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Positivity can cue familiarity.
Teresa Garcia-Marques1, Diane M Mackie, Heather M Claypool
1Instituo Superior de Psicologia Aplicada, Lisbon, Portugal. gmarques@ispa.pt
Personality & Social Psychology Bulletin
|April 27, 2004
Summary
Positivity can enhance feelings of familiarity. Studies show that positive emotions, like happiness or seeing a smile, can make novel things seem familiar, suggesting positivity signals familiarity.
Area of Science:
- Cognitive Psychology
- Social Psychology
- Affective Science
Background:
- Familiarity is often associated with positive affect.
- The relationship between positivity and perceived familiarity is not fully understood.
- Previous research suggests a link, but direct evidence is limited.
Purpose of the Study:
- To investigate whether experiencing positivity increases the perception of familiarity.
- To explore the influence of positive affect on recognition memory and judgment.
- To provide empirical evidence for positivity as a signal of familiarity.
Main Methods:
- Experiment 1: Presented novel faces with neutral or smiling expressions to assess familiarity judgments.
- Experiment 2: Used subliminal positive affect primes to test false recognition of novel words.
- Experiment 3: Examined the effect of happy mood states on familiarity-influenced validity judgments.
Main Results:
- Smiling faces were more often misjudged as familiar compared to neutral faces.
- Positive affect primes led to increased false recognition of new words.
- Happy participants exhibited more familiarity-influenced validity judgments than neutral participants.
Conclusions:
- Positivity itself can serve as a signal for familiarity.
- The experience of familiarity may be intrinsically linked to positive affect.
- These findings contribute to understanding the interplay between emotion and cognitive processes like recognition and judgment.