Go Big or Go Home? Positive Emotions and Responses to Wartime Success

Abstract

Military successes present war leaders with a choice between maintaining their existing aims and strategy and changing one or the other to extend their gains or make the war cheaper. “Staying the course” minimizes the risk of failure but also foregoes possible gains. Making a change increases the risk of failure but leaves nothing on the table. I argue that emotional responses—particularly contentment and joy—account for leaders’ preferences for changing or maintaining their approach to war. Joy, elicited by novel good news, makes change more likely because it leads to the derogation of risks and obstacles. Contentment, elicited by expected good news, tends to produce resistance to change. I substantiate my claims through World War II-era case studies from Japan and the United States.