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

I can't believe I missed that! How the fear of missing out impacts on alcohol behaviours

BACKGROUND

The Fear of Missing Out (FoMO), which is often experienced over missing opportunities for social gains associated with drinking, has been linked to heavy episodic drinking and experiencing negative consequences. The UK Coronavirus (COVID-19)-related lockdown provided a unique context to study FoMO's ability to predict of alcohol consumption. The aim of the current study was to test if FoMO predicted alcohol consumption during a time of social restrictions.

METHODS

One hundred and five UK adults (aged 18-30, 61% female) participated in a study using an ecological momentary assessment design. Surveys were completed on smartphones and assessed FoMO and drinking intentions, three time a day (morning, afternoon, evening) over three consecutive weekends (Friday, Saturday, Sunday). Alcohol consumption was recorded once per day, based on previous day consumption.

RESULTS

Repeated mixed model analyses found FoMO significantly predicted quantity of alcohol consumption (b =.05, p =.01) and drinking intentions (b =.47, p <.001), but did not predict frequency of consumption. Being male (b = 2.93, p =.02) and higher intentions (b = 0.5, p <.001) predicted higher quantity of consumption. Drinking intentions was the only variable to predict frequency of consumption (b =.004, p <.001).

CONCLUSIONS

The study showed FoMO can predict quantity of alcohol consumption and drinking intentions, which are linked to increased negative consequences. Future studies should assess FoMO against other predictive factors. Results provide an insight into how a social predictor influenced alcohol consumption during a time of restrictions.

The Role of the Valence, Arousing Properties and Subjective Significance of Subliminally Presented Words in Affective Priming

In the verbal affective priming paradigm, the properties of a subliminally presented stimulus alter the interpretation of neutral target stimulus. In the experiment reported here, we tested the role of four factors (valence, origin, arousing properties and subjective significance) that determine the emotional reactions to words in affective priming. Subliminal masked presentation of words preceded the explicit task, which was assessment of neutral Quick Response code (QR code) stimuli. The QRs were codes for words representing personality traits. The results showed the effect of assimilation (negative words caused a negative interpretation, positive caused a positive interpretation) for words' emotional valence and no effects for origin. Concerning arousal, we found a weak negative trend. In the case of subjective significance, a moderate positive trend was found. These results suggest that affective priming effects are susceptible not only to the valence of priming stimuli but also to activation factors.

Too Tired and in Too Good of a Mood to Worry About Privacy: Explaining the Privacy Paradox Through the Lens of Effort Level in Information Processing

Policy-oriented Abstract

Data privacy is one of the most pressing issues today. The world is thirsty for novel, effective, and efficient policies to strike an appropriate balance between protecting individuals’ privacy and creating economic value from their personal information. Whereas governmental efforts, such as the enaction of General Data Protection Regulation, California Consumer Privacy Act, and other privacy regulations, have been pushing boundaries to strike this balance, the effects of these types of initiatives on individuals’ privacy awareness and behavior are uncertain, likely to be nuanced, and will take time to sort out. In this paper, we explain the privacy paradox, a phenomenon with important implications that apply to policymakers, industry professionals, and individuals. The privacy paradox refers to a mismatch between individuals’ stated privacy concerns and their actual disclosure behaviors. In three behavioral experiments, we show how the paradox is revealed when individuals are cognitively tired especially when they are in a good mood. These findings do not indicate that individuals do not care about privacy because they do when they are not cognitively tired especially when they are in a bad mood. By explaining the privacy paradox, we inform existing and future privacy policies to strike that balance we all strive for.

Daily fluctuations in occupation with and worry about COVID-19

In the first week after the first COVID-19 patient was reported in the Netherlands, we conducted a pre-registered momentary assessment study (7 surveys per day, 50 participants, 7 days) to study the dynamic relationship between individuals' occupation with and worries about COVID-19 in daily life, and the moderating role of neuroticism in this relationship. At the group level, higher scores on occupation and worry co-occurred, and occupation predicted worry 1 h later, but not vice versa. There were substantial individual differences in the magnitudes and directions of the effects. For instance, occupation with COVID-19 was related to increases in worry for some but decreases in worry for others. Neuroticism did not predict any of these individual differences in the links between worry and occupation. This study suggests that it is important to go beyond group-level analyses and to account for individual differences in responses to COVID-19.

