ABSTRACT
Jaak Panksepp and Antonio Damasio are two particular researchers and writers who have contributed signi®cantly to our understanding of the development of affect and the role that the brain plays in this process. Panksepp (1998) highlights the presence of basic affective states as a key part of the `psychic scaffolding' for other forms of consciousness. In his book Affective Neuroscience: The Foundations of Human and Animal Emotions he offers us a dense and comprehensive account of emotional processes in mammals, based on an interdisciplinary view of development. Based on his review of the relevant research, he maintains that `Descartes' faith in his assertion ``I think, therefore I am'' may be superseded by a more primitive af®rmation that is part of the genetic make-up of all mammals: ``I feel, therefore I am'' (p. 309). In his book, Panksepp presents us with a succinct historical overview of developments in psychology, beginning with the focus of behaviourists such as John Watson and B. F. Skinner in the early part of the twentieth century on environmental factors in an attempt to understand the behaviour of both animals and humans. The behaviourist approach came under vehement criticisms from the linguist Noam Chomsky, who was instrumental in highlighting the erroneous assumptions made by behaviourists in the extension of their ideas about learning language (Leahey, 2004). As Panksepp points out, behaviourists had not taken into account the enormous importance of `instinctual, evolutionary baggage' (1998: 11). He goes on in this book, as well as in his other publications, to provide us with a research-based and detailed insight into the primitive affective structures of the brain and their multifaceted exchanges with the environment, while also recognizing the hugely complex nature of this area of study, speci®cally in the identi®cation of the plasticity and ¯exibility of the human brain.
