Affect and Cognition: Three Principles

Affect and its object are separable, so that the same affective reaction can have different effects. Relevant principles from the affect-as-information approach include: (1) The impact of affect depends on implicit attributions -- what it appears to be about. (2) Affect is always taken to be about whatever is currently mentally accessible. Affective reactions can therefore serve as appraisals of objects of judgment or of initial thoughts and opinions about such objects, when they are more accessible. During problem solving, affect can serve as appraisals of thought style rather than thought content. Then, (3) positive and negative affect serve as go and stop signals for current inclinations. Affective influences on cognition are therefore not fixed, but malleable and context-dependent.