Evolution of emotion Evolution of emotion The study of the evolution of emotions dates back to the 19th century. Evolution and natural selection has been applied to the study of human communication, mainly by Charles Darwin in his 1872 work, "The Expression of the Emotions in Man and Animals". Darwin researched the expression of emotions in an effort to support his theory of evolution. He proposed that much like other traits found in animals, emotions also evolved and were adapted over time. His work looked at not only facial expressions in animals and specifically humans, but attempted to point out parallels between behaviors
The Expression of the Emotions in Man and Animals the actor Henry Siddons in his "Practical Illustrations of Rhetorical Gesture and Action" (1807) and by the anatomist Robert Knox in his "Manual of Artistic Anatomy" (1852) – but abandoned them as unreliable, although the text of "The Expression" is littered with quotations from Shakespeare. Darwin opens the book with three chapters on "the general principles of expression", introducing the rather Lamarckist phrase "serviceable associated habits". With this phrase, Darwin seeks to describe the initially voluntary actions which come together to constitute the complex expressions of emotion. He then invokes a principle of "antithesis", through which opposite states of mind