The core idea
People often consult their feelings as information. A good mood might answer the question 'am I enjoying this?' with yes, which encourages carrying on. The same good mood might answer 'have I done enough?' with yes, which encourages stopping. The feeling is the same, and the question decides how it is used.
The evidence
In a well-known set of experiments, participants in positive moods continued longer when told to keep going while they enjoyed a task, and stopped sooner when told to stop once they had done enough. Negative moods showed the opposite pattern. Related work on feelings as information shows that mood influences judgments less when people notice a separate cause for it.
Why it matters
The model challenges simple claims that happy people work harder or that sad people give up. It has been applied to worry and repetitive checking, where a demanding stop rule can keep anxious people going. Its applied claims rest on a smaller literature than the original laboratory findings.
Further reading
- Martin, L. L., Ward, D. W., Achee, J. W., & Wyer, R. S. (1993). Mood as input: People have to interpret the motivational implications of their moods. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 64, 317-326.
- Schwarz, N., & Clore, G. L. (1983). Mood, misattribution, and judgments of well-being: Informative and directive functions of affective states. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 45, 513-523.