Learning, Remembering, Believing Enhancing Human Performance (1994) / Chapter Skim
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Socially Induced Affect
Socially Induced Affect
Pages 251-276
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From page 251... ...
, this transmission of affect from one person to another does not depend on the relationship that may exist between them; it occurs between strangers as well as between friends. Results from a large number of experiments document the phenomenon of socially induced affect.3 Socially induced affect has long been an important topic in psychology.
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From page 252... ...
We also consider several basic issues unresolved by the research completed to date, such as the role of culture and the difference between socially induced affect and direct affect. The major section on performance presents examples of the possible role played by socially induced affect in seven applied settings.
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From page 253... ...
Often, when the other subject plunges his hand into cold water and winces with pain, the observer twinges with pain, and when the other subject smiles with pleasure in response to an unknown stimulus, the observer expresses a more positive mood. When these reactions occur, the subject has experienced socially induced affect that is, feelings caused by the observable feelings of another person.
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From page 254... ...
Methods of measurement are in parentheses: cry: babies' cries; EDR: electrodermal response; EMG: electromyograph of facial efference; face: facial efference, visually coded; HR: heart rate; modeling: observer imitation of performer; monkey: monkey's displays of distress or learned response to distress; self: self-reported feeling; was: vasoconstriction a Differences in described direction, but not statistically significant. b Stotland's "imagine-him" and "imagine-self" conditions combined.
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From page 255... ...
also found changes in the heart rate of those watching a model experience positive and negative emotions. Although most investigators have used physiological measures of observers' responses, studies using self-reports, facial expressions, or both have also found evidence for both concordant and discordant socially induced affect (Aderman and Unterberger, 1977; Coyne, 1976; Gotlib and Robinson, 1982, Hsee et al., 1990; Hygge, 1978; Marks and Hammen, 19821.
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From page 256... ...
More studies of discordant induction would be helpful in better understanding its dynamics. In particular, studies that use facial efference as measured by electromyographs as a dependent measure would be useful: this approach might allow experimenters to obtain direct information on the valence of the observer's reaction and would thus add to the current evidence for discordant induced affect.
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From page 257... ...
Several studies strongly suggest that socially induced affect cannot be solely explained by appraisals of implications for well-being. Affect can be socially induced in an observer even when the model is a stranger to the observer and when the observer knows that he or she is not going to experience the same treatment.
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From page 258... ...
If Stotland's view is taken to mean that certain activities or perceptual attitudes can eliminate socially induced affect, his findings are supportive. His results are then limited to the finding that imagining oneself in an affective situation leads to physiological changes and self-reported emotion congruent with the situation.
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From page 259... ...
A second way in which cognitive consistency theories explain socially induced affect is in relation to "ought" (Heider, 1958) or the requirements of justice.
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From page 260... ...
For example, an observer does not need to realize that it is good for his or her enemy to fail; just the juxtapositions of the cognition of "enemy" and "enemy's feeling negative" is enough to cause at least some level of positive affect. Although cognitive consistency has appeal as an explanatory mechanism for socially induced affect, it is by no means time to abandon all the other discussed mechanisms.
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From page 261... ...
If mimicry is such a basic phenomenon, then the cognitive resources necessary for mimicry may be minimal. Of course, mimicry may occur as a result of the imaginal processes discussed above; in these cases the mechanisms may work together to create socially induced affect.
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From page 262... ...
Although other types of mimicry may relate to socially induced affect, most investigations of mimicry have concentrated on the face, and the best evidence currently available is about the role of the face (see Hatfield et al., 1992~. How might mimicry lead to socially induced affect?
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From page 263... ...
Evidence that facial action might play a central role in socially induced affect is given by Vaughan and Lanzetta (1981~. When they showed to undergraduate observers a videotape of a model displaying periodic pain expressions, they found that observers who were instructed to pose an expression of pain while the model was expressing pain experienced greater changes in skin conductance and heart rates than both observers instructed to inhibit their facial actions and those given no instructions regarding facial action.
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From page 264... ...
The efficacy with which each of the mechanisms described above induces affect needs to be evaluated and compared with each other and with methods of inducing direct affect. Key characteristics that should be evaluated include intensity of induced affect, duration of change in affect, and individuals' awareness of the changes in affect and their sources.
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From page 265... ...
Research needs to evaluate the relative strength of socially induced affect in various situations and to explain other routes to socially induced affect that may complement or counter the effects of mimicry. AFFECT AND PERFORMANCE As noted above, affect socially induced in individuals may influence their performance in the same ways that direct affect does.
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From page 266... ...
Results obtained from studies on a number of topics have implications for the relationship between socially induced affect and performance. Although support for a relationship is usually indirect, the evidence identifies seven areas of performance likely to be influenced by socially induced affect: performance of flight cockpit crews; attention, teaching and influencing; negotiating; panic behavior in groups; helping behavior; and group cohesion.
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From page 267... ...
While clearly relevant, the studies are primarily explorative in the sense of providing bases for better designed experiments that can isolate effects produced by socially induced affect. Such experiments would control for factors correlated with a leader's expressed affect and also assess whether the expressed affect (positive or negative)
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From page 268... ...
The second person may have to exert effort to both deal with the negative affect and to discover the cause of the negative affect. That person, who is experiencing socially induced affect, might suffer a greater decrement in performance responding as quickly as possible to signs of danger from the screen than the first person.
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From page 269... ...
Socially induced affect might also have an effect through misattribution to some component of a communication. One component is the speaker.
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From page 270... ...
A second component with which socially induced affect might be associated is the topic of the communication. Through socially induced affect, a speaker may be able to influence the observers' attitudes toward specific topics.
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From page 271... ...
With regard to socially induced affect, inferences about another's intentions may be based on the feelings engendered in oneself by the other's expressions. When negative affect or anxious feelings are induced, a negotiator may be quick to conclude that the opponent is concealing information vital to obtaining an agreement.
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From page 272... ...
Both are bases for the emotional experience during negotiation. A more precise rendering of the specific role played by socially induced affect in negotiation awaits further research.
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From page 273... ...
Group Cohesion Socially induced affect can increase a group's cohesion. A particular member's positive affect may produce good feelings in other members.
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From page 274... ...
The evidence is stronger for the induction of the same affect (concordant socially induced affect) than for the induction of an opposite affect (discordant socially induced affect)
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From page 275... ...
Third, the term induction better describes the general phenomenon of interest, as when affect expressed by one person causes affect in another person. Fourth, it does not imply that an observer's response must be identical to that of the performer: thus socially induced affect includes the possibility that an observer's affect is opposite that expressed by the model (discordant affect)
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From page 276... ...
Although we try to maintain the distinction between affect and emotion noted above, in reporting on the research we use the term the investigators use. 40f course, this does not mean that socially induced affect would always be superior to directly induced affect.
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