Abstract
Recent studies demonstrated that the sequential induction of contrasting negative and positive emotions can be used as a social influence technique. The original field experiments found that whenever a sudden change in the emotional dynamic occurs – from negative to positive or vice versa – an increase in compliant behavior and an impairment in cognitive functioning can be observed. The goal of the present experiments was a conceptual replication and extension of the results in a more controlled and counterbalanced fashion. To this aim a novel emotion induction technique was created using an outcome related expectancy violation to induce and change emotions. In a first experiment, the influence of contrasting emotions (vs. only one emotion) on compliance, message processing and information recall was assessed among 80 undergraduate students. We were able to show that a positive, then negative experience, and vice versa, led to losses in processing efficacy, not only leaving individuals momentarily vulnerable to social influence attempts, but also impairing information recall. We replicated this pattern of findings in a second experiment (N = 41). The implications of this innovative induction technique and its findings for theory and future research on the emerging field on contrasting emotions as social-influence techniques are discussed.
Highlights
How does experiencing a negative event that turns out to be positive, or experiencing a positive event that turns out as negative, influence cognitive processing and compliant behavior? The influence of emotions on human behavior (Baumeister et al, 2007), decision making (Lerner et al, 2015), and cognitive processing (Mueller, 2011) has been extensively studied
Because previous studies have already established that consequential compliance is increased after the emotional seesaw phenomenon (ESP), we focus on a compliance scenario that does not depend on material resources, namely signing a petition
Participants displayed impaired message processing, which resulted in higher compliance to sign even a nonsense petition in response to a seesaw manipulation as opposed to the control group were only one emotion was induced (Dolinski and Nawrat, 1998)
Summary
How does experiencing a negative event that turns out to be positive, or experiencing a positive event that turns out as negative, influence cognitive processing and compliant behavior? The influence of emotions on human behavior (Baumeister et al, 2007), decision making (Lerner et al, 2015), and cognitive processing (Mueller, 2011) has been extensively studied. Everyone who just managed to avoid a car accident (fearthen-relief), or picked up a potential treasure from the street that turned out to be trash (happinessthen-disappointment) can relate to the idea that sequential contrasting emotions can affect us on a day-to-day basis These situations and their consequences are poorly captured by existing research on emotion. There is reason to believe that the sequential experience of positive and negative emotions makes people more susceptible to persuasive attempts than the experience of either type of emotion alone – an idea originally proposed by Dolinski and Nawrat (1998) These authors showed that contrasting emotions impair some aspects of cognitive processing and can be used as tools of social influence. Our goal is to validate previous findings, to extend them by examining the ESP’s influence on information recall, and to provide an easy to implement method to stimulate and guide future research on contrasting emotions as social influence technique
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