Università Roma Tre

1. General principles of neurosciences for understanding self-control and emotions.
- Brain and mind. Between biological evolution, heredity, environment and experience
- The maturation of brain circuits of emotion and voluntary control of behavior
- Attention, working memory, self-control
Exercises:
- How do you feel? Description of affective states and emotional literacy
- The experience of (dis)control of the mind

2. We become what we repeatedly do: the plasticity of the brain and behavior
- How the neuron and neurotransmission work
- Neuroplasticity and learning
- The different types of associative learning
- Construction and fixation of habits and automatisms
Exercises:
- Exploring memory
- Attention Training through focus on the breath

3. What is an emotion?
- Emotions as adaptive programs/ Emotions as constructs
- The main theories of emotion
- Human history and the evolutionary mismatch of emotional programs
Exercises:
- Basic meditation
- Well-remembered and reactivated well-being

4. The regulation of emotions
- Basic principles in the psychobiology of emotions
- Emotions and language, Recognizing and naming an emotion as implicit emotion regulation
- The different possible strategies of emotion regulation, adaptive/dysfunctional
- Learning and modification of emotional response styles
Exercises:
- Naming emotions (Strengthening emotional vocabulary)
- Introduction to body scan
- STOP technique - Stop, Take a breath, Observe, Proceed

5. Emotions and stress
- Brief history of the concept of stress, from pathophysiology to the cognitive dimensions of emotions
- The mechanisms of stress
- The impact of chronic stress on the brain and cognitive and executive functions
Exercises:
- Measuring perceived stress
- Relaxation training
- Gratitude journal


6. Cognitive training and contemplative practices. Mindfulness-based practices: scientific evidence and general introduction
- What is Mindfulness
- Risks and consequences of chronic distraction and mindlessness
- Mind wandering and negative mood
- Mindfulness and emotion regulation
- Mindfulness and neuroplasticity
Exercises:
- Basic Mindfulness Meditation
- Meditation in motion


7. Voluntary control of behavior: how it works, how it is being deplete, how it is enhanced
- The neural basis of self-control
- Attention and self-control
- Self-control and ego depletion
Exercises:
- Self-affirmation;
- Implementation intentions


8. Voluntary control of behavior: how to strengthen it
- Self-control can be trained and enhanced
- Exercise as a form of training self-control
- Ego depletion, Mindfulness and other exercises to train the "muscle" of self-control
Exercises:
- Mindfulness Meditation
- Mindfulness of emotions

9. Prosocial behaviors, cognitive empathy
- Prosocial behaviors, executive functions and self-control
- Prosocial behaviors, psychological health and well-being
- What is Cognitive empathy and its brain correlates
Exercises:
- The Reflective Listening Technique;
- Cultivating loving kindness


10. Prosocial behaviors, affective empathy and compassion
- What is affective empathy and its brain correlates
- Empathy as an embodied simulation of others' emotions
- Neuroplasticity and the prosocial brain
Exercises:
- Compassion meditation
- Feeling connected

Stefano Canali, Regolare le emozioni. Teorie e metodi per lo sviluppo e il potenziamento dell’autocontrollo. Carocci, Roma, 2021