Psychology Research Digest
Emotion - Vol 26, Iss 5
Emotion publishes significant contributions to the study of emotion from a wide range of theoretical traditions and research domains. Emotion includes articles that advance knowledge and theory about all aspects of emotional processes, including reports of substantial empirical studies, scholarly reviews, and major theoretical articles.
Relational mobility promotes optimism and willingness to delay happiness.
Are you willing to trade some present happiness for a better future? This study examined cross-country variation in delaying happiness—the belief that sacrificing current joy is worthwhile for long-term happiness. Using nationally representative data from 22 countries (N > 200,000), Study 1 showed that people in countries with high relational mobility (e.g., North and Latin America) were more likely to delay happiness than those in countries with lower mobility (e.g., East Asia). Other national-level variables such as national wealth, income inequality, and individualism–collectivism did not account for this difference. Study 2 replicated the link between relational mobility and delaying happiness in two countries (N = 785) and further tested the mediating roles of sense of control and optimism. We also showed that delaying happiness is associated with different domains of well-being, including happiness/satisfaction, meaning/purpose, and balance/harmony, at both the individual and country levels. These findings suggest that social ecologies that afford greater relational freedom may foster a sense of control over one’s current situation and an optimistic view of the future, which in turn encourages the pursuit of long-term happiness. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2026 APA, all rights reserved)
Publication date: Thu, 29 Jan 2026 00:00:00 GMT Access the article >>When feeling good does not always help you sleep: Cultural moderation of the positive affect–sleep link.
Positive affect has been linked to better sleep. However, this evidence primarily comes from Western societies with a long-standing cultural tradition of prioritizing the pursuit of positivity. Here, we tested whether such benefits generalize to East Asian societies, where positive affect is less culturally valued. In these cultural contexts, individuals strive to achieve emotional balance, and thus, elevating positive emotions may not confer the same health benefits. We tested this hypothesis in two cross-cultural studies. Using large-scale surveys from American and Japanese midlife adults (N = 1,358), Study 1 examined whether culture moderates the relationship between positive affect and subjective sleep quality. As predicted, higher positive affect was associated with better subjective sleep quality among European Americans, but not among Japanese. Study 2 employed a 2-week daily diary design to examine whether European American and East Asian college students (N = 119) differ in how positive affect relates to both subjective and actigraphy-derived sleep measures. Among European Americans, higher average positive affect was associated with better subjective sleep quality and a calmer (vs. tense) mood upon awakening. By contrast, these associations were not observed among East Asians; instead, greater positive affect predicted shorter sleep duration for these individuals. Notably, these cultural differences emerged only for high-arousal (not low-arousal) positive affect. Together, these findings suggest that the restorative benefits of positive affect on sleep may be culturally contingent, depending on how positive emotions are viewed in different societies. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2026 APA, all rights reserved)
Publication date: Thu, 29 Jan 2026 00:00:00 GMT Access the article >>Express yourself: Emotional expressive accuracy in a supportive interaction between friends.
Empathic accuracy—the ability to infer others’ emotions accurately—is associated with positive social functioning. To be empathically accurate, individuals must base their inferences on accurate cues. Consequently, expressive accuracy—the extent to which individuals accurately communicate their self-reported affect—may be a constraint on others’ empathic accuracy. Though affective communication involves both perceivers (i.e., those who make inferences) and targets (i.e., those being judged), prior research has focused on perceivers. Here, we examined the relative contribution of perceivers and targets to explaining variance in empathic accuracy and the association between targets’ expressive accuracy and perceivers’ empathic accuracy. Data from 137 same-gender friend dyads were collected between 2018 and 2020. After engaging in a supportive interaction, participants watched videos and rated their own and their friend’s affect during the conversation. Empathic accuracy was the correlation between participants’ inferences of friends’ affect and friends’ reports of their own affect. Between 2022 and 2023, six to 10 external raters watched the videos and inferred participants’ affect, providing additional empathic accuracy scores. Expressive accuracy was indexed as how accurately each participant’s affect was read by the external raters on average. Targets (participants) explained more variance in empathic accuracy scores than perceivers (external raters), and participants’ expressive accuracy positively predicted friends’ empathic accuracy, even after controlling for emotional expressivity. Results suggest that expressing affect accurately may be a key component of affective communication. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2026 APA, all rights reserved)
Publication date: Mon, 19 Jan 2026 00:00:00 GMT Access the article >>Affective variability prospectively predicts higher affective well-being, but only when people feel low.
