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Social Psychology

University of Massachusetts Amherst

Doctoral Dissertations

Theses/Dissertations

Emotion

Publication Year

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Are People Motivated To Experience Emotions For Their Cognitive Impacts? The Motivational Implications Of Cognitive Appraisal Theories Of Emotion, Daniel R. Rovenpor Nov 2016

Are People Motivated To Experience Emotions For Their Cognitive Impacts? The Motivational Implications Of Cognitive Appraisal Theories Of Emotion, Daniel R. Rovenpor

Doctoral Dissertations

I propose a novel framework for understanding why people want to feel different emotions. I argue that people may be motivated to experience emotions for the cognitive appraisals they are associated with. In an effort to lay the foundation for an appraisal-based model of emotional preferences, I drew upon research on cognitive appraisal theories of emotion, emotional preferences, and basic human motivation. I tested my proposed model by either measuring (Study 1) or manipulating (Studies 2-7) appraisals and measuring emotional preferences, using anger (Studies 1-6) and guilt (Study 7) as specific test cases. I predicted that uncertainty appraisals would lead …


Cognitive Malleability: Does Disgust Act As A "Stop" Signal On Currently Accessible Cognitive Processing Styles In Perceptual And Conceptual Tasks?, Elicia C. Lair Nov 2014

Cognitive Malleability: Does Disgust Act As A "Stop" Signal On Currently Accessible Cognitive Processing Styles In Perceptual And Conceptual Tasks?, Elicia C. Lair

Doctoral Dissertations

Much of the research on feeling and thought supports the notion of a fixed relationship between affect and cognition, specifically that particular affective experiences promote particular ways of thinking (i.e., information processing styles). Surprisingly, little is known about the relationship between disgust and cognition, and this dissertation sought to rectify this omission. The recently proposed Cognitive Malleability approach (Clore, et al., 2001; Huntsinger & Clore, 2007; Isbell, 2010; Isbell, Lair, & Rovenpor, 2013) calls the fixed nature of the affect-cognition relationship into question, and instead argues that affect confers value on whatever information processing style is currently dominant. This new …