, the preconscious and the unconscious
mind. The conscious mind plays a very minor role in mental functioning. It is the
unconscious mind that plays a major role, with the mental forces the ego, id and
superego. Freud felt that thoughts, feelings and desires exist as unconscious impulses,
which have to pass through the preconscious mind to reach the conscious level.
Brand and Graves (1994:72) state that Elizabeth Holman, when writing about
intuition, says that: "the right hemisphere of adults is most active when subjects
respond emotionally, particularly the negative emotions such as fear, anxiety or