Mood effects on emotion recognition

Mood affects memory and social judgments. However, findings are inconsistent with regard to how mood affects emotion recognition: For sad moods, general performance decrements in emotion recognition have been reported, as well as an emotion specific bias, such as better recognition of sad facial expressions compared to happy expressions (negative bias). Far less research has been conducted on the influence of happy moods on emotion recognition. We primed 93 participants with happy, sad, or neutral moods and had them perform an emotion recognition task. Results showed a negative bias for participants in sad moods and a positive bias for participants in happy moods. Sad and happy moods hampered the recognition of mood-incongruent expressions; the recognition of mood-congruent expressions was not affected by moods.     

Emotional language processing: how mood affects integration processes during discourse comprehension

This research tests whether mood affects semantic processing during discourse comprehension by facilitating integration of information congruent with moods’ valence. Participants in happy, sad, or neutral moods listened to stories with positive or negative endings during EEG recording. N400 peak amplitudes showed mood congruence for happy and sad participants: endings incongruent with participants’ moods demonstrated larger peaks. Happy and neutral moods exhibited larger peaks for negative endings, thus showing a similarity between negativity bias (neutral mood) and mood congruence (happy mood). Mood congruence resulted in differential processing of negative information: happy mood showed larger amplitudes for negative endings than neutral mood, and sad mood showed smaller amplitudes. N400 peaks were also sensitive to whether ending valence was communicated directly or as a result of inference. This effect was moderately modulated by mood. In conclusion, the notion of context for discourse processing should include comprehenders’ affective states preceding language processing.     

Effects of induced emotional state on lexical processing in younger and older adults

The authors investigated the effects of an induced emotional mood state on lexical decision task (LDT) performance in 50 young adults and 25 older adults. Participants were randomly assigned to either happy or sad mood induction conditions. An emotional mood state was induced by having the participants listen to 8 min of classical music previously rated to induce happy or sad moods. Results replicated previous studies with young adults (i.e., sad-induced individuals responded faster to sad words and happy-induced individuals responded faster to happy words) and extended this pattern to older adults. Results are discussed with regard to information processing, aging, and emotion.     

Effects of Induced Emotional State on Lexical Processing in Younger and Older Adults

The authors investigated the effects of an induced emotional mood state on lexical decision task (LDT) performance in 50 young adults and 25 older adults. Participants were randomly assigned to either happy or sad mood induction conditions. An emotional mood state was induced by having the participants listen to 8 min of classical music previously rated to induce happy or sad moods. Results replicated previous studies with young adults (i.e., sad-induced individuals responded faster to sad words and happy-induced individuals responded faster to happy words) and extended this pattern to older adults. Results are discussed with regard to information processing, aging, and emotion.     

Do you see what I see? Affect and visual information processing

Individuals in sad moods process information in a less global and more local manner than do those in happier moods. This experiment investigates whether processing speed is associated with these mood effects, whether task ambiguity moderates these mood effects, and whether making feelings appear irrelevant to the task can eliminate these mood effects. Participants in happy, sad, and neutral moods were lead to experience their feelings as being either relevant or irrelevant to a global/local processing task. As predicted, sad moods decreased global processing relative to happier moods when feelings seemed relevant to the task and when the criteria for responding were ambiguous, but not when feelings seemed irrelevant or when the criteria were unambiguous. Consistent with the idea that mood guides processing, increases in affect intensity were associated with faster reaction times. Overall, the results suggest that mood and processing effects share some core similarities with mood and judgement effects.     

Mood-dependent retrieval and mood awareness

Abstract

In six experiments, subjects were induced into happy or sad moods prior to studying a list of words, and then induced into either the same or different mood prior to freely recalling the list. In addition, subjects were administered various individual difference measures of mood states. The hypothesis was that subjects who profess to be most aware of their moods would be most likely to show disrupted performance when study and test moods were different. Mood-dependent performance was not generally observed, nor was there any evidence that it more consistently emerged for high-aware subjects.     

Mood, memory, and social judgments in children

The influence of positive and negative moods on children's recall and recognition memory and impression-formation judgments was investigated in a two-list experimental design. A total of 161 schoolchildren, 8 to 10 years old, were presented with audiovisual information containing positive and negative details about 2 target children. Each presentation was preceded by happy or sad mood manipulations. One day later, the children were again placed in a happy or sad mood, and their recall and recognition memory and impression-formation judgments were assessed. Results showed that memory was better when (a) the children felt happy during encoding, retrieval, or both; (b) the material was incongruent with learning mood; (c) the 2 target characters were encountered in contrasting rather than in matching mood states; and (d) recall mood matched encoding mood. A happy mood increased the extremity of both positive and negative impression-formation judgments. Results are contrasted with experimental data obtained with normal or depressed adults, and implications are considered for contemporary theories of mood effects on cognition and for social-developmental research.     