Previous studies have predominantly viewed affective variability as detrimental to well-being, suggesting an unstable emotional state. However, research on early warning signs of affective disorders suggests that affective variability may also be adaptive, particularly when individuals’ affective well-being is low. Here, we sought to test that greater affective variability would predict increased affective well-being over time (Hypothesis 1), or that better affective well-being would lead to lower affective variability over time (Hypothesis 2), and that the first relationship would be stronger for individuals with low prior levels of affective well-being (Hypothesis 3) and weaker for individuals high in neuroticism (Hypothesis 4). We tested this set of hypotheses by reanalyzing 14 ambulatory assessment data sets (N = 2,374 participants with 25,478 observations at the day level). Our integrative data analysis revealed that greater affective variability at time t₁ was significantly associated with better subsequent affective well-being at time t₂ at the day and year level. In addition, this association was significantly moderated by initial levels of affective well-being and by neuroticism, although the evidence for the latter was limited. These findings highlight the importance of distinguishing between within-person processes and between-person differences: Experiencing greater affective variability relative to others may indicate a lower level of overall affective well-being. At the same time, experiencing greater affective variability when feeling lower than usual may signal the potential for improvement in one’s affective experience. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2026 APA, all rights reserved)
Publication date: Thu, 08 Jan 2026 00:00:00 GMT Access the article >>The positive facial expression advantage: Facilitated recognition of surprise, pride, and awe.
Past research has shown that facial expressions of happiness are recognized faster than negative expressions such as anger. This happy face advantage is influenced by facial social category cues; it is larger for faces that are female, young, or represent an ethnic ingroup. The phenomenon of the happy face advantage as well as the influence of social cues on recognition of happy expressions is best explained by the evaluative congruence account. This account holds that more positively evaluated expressions are recognized faster in positive contexts (including on positively evaluated faces). The evaluative congruence account also predicts that similar recognition advantages should emerge for other positive expressions, not just for happiness. This prediction was tested across three experiments. Undergraduate student participants were asked to recognize positively and negatively evaluated surprise versus anger expressions (Experiments 1 and 2) or happiness, pride, and awe versus anger expressions (Experiment 3) on female and male faces as quickly and accurately as possible. Consistent with the predictions of the evaluative congruence account, expressions of surprise, happiness, pride, and awe were recognized faster than expressions of anger on female faces, whereas a similar recognition advantage was smaller or absent on male faces. In line with the evaluative congruence account, these findings indicate that the happy face advantage may be a special case of a broader positive facial expression advantage in speeded expression recognition. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2026 APA, all rights reserved)
Publication date: Thu, 08 Jan 2026 00:00:00 GMT Access the article >>Positive affect inertia uniquely differentiates formerly depressed individuals from healthy controls: An ecological momentary assessment study.
Previous studies have shown that emotional dynamics, that is, moment to moment variability and inertia of emotional states, are related to depression, but have no significant contribution after their overlap with mean affect is taken into account. However, few studies considered clinical samples. In our study, we compared a sample of euthymic formerly depressed persons (n = 94) at high risk of depression recurrence and healthy controls with no history of depression (n = 56), while using ecological momentary assessment data collected 10 times per day. The samples differed with respect to indicators of negative and positive affect dynamics computed from ecological momentary assessment data. However, when jointly considering all of emotional variability, inertia, and mean affect, only emotional inertia emerged as a significant predictor of group assignment. Specifically, the higher emotional inertia of positive affect proved to be the most influential predictor of belonging to the sample of formerly depressed persons versus being a healthy control. The finding remained even after controlling for differences in depressive symptoms between the samples. These findings indicate that positive affect inertia may characterize formerly depressed persons after symptoms have subsided, potentially indicating vulnerability for recurrence of depression episodes. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2026 APA, all rights reserved)
Publication date: Mon, 12 Jan 2026 00:00:00 GMT Access the article >>Seven challenges in affective inertia research.
