自約1990年代後期起，對情緒的研究有所增加，其中包括心理學、醫學、史學、情緒社會學（英語：Sociology of emotions）和計算機科學等許多領域。試圖解釋情緒的起源、功能和其他方面的眾多理論促進了對該主題的更深入的研究。當前情緒概念的研究領域包括刺激和引發情緒的材料的開發。此外，正子斷層造影掃描和功能性磁振造影掃描有助於研究大腦中的情感圖像（英語：affective picture）過程。[8]
威廉·詹姆士在1884年发表的文章中提出其理論，指出情绪体验主要是身体变化造成的。[46]丹麦心理学家卡尔·兰格（英语：Carl Lange (physician)）（Carl Lange）几乎在同时发表了相似的理论，因此这被称为“詹姆士-兰格理论”（英：James-Lange theory）。这一理论主张：“当身体产生（生理）变化时，我们感受到这些变化，这就是情绪。”[46]
认知心理学家认为，造成情绪的直接原因不是外部事件，而是我们对事件的判断。[63]一个典型的例子是，奥运会上获得铜牌的选手比获得银牌的选手更高兴，前者庆幸自己获得奖牌，后者则遗憾没有拿到第一。[64]瑪格達·阿諾（英语：Magda B. Arnold）（Magda Arnold）在60年代最先提出，在外界事件发生后，大脑的边缘系统会自动判断这件事对我们是好是坏[65]根据事件定性，我们下意识地决定是喜欢还是厌恶这件事，因此产生情绪。情绪成为我们的动机，使我们接近或是避免刚刚发生的事件。
^Panksepp, Jaak. Affective neuroscience: the foundations of human and animal emotions [Reprint]. Oxford [u.a.]: Oxford Univ. Press. 2005: 9.ISBN 978-0195096736.Our emotional feelings reflect our ability to subjectively experience certain states of the nervous system. Although conscious feeling states are universally accepted as major distinguishing characteristics of human emotions, in animal research the issue of whether other organisms feel emotions is little more than a conceptual embarrassment
^Ekman, Paul; Davidson, Richard J. The Nature of emotion: fundamental questions. New York: Oxford University Press. 1994: 291–293.ISBN 978-0195089448.Emotional processing, but not emotions, can occur unconsciously.
^Cabanac, Michel. What is emotion?. Behavioural Processes. 2002,60 (2): 69–83.doi:10.1016/S0376-6357(02)00078-5.There is no consensus in the literature on a definition of emotion. The term is taken for granted in itself and, most often, emotion is defined with reference to a list: anger, disgust, fear, joy, sadness, and surprise. [...] I propose here that emotion is any mental experience with high intensity and high hedonic content (pleasure/displeasure).
^Scherer, K.R. What are emotions? And how can they be measured?. Social Science Information. 2005,44: 693–727.
^Mascolo, M. F., Fischer, K. W.,& Li, J. (2003). Dynamic development of component system of emotions: Pride，shame, and guilt in China and the United States. In R. J. Davidson, K. R. Scherer, & H. H. Goldsmith (Eds.),Handbook of affective sciences (pp. 375-408). New York: Oxford University Press.
^Schwarz, N.H. (1990). "Feelings as information: Informational and motivational functions of affective states".Handbook of motivation and cognition: Foundations of social behavior, 2, 527–561.[缺少ISBN]
^Solomon, R. L. (1980). The opponent-process theory of motivation: The costs of pleasure and the benefits of pain.American Psychologist, 35, 691-712.
^Izard, C. E. (1991).The psychology of emotions. New York: Plenum Press.
^Ekman, P., & Davidson, R. J. (Eds.). (1994).The nature of emotions: Fundamental questions (pp. 20-24). New York: Oxford University Press.
^Darwin, C. A. (1872).The expression of the emotions in man and animals. London: John Murray.
^Tooby, J., & Cosmides, L. (1990). The past explains the present: Emotional adaptations and the structure of ancestral environment.Ethology and Sociobiology, 11, 375-424.
^Keltner, D., & Haidt, J. (1999). Social functions of emotions at four levels of analysis.Cognitive and Emotions, 13, 505-521.
^See Philip Fisher (1999)Wonder, The Rainbow and the Aesthetics of Rare Experiences for an introduction
^Cacioppo, J. T. (1998). Somatic responses to psychological stress: The reactivity hypothesis.Advances in psychological science, Vol. 2, pp. 87-114). East Sussex, United Kingdom: Psychology Press
^Aziz-Zadeh L, Damasio A. (2008) Embodied semantics for actions: findings from functional brain imaging. J Physiol Paris. Jan-May;102(1-3):35-9
^LeDoux J.E. (1996) The Emotional Brain. New York: Simon & Schuster.
