Dancing with feeling

A nearly 2,000-year-old Hindu text on the performing arts has opened a new avenue of research into emotions. The ancient book, known as the Natyasastra, describes nine primary emotions and how to express each of them in Indian classical dance. Until now, researchers studying emotions have mainly had volunteers assess pictures of facial expressions.

Natives of both the United States and India shown videotapes of these dances identified the emotions accurately in two out of three trials, a new study finds.