Positive mood and executive function: evidence from stroop and fluency tasks.

Full Abstract

Contrasting predictions have been made about the effects of positive mood states on the performance of frontal lobe tests that tap executive functions such as inhibition, switching, and strategy use. It has been argued that positive mood is likely to improve some cognitive processes, particularly those dependent on the frontal cortex and anterior cingulate of the brain. However, there is some evidence that happy mood may impair executive functioning. The current experiments investigated the effects of positive mood on Stoop and fluency tests, which are frequently used to assess executive function. Positive mood impaired performance on a switching condition of the Stroop test, but improved performance on a creative uses test of fluency. The effect of positive mood on an executive task may therefore depend on whether a task is inherently motivating or is impaired by diffuse semantic activation.

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Author information

Author/s: Phillips, Louise H (LH); Bull, Rebecca (R); Adams, Ewan (E); Fraser, Lisa (L);

Affiliation: Department of Psychology, University of Aberdeen, Scotland, United Kingdom. louise.phillips(-atsign-)abdn.ac.uk

Journal and publication information

Publication Type: Journal Article

Journal: Emotion (Washington, D.C.) (Emotion), published in United States. (Language: eng)

Reference: 2002-Mar; vol 2 (issue 1) : pp 12-22

Dates: Created 2003/08/05; Completed 2003/10/27; Revised 2004/11/17;

PMID: 12899364, status: MEDLINE (last retrieval date: 12/26/2008)

Sourced from the National Library of Medicine. Abstract text and other information may be subject to copyright.

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MeSH headings (categories)

This article was linked to the MESH Headings shown below.

Adolescent
Adult
Affect
Attention
Color Perception
Creativeness
Female
Humans
Male
Mental Recall

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