When the ends outweigh the means: mood and level of identification in depression

Research in healthy controls has found that mood influences cognitive processing via level of action identification: happy moods are associated with global and abstract processing; sad moods are associated with local and concrete processing. However, this pattern seems inconsistent with the high level of abstract processing observed in depressed patients, leading Watkins (2008, 2010) to hypothesise that the association between mood and level of goal/action identification is impaired in depression. We tested this hypothesis by measuring level of identification on the Behavioural Identification Form after happy and sad mood inductions in never-depressed controls and currently depressed patients. Participants used increasingly concrete action identifications as they became sadder and less happy, but this effect was moderated by depression status. Consistent with Watkins' (2008) hypothesis, increases in sad mood and decreases in happiness were associated with shifts towards the use of more concrete action identifications in never-depressed individuals, but not in depressed patients. These findings suggest that the putatively adaptive association between mood and level of identification is impaired in major depression.     

When the ends outweigh the means: Mood and level of identification in depression

Research in healthy controls has found that mood influences cognitive processing via level of action identification: happy moods are associated with global and abstract processing; sad moods are associated with local and concrete processing. However, this pattern seems inconsistent with the high level of abstract processing observed in depressed patients, leading Watkins (2008, 2010) to hypothesise that the association between mood and level of goal/action identification is impaired in depression. We tested this hypothesis by measuring level of identification on the Behavioural Identification Form after happy and sad mood inductions in never-depressed controls and currently depressed patients. Participants used increasingly concrete action identifications as they became sadder and less happy, but this effect was moderated by depression status. Consistent with Watkins' (2008) hypothesis, increases in sad mood and decreases in happiness were associated with shifts towards the use of more concrete action identifications in never-depressed individuals, but not in depressed patients. These findings suggest that the putatively adaptive association between mood and level of identification is impaired in major depression.     

When necessity is the mother of invention: Mood and problem solving

Happy moods foster the ability to think about problems in new ways, but little is known about how sad moods affect this process. This paper investigates the hypothesis that individuals in sad moods adhere to the data and might not think about problems in new ways until they receive data indicating that it is appropriate to do so. To investigate this hypothesis, participants in happy, sad, and neutral moods completed a classic mental set task (Luchins, 1942). All mood groups were able to break the mental set and to think about the problems in a new way, but mood affected when they did so. Consistent with the idea that individuals in sad moods adhere to the data, they relied on the mental set until they received evidence that it may be problematic. In contrast, individuals in happier moods were more likely to abandon the mental set on their own, rather than wait for evidence of its inadequacy. In three follow-up experiments, when the information provided by participants’ sad feelings was rendered uninformative, the mood effect disappeared. These findings are consistent with the claim that affect influences processing only when it provides information about how to proceed.     

Positive mood + action = negative mood + inaction: effects of general action and inaction concepts on decisions and performance as a function of affect

General action and inaction concepts have been shown to produce broad, goal-mediated effects on cognitive and motor activity irrespective of the type of activity. The current research tested a model in which action and inaction goals interact with the valence of incidental moods to guide behavior. Over four experiments, participants' moods were manipulated to be positive (happy), neutral, or negative (angry or sad), and then general action, inaction, and neutral concepts were primed. In Experiment 1, action primes increased intellectual performance when participants experienced a positive (happy) or neutral mood, whereas inaction primes increased performance when participants experienced a negative (angry) mood. Including a control-prime condition, Experiments 2 and 3 replicated these results measuring the number of general interest articles participants were willing to read and participants' memory for pictures of celebrities. Experiment 4 replicated the results comparing happiness with sadness and suggested that the effect of the prime's adoption was automatic. Overall, the findings supported an interactive model by which action concepts and positive affect produce the same increases in active behavior as inaction concepts and negative affect.     

Effects of emotional state on lexical decision performance

The effect of emotional state on lexical processing was investigated. Subjects were randomly assigned to either a happy or sad mood condition. Emotional state was then induced by listening to 8 min of classical music previously rated to induce happy or sad moods. Response times and error rates were analyzed in a lexical decision task involving sad words, happy words, and pseudowords. Results suggest that emotion aided the participants in responding to emotion-congruent stimuli. The sad group responded faster than the happy group to sad words and the happy group responded faster than the sad group to happy words. Results are discussed with regard to information processing and emotion.     

The effect of mood on detection of covariation

The purpose of this research is to explore the effect of mood on the detection of covariation. Predictions were based on an assumption that sad moods facilitate a data-driven information elaboration style and careful data scrutinizing, whereas happy moods predispose individuals toward top-down information processing and decrease the attention given to cognitive tasks. The primary dependent variable involved is the detection of covariation between facial features and personal information and the use of this information for evaluating new target faces. The findings support the view that sad mood facilitates both conscious and unconscious detection of covariation because it increases motivation to engage in the task. Limiting available cognitive resources does not eliminate the effect of mood on the detecting of covariation.     

