For "full" emotional communication, one person needs to allow his state of mind to be influenced by that of the other.

Interpersonal experience shapes the mind as it continues to develop throughout the lifespan... Interactions with the environment, especially relationships with other people, directly shape the development of the brain's structure and function.

...not all encounters with the world affect the mind equally. Studies have demonstrated that if the brain appraises an event as "meaningful," it will be more likely to be recalled in the future.

Adolescents who are absorbing negative messages about who they are and what is expected of them may sink to that level instead of realizing their true potential. As Johann Wolfgang von Goethe wrote, “Treat people as if they were what they ought to be and you help them become what they are capable of being."

The amygdala, along with related areas..., plays a crucial role in coordinating perceptions with memory and behavior. These regions are especially sensitive to social interactions.

Internal mental experience is not the product of a photographic process. Internal reality is in fact constructed by the brain as it interacts with the environment in the present, in the context of its past experiences and expectancies of the future. At the level of perceptual categorizations, we have reached a land of mental representations quite distant from the layers of the world just inches away from their place inside the skull. This is the reason why each of us experiences a unique way of minding the world. (pp. 166-167)

Early experience shapes the structure and function of the brain. This reveals the fundamental way in which gene expression is determined by experience.