Affective inertia—the persistence of emotional states over time—has garnered growing attention in affective science due to its implications for psychological well-being and emotion regulation. Yet empirical progress has been hindered by conceptual ambiguities, measurement challenges, and statistical limitations. Here, we identify seven interrelated challenges spanning three domains: conceptual (e.g., conflating inertia with emotional stability), measurement (e.g., misalignment between ordinal data and parametric models), and statistical modeling (e.g., violations of stationarity assumptions). Addressing these challenges requires dynamic approaches that capture the temporal complexity of emotional processes and differentiate adaptive from maladaptive persistence. We review theoretical developments and empirical innovations—including advances in modeling, assessment design, and assumption testing—that offer a path forward. By clarifying the measurement and interpretation of affective inertia, this work aims to enhance both basic emotion research and its clinical translation. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2026 APA, all rights reserved)
Publication date: Mon, 12 Jan 2026 00:00:00 GMT Access the article >>Dissecting appraisal and multicomponential features of emotion: Evidence from multilevel annotation during naturalistic stimulation.
This study described the relationship between discrete emotions and their underlying components from a detailed data set of continuous annotations of more than 50 emotion variables during short films. Theoretical accounts such as appraisal models predict that emotions arise through a combination of distinctive components engaged by the evaluation of different situational dimensions. Here we build on the component process model that highlights a prime role of appraisals which determine motivation, expression, physiology, and feeling features associated with emotion experience. We obtained continuous annotations from all these domains during movie watching and observed a hierarchical organization of discrete emotions by appraisal of valence and self-relevance. Furthermore, we applied predictive models to understand the contribution of different emotion components to discrete emotion categories. We found that all 13 discrete emotions in our data set were reliably predicted as a function of particular emotion components. Our study contributed key insights using rich descriptors and machine learning to dissect the nature of emotion and supports the notion that appraisal processes are a key component in the differentiation of emotion experience. These findings also have implications on the complexity and function of emotion as an adaptive process. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2026 APA, all rights reserved)
Publication date: Mon, 12 Jan 2026 00:00:00 GMT Access the article >>The moving potential of global crises: Threat and future visions are linked to collective action through feelings of being moved.
Global crises necessitate collective action but confront people with the threat of negative future consequences, which can make them anxious and inactive. Based on the assumption that being moved is a collective approach emotion, we predicted that the threat of negative future consequences, as well as a positive future vision, motivates collective action through feelings of being moved. In four experimental studies (Ntotal = 718, conducted between 2021 and 2022 in Central Europe), we tested the moving potential of different threatening and visionary scenarios related to global crises, such as climate change and gender inequality, on collective action. While testing being moved as an underlying emotional process, we accounted for anxiety and anger as parallel processes. The results show that experimentally confronting participants with the threatening negative future consequences of the gender data gap (S1a and 1b) or climate change (S3) increased feelings of being moved that were linked to collective action. Shifting the cognitive focus from threat to a positive future vision (S2 and S3), where collective goals for equality and sustainability will be achieved, also increased feelings of being moved, predicting collective action as well. However, the total effect of global crisis salience on collective action was only positive in Studies 1a and 2, whereas Studies 1b and 3 revealed a null effect. Together, the findings connect threat and future vision salience effects on collective action through an affective–motivational process of being moved. The present findings may generalize to the target population of well-educated Western industrialized countries. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2026 APA, all rights reserved)
Publication date: Thu, 15 Jan 2026 00:00:00 GMT Access the article >>The developmental changes in emotion recognition from human biological motion by children aged from 4 to 12 years.
