Synonyms

Affect

Definition

Mood is understood as a momentary, relatively long lasting, and subjectively experienced state of mind, the cause of which is generally unclear. Unlike emotions, mood states are generally less specific and less likely to be triggered by a particular environmental or intrapsychic stimulus. Moreover, the low mood intensity does not normally interrupt current actions and behavior. Mood can be described as a continuum ranging from a bad/negative to a good/positive mood. People generally state that they are in a good or bad mood. Note that even if from an experimental and methodological point of view, good and bad moods are distinguished from a neutral mood, everyday experience and experimental analyses show that people are generally in a good mood. One major function of mood is to inform the subject about the general quality of her or his momentary emotional state. When the diffuse state of mind goes below or exceeds a certain intensity, duration, and characteristics, these mood states are generally regarded as pathological. An exceedingly good mood may lead to hypomania and mania, whereas an exceedingly bad mood may lead to dysphoria and a depressive disorder.

With regard to the association between mood and learning, there is a general consensus that mood influences learning, that is to say: mood may change the way information is processed cognitively. By contrast, no general consensus is observable with regard to the manner in which a specific quality of mood (good vs. bad) may have a favorable or unfavorable influence on cognitive processes (see below).

Theoretical Background

Research on mood and learning focuses on the influence of both positive and negative mood states on learning performance and cognitive processes.

To explain why different mood states may have a favorable or unfavorable influence on the processing of information, research has focused on the reduction of the information processing capacity. Accordingly, it has been argued that a positive mood leads to a depletion of central executive processes, because the person is occupied with finding out why he or she is in that specific mood state. As a result, less cognitive capacity is available for the processing of the learning tasks. By contrast, at least four reasons have been offered for the fact that a negative mood is associated with a reduction in cognitive performance, again, all of them focusing on the reduction of the information processing capacity. First, the resource allocation model (Ellis and Ashbrook 1988) points out that people in a sad mood are concerned with extra-task processing (e.g., thinking about their own bad mood) or with task-irrelevant processing. Second, a bad mood leads to a depletion of central executive processes. Third, a bad mood leads to a reduction of the information processing capacity since subjects in a bad mood are more concerned with finding the reason for their specific mood than with solving the task at hand. Fourth, Alice Isen (1987) proposes that a person in a negative mood tries to regain a better mood (“mood repair”); as a consequence, cognitive capacity must be divided between the task and the mood correction.

Why should a positive mood lead to improved cognitive performance? The underlying theoretical framework is based on the idea that subjects in a positive mood may have access to more varied information. Consequently, there is a tendency to see a relationship between types of information that are normally not associated. This suggests that a good mood influences the breadth of attention, thus resulting in a larger and more varied range of information. A neurobiological theory of positive affect points out that a positive mood may be directly associated with increased dopamine levels in the brain.

Important Scientific Research and Open Questions

With regard to the specific direction of the relation between mood and performance, there does not seem to be one general rule. There is empirical evidence that cognitive performance may be reduced in the presence of a positive, as opposed to a negative mood. These findings tally with models assuming that a positive mood leads to a simplification of cognitive processes, a reduction in processing capacity, and a decline in motivation. In particular, it is argued that a positive mood suppresses convergent, analytic thinking by depleting central executive resources while solving, for instance, the Tower of London problem. Additionally, with respect to social perception, people in a positive mood are more prone to rely on stereotypes and are more vulnerable to halo effects. These observations are in agreement with the claim that a positive mood impairs performance. By contrast, a number of studies demonstrate that a negative mood can result in more systematic, elaborate, and analytical cognitive processing, and can significantly reduce halo effects. People in a negative mood (as compared to those in a neutral or positive mood) seem especially likely to engage in systematic processing, to adhere more consistently to the given data and to show less confidence in their assumptions. Correspondingly, judgments of people in a negative mood are less influenced by stereotypes, and more specifically by negative stereotypes. As recent data suggest, a negative mood induced by bad weather even leads shoppers to show increased memory performance for unusual objects placed in the check-out area (Forgas et al. 2009). Yet the observation that a negative mood may improve performance is at odds with the conclusion that a bad mood is associated with a reduction in cognitive processing.

Improved performance has been observed in subjects in a positive mood when a task requires either elaboration of the given data, decision making, logical thinking, problem solving, transfer of problem-solving procedures, or broadening the scope of attention (see Brand et al. 2007 Isbell 2003; Isen 1987). Furthermore, it has been shown that people in a positive mood were more likely to acquire a problem-solving procedure. In addition, an increased flexibility in thinking has been found to co-occur with a positive mood: subjects in a positive mood solved insight problems or word association problems faster and more accurately than subjects in a negative mood. Furthermore, subjects in a positive mood showed flexible thinking even when they were not required to do so. Recent research has emphasized the concept of affect-as-information (the AAI-model; see Martin and Clore 2001) according to which the assessment and significance of the momentary situation and hence also the associated processing style changes as a function of mood. If situations are interpreted as being unproblematic and not requiring caution, it can be assumed that the already existing knowledge structures can be used successfully and repeatedly. On the other hand, unknown or problematic situations require a more information-driven procedure. Thus, people in a positive mood should have confidence in their available cognitive concepts, whereas those in a negative mood tend to take the existing data into account and engage in more systematic information processing.

In sum, the empirical findings are controversial; a positive mood can be associated with reduced cognitive performance but also with more flexible thinking; a negative mood can result in more systematic and data-oriented information processing but can also impair performance.

Cross-References

Capacity Limitations of Memory and Learning

Cognitive Learning

Creativity, Problem Solving, and Feeling

Mood-Dependent Learning