broadens a student’s perspective, the student should be more open to chang-
ing her understanding. That is, the positive emotions may signal that broad,
expansive processing is appropriate and thus make the student more open to
accepting new information. Indeed, the results suggest that students in a posi-
tive mood may have been more likely to elaborate on the information, sug-
gesting a broadening of one’s perspective. Nevertheless, we would have ex-
pected that positive affect would also lead to conceptual change based on
Fredrickson’s model and our results do not support this idea.
Overall, while the three theories presented here (broaden-and-build, mood-
and-general-knowledge structure, and dual-process model) differ somewhat in
terms of predictions regarding conceptual change, there are important similari-
ties to consider as well. For instance, all three theories suggest that positive af-
fect leads to more expansive, broader thinking. However, they differ somewhat
in terms of the simultaneous activation of prior knowledge and attention to ex-
ternal information, which is important to stimulate conceptual change. For in-
stance, Bless’ (2000) theory suggests that prior knowledge is activated under
positive affect but that prior knowledge can also be linked to external informa-
tion, especially when a discrepancy is detected. In contrast, Fiedler’s (2000)
theory suggests that external stimuli are attended to under negative affect but
that this may also relate to some links with prior knowledge. In this way, differ-
ent predictions regarding conceptual change can be made based on the mood-
and-general knowledge structures theory versus the dual-processing theory.
However, given the inconsistent nature of our findings, it is difficult to provide
support to one theory over another in terms of explaining the relation of affect
to conceptual change in science understanding.
Additional research examining conceptual change and affect could help to
clarify some of these ideas. In conducting this research, it will be important to
consider the possibility that positive affect is useful for general concept learn-
ing but may not be useful for conceptual change due to the reliance on assimi-
lation rather than accommodation. In this way, both Fiedler’s (2000) and
Bless’ (2000) theories could be accurate. It could be that positive affect is gen-
erally beneficial but that under situations requiring conceptual change, posi-
tive affect may both enhance (based on the mood-and-general-knowledge
structure theory) and hinder (based on the dual-process theory) cognitive
processing resulting in no clear relation between positive affect and concep-
tual change, as was found in our studies.
In addition to considering how affect relates to cognitive processing for
conceptual change in science understanding, it is also important to consider
how affect might be linked to the storage and retrieval of information for
conceptual change in science understanding. Although we are unaware of
any research speaking directly to this issue, we use Forgas’ (1995, 2000a)
AIM model to discuss how affect might infuse thinking during the conceptual
change process. As noted earlier, Forgas (2002a) suggested that mood may be
72 LINNENBRINK AND PINTRICH