^McIntosh, D. N., Zajonc, R. B., Vig, P. S., & Emerick, S. W. (1997). Facial movement, breathing, temperature, and affect: Implications of the vascular theory of emotional efference. Cognition & Emotion, 11(2), 171-195.
^Laird, James,Feelings: the Perception of Self, Oxford University Press
^Cannon, W. B. (1927). The James-Lange theory of emotions: A critical examination and an alternative theory. The American Journal of Psychology, 39(1/4), 106-124.
^Levenson, R. W. (1994). The search for autonomic specificity. In P. Ekman & R. J. Davidson (Eds.),The nature of emotion: Fundamental questions (pp. 252-257). New York : Oxford University Press.
^Gray, J. A. (1994). Three fundamental emotion systems. In P. Ekman & R.J. Davidson (Eds.),The nature of emotion: Fundamental questions (pp.243-247). New York: Oxford University Press.
^Ekman, P., Levenson, R. W., & Friesen, W. V. (1983). Autonomic nervous system activity distinguishes between emotions.Science, 221, 1208-1210.
^Lövheim H. A new three-dimensional model for emotions and monoamine neurotransmitters. Med Hypotheses (2011), Epub ahead of print.doi:10.1016/j.mehy.2011.11.016PMID 22153577
^Kringelbach, M.L.; O'Doherty, J.O.; Rolls, E.T.; & Andrews, C. (2003). Activation of the human orbitofrontal cortex to a liquid food stimulus is correlated with its subjective pleasantness.Cerebral Cortex, 13, 1064–1071.
^Drake, R.A. (1987). Effects of gaze manipulation on aesthetic judgments: Hemisphere priming of affect.Acta Psychologica, 65, 91–99.
^Merckelbach, H.; & van Oppen, P. (1989). Effects of gaze manipulation on subjective evaluation of neutral and phobia-relevant stimuli: A comment on Drake's (1987) 'Effects of gaze manipulation on aesthetic judgments: Hemisphere priming of affect.'Acta Psychologica, 70, 147–151.
^Harmon-Jones, E.; Vaughn-Scott, K.; Mohr, S.; Sigelman, J.; & Harmon-Jones, C. (2004). The effect of manipulated sympathy and anger on left and right frontal cortical activity.Emotion, 4, 95–101.
^LeDoux，J. E. (1992). Brain mechanisms of emotion and emotional learning. ‘’Current Opinion in Neurobiology’’, 2, 191-198.
^Shaver， P., Schwartz， J., Kirson, D.,& O'Connor, C. (1987). Emotion knowledge: Further exploration of a prototype approach.Journal of personality and Social Psychology, 52， 1061-1086.
^Mascolo, M. F., Fischer, K. W., & Li,J. (2003). Dynamic development of component system of emotions: Pride, shame, and guilt in China and the United States. In R. J. Davidson, K. R. Scherer, & H. H. Goldsmith (Eds.),Handbook of affective sciences (pp. 375-408). New York: Oxford University Press.
^Shaver, P. R., Wu, S., & Schwartz, J. C. (1992). Cross-cultural similarities and differences in emotion and its representation: A prototype approach. In Clark, M. S. (Ed.),Review of Personality and Social Psychology, 13, pp. 231-251. Sage: Thousand Oaks.
^Saarni, C. (1997). Coping with aversive feelings.Motivation and Emotion, 21, 45-63.
^Smith, A. C., III, & Kleinman, S. (1989). Managing emotions in medical school: Students’ contacts with the living and the dead.Social Psychology Quarterly, 52, 56-69.
^Hochschild, A. R. (1983).The managed heart. Berkeley: University of California Press.
LeDoux, J.E. (1986). The neurobiology of emotion. Chap. 15 in J.E. LeDoux & W. Hirst (Eds.)Mind and Brain: dialogues in cognitive neuroscience. New York: Cambridge.
Mandler, G. (1984).Mind and Body: Psychology of emotion and stress. New York: Norton.
Nussbaum, Martha C. (2001)Upheavals of Thought: The Intelligence of Emotions. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Plutchik, R. (1980). A general psychoevolutionary theory of emotion. In R. Plutchik & H. Kellerman (Eds.),Emotion: Theory, research, and experience: Vol. 1. Theories of emotion (pp. 3–33). New York: Academic.
Dror Green (2011). "Emotional Training, the art of creating a sense of a safe place in a changing world". Bulgaria: Books, Publishers and the Institute of Emotional Training.