Most research on the development of emotion recognition has focused on facial expressions, leaving a relative gap in our understanding of how children interpret emotions through body movements. This study examined developmental changes in the ability to recognize basic emotions (joy, anger, fear, and sadness) from human biological motion presented in point-light displays (HBM-PLDs), with particular attention to how these changes vary depending on the type of emotion and age. One hundred twenty-eight preschool and primary school children aged 4–12 years participated in two experimental tasks involving the explicit recognition of emotions from HBM-PLDs. The results highlight a clear developmental progression in the recognition of emotions from HBM-PLDs with increasing age. This developmental change appears to follow a curvilinear trajectory, with an inflection point around 8.5 years of age (100 months). However, the study further reveals that this inflection point differs depending on the specific discrete emotion considered. Joy seems to be recognized as early as age 4, followed by anger between ages 5 and 6, sadness between ages 6 and 7.5, and finally fear after age 9–10. This represents an important contribution, demonstrating that the improvement in emotion recognition from body movement is not homogeneous but modulated according to the discrete emotion. These findings support the idea that the development of discrete emotion recognition is independent of the modality of presentation (facial expressions, body movements, vocal cues, etc.) and suggest that emotion recognition may rely on a modality-independent and unified developmental process. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2026 APA, all rights reserved)
Publication date: Thu, 15 Jan 2026 00:00:00 GMT Access the article >>The role of mindfulness in attenuating the adverse effects of daily negative events: An experience sampling study.
Mindfulness is robustly associated with psychological and physiological well-being. To date, studies have primarily focused on trait mindfulness while neglecting its state-level momentary regulatory effects on daily stress. This preregistered study investigated the effects of state mindfulness on participants’ momentary mood and physiological arousal in cohorts sampled between 2021 and 2024. Using the experience sampling method, 100 cohabiting couples (N = 200) completed five daily surveys for 16 days, and reported on their experiences of stressors (adverse events), state mindfulness levels, positive mood, and negative mood, while wearing Fitbit devices to monitor their heart rate. The registered analyses mainly demonstrated main effects (but no buffering effects) for state mindfulness. Specifically, state mindfulness predicted higher positive mood and lower heart rate among women. No association was found with negative mood, and state mindfulness did not moderate the relationship between stressors and stress response (mood and heart rate). However, secondary registered analyses, using a State Mindfulness Scale with more items, showed support for the mindfulness buffering effect, and indicated that negative events were associated with men’s heart rate when mindfulness was low. Overall, these results underscore the importance of studying state-level mindfulness and pave the way for future research on how momentary mindfulness can enhance emotion regulation, which in turn may help promote well-being in daily life. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2026 APA, all rights reserved)
Publication date: Mon, 19 Jan 2026 00:00:00 GMT Access the article >>The memory palace architect: Effect of valence on loci-dependent recall performance.
Method of loci (MOL) is a strategy heavily utilized by superior memorists that leverages visualizations of familiar spatial environments (memory palaces) to enhance information recall. The characteristics of memory palaces used in MOL have not been well-studied. Yet, understanding how different memory palace features contribute to memory enhancement may allow us to design optimal palaces. Here, we examined whether memory palace valence influences neutral information recall. We found that participants (U.S. adults) who applied MOL using a negatively valenced palace (N = 40) outperformed participants who applied MOL using a positively valenced palace (N = 38) and participants in a non-MOL control group (N = 47) on a word recall test. Furthermore, participants who perceived the negative palace more negatively or positive palace more positively exhibited greater recall accuracy, but overall, the negative group outperformed the positive group. We replicated these findings in an independent sample of participants tested on their memory for steps in the process of making a floral paperweight. Again, the negative group (N = 33) outperformed the positive (N = 34) and control (N = 31) groups. These findings highlight that memory palaces can be constructed to optimize loci-dependent memory accuracy, providing new evidence-based strategies to improve memorization. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2026 APA, all rights reserved)
Publication date: Mon, 19 Jan 2026 00:00:00 GMT Access the article >>The relationship between dispositional cognitive reappraisal and the efficacy of a cognitive restructuring manipulation following fear conditioning.