Many Labs 5: Registered Replication of Albarracín et al. (2008), Experiment 5

In Experiment 5 of Albarracín et al. (2008), participants primed with words associated with action performed better on a subsequent cognitive task than did participants primed with words associated with inaction. A direct replication attempt by Frank, Kim, and Lee (2016) as part of the Reproducibility Project: Psychology (RP:P) failed to find evidence for this effect. In this article, we discuss several potential explanations for these discrepant findings: the source of participants (Amazon’s Mechanical Turk vs. traditional undergraduate-student pool), the setting of participation (online vs. in lab), and the possible moderating role of affect. We tested Albarracín et al.’s original hypothesis in two new samples: For the first sample, we followed the protocol developed by Frank et al. and recruited participants via Amazon’s Mechanical Turk ( n = 580). For the second sample, we used a revised protocol incorporating feedback from the original authors and recruited participants from eight universities ( n = 884). We did not detect moderation by protocol; patterns in the revised protocol resembled those in our implementation of the RP:P protocol, but the estimate of the focal effect size was smaller than that found originally by Albarracín et al. and larger than that found in Frank et al.’s replication attempt. We discuss these findings and possible explanations.

What motivates Chinese consumers to avoid information about the COVID-19 pandemic?: The perspective of the stimulus-organism-response model

This study investigated consumers' information-avoidance behavior in the context of a public health emergency-the COVID-19 pandemic in China. Guided by the stimulus-organism-response paradigm, it proposes a model for exploring the effects of external stimuli (perceived threat and perceived information overload) related to COVID-19 on consumers' internal states (sadness, anxiety, and cognitive dissonance) and their subsequent behavioral intentions to avoid health information and engage in preventive behaviors. With a survey sample (N = 721), we empirically examined the proposed model and tested the hypotheses. The results indicate that sadness, anxiety, and cognitive dissonance, which were a result of perceived threat and perceived information overload, had heterogeneous effects on information avoidance. Anxiety and cognitive dissonance increased information avoidance intention, while sadness decreased information avoidance intention. Moreover, information avoidance predicted a reluctance on the part of consumers to engage in preventive behaviors during the COVID-19 pandemic. These findings not only contribute to the information behavior literature and extend the concept of information avoidance to a public health emergency context, but also yield practical insights for global pandemic control.

Goal-directed rumination and its antagonistic effects on problem solving: a two-week diary study

BACKGROUND

The tendency to repetitively and intrusively think about a particular negative event, goal failure, or problem (i.e., goal-directed rumination) is generally associated with impairments in well-being, thus decreasing performance in solving this failure. However, rumination is also associated with higher levels of resources invested in problem solving, likely leading to an improvement in performance.

OBJECTIVES

The current study thus examines the indirect effect of rumination via various mediators on subjective problem-solving performance in the everyday context.

DESIGN

Over a period of two weeks, 147 students completed a brief survey each evening (i.e., diary study).

METHODS

Data were analyzed by means of a multiple mediation model in the multilevel structural equation modeling (MSEM) framework.

RESULTS

The analyses revealed that perceived stress and negative mood negatively mediated the relationship between rumination and problem solving, while attention and effort positively mediated this relationship. Finally, both a negative direct and total effect of rumination on problem solving was observed.

CONCLUSIONS

Conclusively, goal-directed rumination exerted a negative indirect effect on subjective problem solving via perceived stress and negative mood, whereas it positively affected problem solving via attention and effort. Possible limitations and implications are discussed.

Does Neutral Affect Exist? How Challenging Three Beliefs About Neutral Affect Can Advance Affective Research

Researchers interested in affect have often questioned the existence of neutral affective states. In this paper, we review and challenge three beliefs that researchers might hold about neutral affect. These beliefs are: (1) it is not possible to feel neutral because people are always feeling something, (2) neutrality is not an affective state because affect must be positively or negatively valenced, and (3) neutral affect is unimportant because it does not influence cognition or behavior. We review the reasons these beliefs might exist and provide empirical evidence that questions them. Specifically, we argue that neutral affect is a felt experience that provides important valence-relevant information, which influences cognition and behavior. By dispelling these beliefs about neutral affect, we hope to shine a light on the assumptions that researchers hold about the nature of affect and to provide novel theoretical and methodological perspectives that help advance our understanding of the affective landscape.

