The Nature of Moods and Emotions

Although most people tend to view moods and emotions as similar states, differ­ences exist between the two (Forgas, 1983). A mood is a state ofmind that involves diffuse and general information (Forgas, 1983).

Emotion, on the other hand, is more specific and includes fewer behaviors. Emotions entail distinct reactions to specific situations; people process certain information about an event and then react to those perceptions. Their emo­tion then influences behavior choices. For example, if you experience sadness, you will select different strategies than if you feel anger (Ellis & Malamuth, 2000). Because moods are more diffuse, they are easier to change than emo­tions (Forgas, 1983). Being sad because you move away from your friends and family is hard to change because, no matter what you do, the situation remains the same.

The Role of Moods and Emotions in Communication

Emotions influence communication in multiple ways during strategic commu­nicating and message interpretation. Mood and emotion are involved in com­munication in three interrelated ways. First, in emotion-motivated communication, emotion precedes the communication and forms the basis for it (Dillard & Wil­son, 1993).

Reactions to Moods and Emotions

Moods and emotions initially influence behavior through priming, or by increas­ing normal base-state level of arousal to levels that can be readily triggered into an emotional reaction. Priming can occur before or during conflict, but it affects people similarly in two ways: first, arousal occurs when people experience per­ceptual discrepancies or when a force interrupts or blocks some activity they are doing (Mandler, 1993); second, physiological arousal occurs when people expe­rience an interruption of goal-relevant actions. Because people cannot easily identify strategic paths to complete their plans, they experience emotional prim­ing. The positive or negative feature of the emotion depends on several factors, such as the importance and urgency of the goal.

One communication-based emotional priming involves positive versus nega­tive interruptions. Conflict challenges people to make coherent sense of their thoughts when they might feel emotionally strained (Sillars & Weisberg, 1983). Not allowing someone to complete his or her thoughts adds to the challenge. Moreover, interruptions during conflict typically emerge in direct fighting tac­tics that bewilders and frustrates the conversational partner (Sillars et al., 2003). More helpful interruptions assist the partner to complete his or her thoughts with clarification, organization, evidence, and other forms of support (Robey, Canary, & Burggraf, 1998).

With regard to mood and functions of interruptions, we offer the following:

Conclusion 4.2: Become mindful that moods are diffuse but can change by altering your interpretation of events, and emotions are more difficult to change.

Suggestion 4.3: Interrupt other people primarily to help them develop their ideas.

The Role of Moods in Thought and Action

Mood affects people in various ways. Happy people tend to be more confident, set higher goals for themselves, and overestimate the likelihood that they will succeed (Forgas, 1999). People in positive moods more likely comply with a request—if it does not interfere with their own positive mood (Forgas, 1998a). Happy peo­ple tend to use negotiation tactics more and direct fighting less (Forgas, 1998b). In contrast, people in negative moods make negative assessments of themselves and of others, have reduced levels of self-confidence and self-efficacy, increased self-deprecating messages, and reliance on pessimistic judgments of other people’s behavior (Forgas, 1999). These people also are less likely to comply with requests and to be more critical ofrequests (Forgas, 1998a). In addition, people in negative moods tend to be more competitive and less cooperative.

Naturally, moods affect how people process information. Happy people, who have no need to change to their mood state, tend to use heuristic processing (e.g., “She’s wearing glasses, so she must know what she is saying”). Heuristic think­ing is a type of mindless thinking largely formed by schemata or ready-made explanations for how behavior unfolds. Sad people tend toward more complex systematic processing (Forgas, 1995), and they tend to take an analytical approach to explaining events (e.g., “His data do not support his claim”) (Keltner, Ellsworth, & Edwards, 1993). As a result of their unconscious awareness, happy people generally recall less information from interactions than do people in a negative mood.

However, here is a situation where systematic processing works against stra­tegic conflict. The reason is that people mindlessly, unconsciously distort evalua­tions of interactions to coincide with their moods (Forgas, Levinger, & Moylan, 1994). Even temporary moods affect our judgments, such as attributions we make about who is responsible for the conflict, a phenomenon we discuss with more development in Chapter 10.

Such biases no doubt affect responses to conflict (Forgas, 1998c). Judgments about our relationships tend to be favorable when we are in good moods and unfavorable when we are in negative moods. Clearly, mood-congruent judg­ments (when negative) can set up conflict situations that can quickly escalate (For- gas et al., 1994). For example, an individual can have radically different reactions to teasing. When in a good mood, teasing can be seen as good fun; when in a bad mood, teasing can be taken as provocation.

Regulating Negative Moods

People can learn to recognize their positive and negative moods and to understand the distortion these moods can cause. This recognition allows people to compen­sate for their current mood (Forgas, 1999). Indeed, the simple recognition ofyour ability to change negative mood states can improve your negative moods.

Catanzaro and Mearns (1990) argued that mood regulation largely depends on people’s belief that they can change their negative moods. They proposed three factors ofnegative mood regulation. General negative mood regulation (NMR) refers to one’s thoughts about cheering oneself. Cognitive NMR concerns thinking of hap­pier times and faith in happier times again and soon. Behavioral NMR refers to being with friends and sharing pleasurable activities with friends. Catanzaro and Mearns developed a measure of NMR which assesses people’s expectations that they can change their negative moods—and provides a tool to gain episodic control.

These factors are contained in the NMR measure. Table 4.1 reports example items for general, cognitive, and behavioral NMR.

Catanzaro and Mearns found that the greater a person’s NMR score, the less they tend to experience depression and sadness. In addition, Cantazaro and Lau­rent (2004) found that NMR is negatively linked to avoidance and using alcohol to alleviate negative moods (i.e., alcohol does not relieve depression). The impli­cation for episodic control is clear with regard to mood variation:

Conclusion 4.3: Moods affect how you perceive and process information, including information about other people.

TABLE 4.1 Negative Mood Regulation (NMR) Example Items

General Items

I can usually find a way to cheer up.

Wallowing in it is all I can do (reversed).

I won't be able to enjoy the things I usually enjoy (reversed).

Cognitive Items

I feel okay if I think about more pleasant times.

I can forget about what's upsetting me pretty easily.

Thinking that things will eventually be better won't help me feel any better (reversed).

Behavioral Items

Being with other people will be a drag (reversed).

Doing something nice for someone else will cheer me up.

Going out to dinner with friends will help.

Adapted from Cantazaro and Mears.

Suggestion 4.4: Be mindful and use negative mood regulation with alternative cogni­tions and rely on people in your social network.