Dispositional cognitive reappraisal, an emotion regulation skill that involves reframing thoughts about a situation to improve emotional responses, may be an important factor in predicting response to cognitive restructuring. This study examines whether dispositional cognitive reappraisal skills are associated with the efficacy of a lab-based cognitive restructuring manipulation in reducing physiological conditioned fear responses. Psychiatrically healthy participants (n = 107) completed fear acquisition on Day 1, followed by a cognitive restructuring manipulation or control task on Day 2 and a test of physiological fear responses and the Emotion Regulation Questionnaire on Day 3. A significant interaction between manipulation and dispositional cognitive reappraisal skills was observed (p < .05). Specifically, among participants who completed the lab-based cognitive restructuring manipulation, participants with low reappraisal skills showed greater decreases in conditioned fear responses than participants with high reappraisal skills. Further research is needed to replicate these findings and determine whether they would extend to clinical populations. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2026 APA, all rights reserved)
Publication date: Thu, 29 Jan 2026 00:00:00 GMT Access the article >>Attention to interoceptive processes interferes with access of emotion concepts.
Grounded theories of cognition would predict that processing concepts such as emotions, which are inherently associated with a variety of bodily states, would rely on embodied simulations. Here, we manipulated attention to respiratory rate and used a feature-verification task to assess the degree to which such simulations are involved when processing emotion, concrete, and abstract (but non-emotion-related) concepts. Participants in the experimental group were guided through a mindful breathing exercise and instructed to pay attention to the sensations of breath for the duration of the feature verification task. They reported an estimate of number of breaths taken during the preceding minute at specific intervals throughout the experiment, while we continuously recorded the participants’ respiration rate. A separate control group tracked the presence of an unrelated visual distractor while completing the feature verification task. Using a linear mixed effects model to analyze the data, we found evidence of an interference effect where attention to respiration slowed reaction times specifically for emotion concepts. This effect was driven by multiple dimensions of interoceptive ability, including individual differences in baseline interoceptive sensibility, and task-concurrent engagement of those interoceptive resources. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2026 APA, all rights reserved)
Publication date: Thu, 29 Jan 2026 00:00:00 GMT Access the article >>The emotional and motivational aftermath of everyday rejection.
Although rejection is a universal human experience, the short- and long-term social and emotional consequences of naturally occurring rejection are understudied. Using two experience-sampling designs, we delineated the concurrent and prospective sequelae of rejection. Study 1 used daily diary data collected in 2020 to examine how rejection experiences predicted daily emotional well-being and social motivation in 269 participants (age range = 18–73) screened for social anxiety and/or depression symptoms. Study 2 used denser, within-day sampling via ecological momentary assessment data collected in 2021 and multivariate, temporal network analyses to examine the direct and indirect effects of rejection on socioemotional factors in 96 participants (age range = 18–66) with and without social anxiety disorder. In Study 1, feeling rejected during daily social interactions predicted same-day increases in negative emotions (i.e., sadness, anger, irritability), decreases in approach motivation, and increases in avoidance motivation, but none of these effects persisted to the next day. In Study 2, feeling rejected concurrently and temporally predicted increased negative emotions (i.e., loneliness, sadness, embarrassment, hurt, anger, and irritability) and desire to be alone. Temporal network analyses yielded evidence of direct and indirect feedback loops between rejection and feeling hurt and angry that might maintain a cycle of negative affect and rejection feelings. Sensitivity analyses indicated that social anxiety moderated some reciprocal effects between rejection and social motivation. Together, these findings shed new light on the potency of naturally occurring rejection and why its consequences can be so difficult to counteract. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2026 APA, all rights reserved)
Publication date: Thu, 29 Jan 2026 00:00:00 GMT Access the article >>The emotional cost of political engagement.