Utilizing Neutral Affective States in Research: Theory, Assessment, and Recommendations

Even though researchers regularly use neutral affect induction procedures (AIPs) as a control condition in their work, there is little consensus on what is neutral affect. This article reviews five approaches that researchers have used to operationalize neutral AIPs: to produce a(n) (a) minimal affective state, (b) in-the-middle state, (c) deactivated state, (d) typical state, or (e) indifferent state. For each view, the article delineates the theoretical basis for the neutral AIP, how to assess it, and provides recommendations for when and how to use it. The goal of the article is to encourage researchers to state their theoretical assumptions about neutral affect, to validate those assumptions, and to make appropriate conclusions based on them.

Regulating food consumption: Action messages can help or hurt

OBJECTIVE

Previous research suggests that messages promoting active behavior change may inadvertently increase food consumption by promoting a general goal to act. We suggest that this is only the case for active-approach behaviors and that messages promoting active-avoidance behaviors may be used to effectively decrease food consumption.

METHODS

Participants were presented with healthy eating messages pretested to vary on the dimensions of direction (approach vs. avoid) and amount (action vs. inaction) of behavior. After viewing the messages, participants selected and consumed a healthy or unhealthy snack during a taste test.

RESULTS

There were no differences in snack selection (healthy vs. unhealthy) across message conditions. For messages promoting more active behavior, however, there was a significant difference in snack consumption such that participants viewing active-approach messages consumed significantly more food than participants viewing active-avoidance messages. This happened regardless of whether participants selected a healthy or unhealthy snack. For messages promoting less active behavior there was no difference in consumption between approach and avoidance based messages.

CONCLUSIONS

These findings suggest that when viewing health messages that promote active behavior change, individuals are sensitive to the direction of action advocated by the message (approach vs. avoidance) and modulate consumption accordingly.

How emotion context modulates unconscious goal activation during motor force exertion

Priming participants with emotional or action-related concepts influences goal formation and motor force output during effort exertion tasks, even without awareness of priming information. However, little is known about neural processes underpinning how emotional cues interact with action (or inaction) goals to motivate (or demotivate) motor behaviour. In a novel functional neuroimaging paradigm, visible emotional images followed by subliminal action or inaction word primes were presented before participants performed a maximal force exertion. In neutral emotional contexts, maximum force was lower following inaction than action primes. However, arousing emotional images had interactive motivational effects on the motor system: Unpleasant images prior to inaction primes increased force output (enhanced effort exertion) relative to control primes, and engaged a motivation-related network involving ventral striatum, extended amygdala, as well as right inferior frontal cortex. Conversely, pleasant images presented before action (versus control) primes decreased force and activated regions of the default-mode network, including inferior parietal lobule and medial prefrontal cortex. These findings show that emotional context can determine how unconscious goal representations influence motivational processes and are transformed into actual motor output, without direct rewarding contingencies. Furthermore, they provide insight into altered motor behaviour in psychopathological disorders with dysfunctional motivational processes.

Action Tweets Linked to Reduced County-Level HIV Prevalence in the United States: Online Messages and Structural Determinants

HIV is uncommon in most US counties but travels quickly through vulnerable communities when it strikes. Tracking behavior through social media may provide an unobtrusive, naturalistic means of predicting HIV outbreaks and understanding the behavioral and psychological factors that increase communities' risk. General action goals, or the motivation to engage in cognitive and motor activity, may support protective health behavior (e.g., using condoms) or encourage activity indiscriminately (e.g., risky sex), resulting in mixed health effects. We explored these opposing hypotheses by regressing county-level HIV prevalence on action language (e.g., work, plan) in over 150 million tweets mapped to US counties. Controlling for demographic and structural predictors of HIV, more active language was associated with lower HIV rates. By leveraging language used on social media to improve existing predictive models of geographic variation in HIV, future targeted HIV-prevention interventions may have a better chance of reaching high-risk communities before outbreaks occur.

