Persuasive Communication - How Audiences Decide. 2nd Edition

Emotions in Audience Decision Making 335

Although the audience’s incidental moods and emotions enable them to quickly recognize con-

gruent emotions in others,^283 they can also bias the audience’s perception of others.^284 One partner

in a relationship will often misinterpret the other partner’s emotional state as congruent with her

own. Likewise, happy people tend to see others as happy, and sad people will often see others as

sad.^285 In a study of the effects of exercise on person perception, one group of people was put into

a positive mood by exercising immediately before viewing another person. A second group did

not exercise prior to viewing the person. The group of exercisers associated the person’s positive

verbal and nonverbal communication with more intense positive emotions than the nonexercis-

ers. For instance, whereas the nonexercisers saw the person expressing contentment, the exercisers

saw the person expressing joy.^286 In a another study, one group of people evaluated a person while

they were working in an unpleasantly hot and crowded room. Another group evaluated the same

person while they were working in a pleasant, uncrowded room. Interestingly, the two groups made

signifi cantly different but mood-congruent evaluations.^287

Incidental moods and emotions typically bias the decisions of novice audience members more

than those of experts. In a study that compared automotive experts and novices, partcipants were

fi rst put into a positive, neutral, or negative mood and then asked to read an ad for a new car. After

48 hours both experts and novices were asked to rate the car. In contrast to the experts’ ratings, the

novices’ ratings were strongly affected by the mood they were in when they read the ad.^288

Surprisingly, incidental moods and emotions can sometimes bias experts and novices in opposing

ways. For example, when political novices are put into a positive mood, they show typical mood congru-

ency effects and make more favorable judgments of candidates. Conversely, when political experts are

put into a positive mood, they show a contrast effect and make less favorable judgments.^289 In a similar

way, new and seasoned employees react differently to polite directives from their supervisors. Politeness

increases compliance for new employees but decreases it for those with experience.^290

Audience members are rarely aware of how their incidental moods and emotions affect their

decisions,^291 yet the consequences of those moods and emotions can be far reaching.^292 The power

of incidental moods and emotions to bias decision making can be decreased if audiences become

aware that irrelevant situational factors are infl uencing their judgments.^293 A de-biasing study asked

readers to read a sad story and then to estimate how satisfactory their lives were. Readers asked to

refl ect on the cause of their sad feelings prior to making their estimates reported more satisfaction

with their lives.^294 Usually, people are completely unaware that a mood or an emotion triggered by

one situation has infl uenced their judgment in another situation.^295

The power of incidental moods and emotions to bias audience decision making also decreases

when audiences are held accountable for their decisions. For example, the tendency of happy audi-

ences to base their impressions of others on stereotypes decreases when they are held accountable

for their decisions regarding them.^296 The tendency of angry jurors to demand more severe punish-

ment in unrelated legal cases also decreases when they are held accountable for their decisions.^297

Being polite to the audience can reduce the biasing effects of incidental moods and emotions.

One study induced a positive or negative mood in an audience and then made an unexpected request

to them either in a polite or impolite manner. The audience’s response to the impolite request was

signifi cantly more mood congruent than their response to the polite request; audience members in

both positive and negative moods responded positively to the polite request.^298 Not surprisingly,

audiences also view senders of polite messages more positively than senders of impolite ones.^299

The Effects of Incidental Happiness

Each specifi c incidental emotion produces a number of predictable effects. Audiences put into

happy moods, such as employees at an offi ce party or viewers of a funny TV commercial, tend