Aggressive Outcomes and Videogame Play: The Role of Length of Play and the Mechanisms at Work

We conducted three experiments to rectify methodological limitations of prior studies on selective exposure to music and, thereby, clarify the nature of the impact of sad mood on music preference. In all studies, we experimentally manipulated mood (sad vs. neutral in Experiments 1 and 2; sad vs. neutral vs. happy in Experiment 3) and then assessed participants' preferences for expressively happy versus sad musical selections. To further help illuminate the reasons for their music preferences, we also asked participants to indicate how they believed listening to each song would affect their current emotional state as well as how appropriate they felt it would be to select a given song. Results suggested that individuals in sad moods were not reliably inclined to listen to sad songs, but rather, were strongly averse to listening to happy songs, apparently out of concern that choosing such songs would feel inappropriate. We discuss implications of these findings for theories of selective media exposure and emotion regulation.     

Does mood state change risk taking tendency in older adults?

No study has been conducted to evaluate the influences of age differences on specific moods for risk taking tendencies. This study examined the patterns of risk taking tendencies among younger and older persons in 3 transient affective states: positive, neutral, and negative moods. By means of viewing happy, neutral, or sad movie clips, participants were induced to the respective mood. Risk taking tendencies were measured with decision tasks modified from the Choice Dilemmas Questionnaire (N. Kogan & M. A. Wallach, 1964). Consistent with the affect infusion model (J. P. Forgas, 1995), risk taking tendency was greater for those individuals who were in a happy mood than for those who were in a sad mood, for both young and older participants. However, an asymmetrical effect of positive and negative mood on risk taking tendency was identified among both the young and older participants, but in opposite directions. These results are consistent with the predictions of the negativity bias and the positivity effect found in young and older adults, respectively, and are interpreted via information processing and motivation effects of mood on the decision maker.     

The influence of induced mood on music preference

The purpose of this study was to clarify the impact of different self-centered moods on music preference without listening to music. Participants’ affective state (sad vs. happy vs. neutral) were experimentally manipulated through the mood induction procedure, and then their preferences for music were ascertained through self-reports. To understand participants’ internal motivations for their choices, we also asked them to indicate how appropriate he/she felt it would be to select the different music types as well as why they made such choices. Results suggested that participants in a sad mood were inclined to listen to sad (and slow) music, those in a happy mood preferred to listen to happy (and fast) music, and those in a neutral mood did not consistently prefer to listen to neutral music. In addition, participants were averse to sad music when they were in a happy or neutral mood; while they showed no aversion to happy music when they were in a sad mood. In conclusion, individuals select valence-consistent music when they are in an autobiographical memory-induced mood state.     

Mood and Information Processing: When Happy and Sad Look the Same

Two studies were conducted to demonstrate that sad and happy moods can cause individuals to be similarly sensitive to the valence of observed stimuli with regard to how effortfully such stimuli are processed. In Study 1, individuals in whom a sad or happy mood had been induced unitized a behavior sequence less finely when its contents were neutral as opposed to positive. Individuals in a neutral mood state maintained a comparable level of unitization regardless of the valence of the behavior sequence. In Study 2, individuals in whom a sad or a happy mood had been induced processed the arguments in a persuasive communication more extensively when its contents were affectively uplifting rather than depressing. Sad individuals showed this pattern only if no prior affective expectation was provided. Taken together, these studies may fit with the notion that under certain conditions sad and happy individuals similarly decrease the amount of information processed from a neutral (Study 1) or depressing (Study 2), relative to a positive, stimulus.     

Misery loves company: mood-congruent emotional responding to music

We examined emotional responding to music after mood induction. On each trial, listeners heard a 30-s music excerpt and rated how much they liked it, whether it sounded happy or sad, and how familiar it was. When the excerpts sounded unambiguously happy or sad (Experiment 1), the typical preference for happy-sounding music was eliminated after inducing a sad mood. When the excerpts sounded ambiguous with respect to happiness and sadness (Experiment 2), listeners perceived more sadness after inducing a sad mood. Sad moods had no influence on familiarity ratings (Experiments 1 and 2). These findings imply that "misery loves company." Listeners in a sad mood fail to show the typical preference for happy-sounding music, and they perceive more sadness in music that is ambiguous with respect to mood.     

Daily Mood Variability: Form of Diurnal Patterns and Determinants of Diurnal Patterns

Mood and affect are often assessed in psychological research without regard for the potential influence of time of day or other environmental factors. This study examined the determinants of daily mood variability. Ninety-four subjects completed a diary every 15 min for 1 day, and subjects' moods, activities, and locations were assessed. Diurnal cycles were found for several moods (e.g., happy, tired), activities (e.g., discourse, thinking), and locations (e.g., home, work). Diurnal cycles in most moods were strongly associated with activities and location, yet diurnal cycles of some moods (rushed, sad, and tired) were not dependent on these factors. These findings have implications for mood assessment: Mood assessment performed only at particular times of day, or those relying on point assessment, may be influenced by time of day and by the activities and location of the subject.