From primed concepts to action: A meta-analysis of the behavioral effects of incidentally presented words

A meta-analysis assessed the behavioral impact of and psychological processes associated with presenting words connected to an action or a goal representation. The average and distribution of 352 effect sizes (analyzed using fixed-effects and random-effects models) was obtained from 133 studies (84 reports) in which word primes were incidentally presented to participants, with a nonopposite control group, before measuring a behavioral dependent variable. Findings revealed a small behavioral priming effect (dFE = 0.332, dRE = 0.352), which was robust across methodological procedures and only minimally biased by the publication of positive (vs. negative) results. Theory testing analyses indicated that more valued behavior or goal concepts (e.g., associated with important outcomes or values) were associated with stronger priming effects than were less valued behaviors. Furthermore, there was some evidence of persistence of goal effects over time. These results support the notion that goal activation contributes over and above perception-behavior in explaining priming effects. In summary, theorizing about the role of value and satisfaction in goal activation pointed to stronger effects of a behavior or goal concept on overt action. There was no evidence that expectancy (ease of achieving the goal) moderated priming effects. (PsycINFO Database Record

The Effect of Mood on Performance in a Nonnormal Situation

Abstract. The effect of mood on performance in everyday situations is widely studied and the results commonly reveal a mood-congruence relationship. However, little is known about the effect of mood on performance in nonnormal situations such as those experienced during an unscheduled event. This study investigated whether induced mood (positive or negative) influenced performance during an unscheduled aircraft evacuation. Forty-five participants (15 female), with an average age of 21.90 (SD = 3.96) years, were randomly exposed to either positive or negative mood facilitation. Following this, all participants watched the same preflight safety video, and then had to conduct an unscheduled evacuation following a simulated water ditching. Participants exposed to a positive mood manipulator were found to commit fewer errors during the evacuation exercise and completed the evacuation in less than half of the time taken by participants who were exposed to a negative mood manipulator. In safety-critical environments such as aviation, these results highlight the advantages of creating an atmosphere or environment that induces positive moods.

The impact of positive affect on health cognitions and behaviours: a meta-analysis of the experimental evidence

Several reviews suggest that positive affect is associated with improved longevity, fewer physical symptoms, and biological indicators of good health. It is possible that positive affect could influence these outcomes by promoting healthful cognitions and behaviours. The present review identified conceptual pathways from positive affect to health cognitions and behaviour, and used random effects meta-analysis to quantify the impact of positive affect inductions (versus neutral affect conditions) on these outcomes. Literature searches located 54 independent tests that could be included in the review. Across all studies, the findings revealed no reliable effects on intentions (d+ = -.12, 95% CI = -.32 to .08, k = 15) or behaviour (d+ = .15, 95% CI = -.03 to .33, k = 23). There were four reliable effects involving specific cognitions and behaviours, but little clear evidence for generalised benefits or adverse effects of positive emotions on health-related cognitions or actions. Conclusions must be cautious given the paucity of tests available for analysis. The review offers suggestions about research designs that might profitably be deployed in future studies, and calls for additional tests of the impact of discrete positive emotions on health cognitions and behaviour.

Neuroticism and attitudes toward action in 19 countries

Although individuals scoring high on Neuroticism tend to avoid taking action when faced with challenges, Neuroticism is also characterized by impulsivity. To explore cognitive biases related to this costly behavior pattern, we tested whether individuals who rated themselves as higher in Neuroticism would evaluate the general concepts of action and inaction as, respectively, more negative and positive. We further investigated whether anxiety and depression would mediate and individualism-collectivism would moderate these relations in a large international sample. Participants (N = 3,827 college students; 69% female) from 19 countries completed surveys measuring Neuroticism, attitudes toward action and inaction, depression, anxiety, and individualism-collectivism. Hierarchical linear models tested the above predictions. Neuroticism negatively correlated with attitudes toward action and positively correlated with attitudes toward inaction. Furthermore, anxiety was primarily responsible for emotionally unstable individuals' less positive attitudes toward action, and individuals who endorsed more collectivistic than individualistic beliefs showed a stronger negative association between Neuroticism and attitudes toward action. Researchers and practitioners interested in understanding and remediating the negative consequences of Neuroticism should pay greater attention to attitudes toward action and inaction, particularly focusing on their links with anxiety and individualism-collectivism.

Liking More Means Doing More: Dispositional Attitudes Predict Patterns of General Action

Dispositional attitudes are an individual difference in the tendency to form positive versus negative attitudes. As positive (negative) attitudes promote active (inactive) responses to stimuli, we predicted that dispositional attitudes would be positively correlated with patterns of general action. In Study 1, participants reported all activities they engaged in during a 1-week period using a structured time use survey. Dispositional attitudes were positively correlated with the number of unique behaviors participants engaged in and with the total number of behaviors reported for the entire week. Study 2 replicated Study 1 using a free response time use survey. Overall, the results demonstrated that dispositional attitudes predict general action, such that the tendency to form positive (negative) attitudes predicts the tendency to engage in many (few) behaviors in daily life. This pattern occurred for both low effort and high effort behaviors. Implications for understanding activity patterns are discussed.

On the validity of the autobiographical emotional memory task for emotion induction

The Autobiographical Emotional Memory Task (AEMT), which involves recalling and writing about intense emotional experiences, is a widely used method to experimentally induce emotions. The validity of this method depends upon the extent to which it can induce specific desired emotions (intended emotions), while not inducing any other (incidental) emotions at different levels across one (or more) conditions. A review of recent studies that used this method indicated that most studies exclusively monitor post-writing ratings of the intended emotions, without assessing the possibility that the method may have differentially induced other incidental emotions as well. We investigated the extent of this issue by collecting both pre- and post-writing ratings of incidental emotions in addition to the intended emotions. Using methods largely adapted from previous studies, participants were assigned to write about a profound experience of anger or fear (Experiment 1) or happiness or sadness (Experiment 2). In line with previous research, results indicated that intended emotions (anger and fear) were successfully induced in the respective conditions in Experiment 1. However, disgust and sadness were also induced while writing about an angry experience compared to a fearful experience. Similarly, although happiness and sadness were induced in the appropriate conditions, Experiment 2 indicated that writing about a sad experience also induced disgust, fear, and anger, compared to writing about a happy experience. Possible resolutions to avoid the limitations of the AEMT to induce specific discrete emotions are discussed.

The role of positive emotion and contributions of positive psychology in depression treatment: systematic review

The present study aims to conduct a systematic review of the literature by checking the impact of positive emotion in the treatment of depression and on the use of strategies of positive psychology which involves positive emotion to treat and reduce symptoms of depression. For this purpose, we conducted searches in databases ISI Web of Knowledge, PsycINFO and PubMed and found a total of 3400 studies. After inclusion application and exclusion criteria, 28 articles remained, presented and discussed in this study. The studies have important relations between humor and positive emotion as well as a significant improvement in signs and symptoms of depression using differents strategies of positive psychology. Another relevant aspect is the preventative character of the proposed interventions by positive psychology by the fact that increase well-being and produce elements such as resilience and coping resources that reduce the recurrent relapses in the treatment of depression. The strategies of positive psychology, such as increasing positive emotions, develop personal strengths: seeking direction, meaning and engagement for the day-to-day life of the patients, appear as potentially tools for the prophylaxis and treatment of depression, helping to reduce signs and symptoms as well as for prevention of relapses.

Complete unconscious control: using (in)action primes to demonstrate completely unconscious activation of inhibitory control mechanisms

Although robust evidence indicates that action initiation can occur unconsciously and unintentionally, the literature on action inhibition suggests that inhibition requires both conscious thought and intentionality. In prior research demonstrating automatic inhibition in response to unconsciously processed stimuli, the unconscious stimuli had previously been consciously associated with an inhibitory response within the context of the experiment, and participants had consciously formed a goal to activate inhibition processes when presented with the stimuli (because task instructions required participants to engage in inhibition when the stimuli occurred). Therefore, prior work suggests that some amount of conscious thought and intentionality are required for inhibitory control. In the present research, we recorded event-related potentials during two go/no-go experiments in which participants were subliminally primed with general action/inaction concepts that had never been consciously associated with task-specific responses. We provide the first demonstration that inhibitory control processes can be modulated completely unconsciously and unintentionally.

[Happiness in the elderly: an epidemiological approach in the ISA-Camp 2008 study]

The objective was to identify factors associated with happiness in the elderly. A cross-sectional, population-based study was conducted in 1,431 elderly under the ISA-Camp 2008 project. The survey used a two-stage probabilistic cluster sample. Prevalence of happiness was measured over time according to socio-demographics variables, health behaviors, and health conditions. High prevalence of happiness was associated with: marital status (married), active working, activity and insufficient leisure-time activity, occasional consumption of alcoholic beverages, daily consumption of fruit, vegetables, and leafy vegetables, normal body mass index, and sleeping less than 10 hours/night and sleeping well. The highest prevalence of long-term happiness was observed among elderly with no reported illness, with better self-rated health, and with less disability. Happiness was strongly related to health indicators, suggesting the adequacy of complementary use of this indicator for evaluating health promotion programs in the elderly.