Political polarization is increasingly recognized as a critical threat to individual and collective well-being. Prevailing frameworks suggest that political engagement diminishes well-being by evoking negative emotions, which act as chronic stressors. However, the relationship between politics and emotion has largely been investigated by relying on static snapshots of emotional reactions to political events, overlooking how well-being is impacted by the temporal dynamics of political engagement and associated emotional responses. Across two longitudinal experience-sampling studies that include long-form “diary” responses (N = 259, 1,788 observations), we examine how political engagement shapes daily affective experiences. Contrary to the prevailing notion that engaging with politics leads to sustained negative moods, we find that political engagement is characterized by heightened affective instability—that is, frequent and large fluctuations in affective states—which, in turn, predicts lower well-being (i.e., greater anxiety). Politically polarizing events are particularly destabilizing when they are highly salient and when individuals spontaneously engage with these events. Strong partisans on both ends of the political spectrum also show the greatest fluctuations in daily affect, characteristic of an unstable emotional life. By observing that political engagement is intimately tied to increased affective instability, this research reveals an overlooked emotional cost of political involvement. These findings open new avenues for understanding and mitigating the emotional and mental health consequences of political engagement in an era of deepening divides. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2026 APA, all rights reserved)
Publication date: Mon, 09 Feb 2026 00:00:00 GMT Access the article >>Should I stay or should I go: An exploration of spontaneous postural behaviors following threatening emotion perception.
Emotional facial expressions can indicate behavioral intentions to others. Observing a threatening emotional expression (e.g., angry face) could prompt avoidance. However, the literature reports mixed findings, with emotional expressions such as anger or fear being associated with both approach and avoidance. In this study (N = 152 participants; 93.9% women, 4.7% men, 1.4% other; Mage = 19.57, SDage = 3.25), we investigated how facial characteristics (i.e., gaze direction) and individual traits (i.e., Big Five and schizotypal personality traits) modulate behavioral responses to the perception of approaching emotional facial expressions (angry, fearful, sad, and neutral faces). We assessed motor responses using force plates to investigate spontaneous postural adjustments. Results show that angry and fearful faces elicit defensive responses characterized by backward body sway (i.e., avoidance). Although facial features further qualified those defensive reactions with averted gazes in fear stimuli eliciting a relative approach, we did not find conclusive evidence for the role of personality in these responses. Results are discussed in light of sociofunctional and appraisal models of emotion perception. The present study underlines the relevance of studying postural sway to assess adaptive avoidance of threatening social stimulus. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2026 APA, all rights reserved)
Publication date: Mon, 09 Feb 2026 00:00:00 GMT Access the article >>I react to bodies but not faces, a replication and extension of Aviezer et al. (2012).
How do we truly assess the emotions of others? While numerous theories have highlighted the central role of facial expressions in evaluating emotions, some studies have challenged the ability to gauge others’ feelings based solely on their faces (Aviezer et al., 2012). These studies suggest that we preferentially use bodies rather than faces to assess others’ affective states. The aim of the present work is to replicate and extend these findings. A series of five experiments replicated the results obtained by Aviezer et al. (2012; Experiment 1) and extended them to other tasks (i.e., affective priming, affective misattribution procedure, feeling, and action tendencies). The results show that stimuli presenting only bodies, rather than faces, consistently produce these classic effects found in the literature. Overall, these findings highlight that faces do not seem to be discriminative in detecting emotions, nor do they elicit affective reactions when affective stimuli are extreme. These results thus support the idea that context is predominant in the detection of emotions. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2026 APA, all rights reserved)
Publication date: Mon, 09 Feb 2026 00:00:00 GMT Access the article >>Acute stress reduces affective habituation to unpleasant odors in men with blunted cortisol reactivity.
Habituation to pleasant or unpleasant odors may reflect a dynamic affective process influenced by individuals’ physiological and psychological states. This study investigated the effects of acute stress on habituation patterns to odors with varying valence. Forty male participants from an ethnically homogeneous Chinese sample completed the socially evaluated cold pressor task and a control task in randomized order. Participants then performed two olfactory habituation tasks, which involved 20 consecutive presentations of positive-valence odors (phenethyl alcohol or orange oil) and negative-valence odors (4-methylpentanoic acid or 1-butanol; NVO). Generalized linear mixed-effects model analyses revealed that acute stress reduced affective habituation to NVO, F(1, 51) = 4.6, p = .037, but accelerated habituation to positive-valence odors, F(1, 41) = 29.1, p < .001. Higher cortisol responses were marginally associated with faster habituation to NVO (r = .33, p = .055). Exploratory analyses indicated that stress-related reductions in affective habituation to NVO were observed among cortisol nonresponders, but not responders. These findings suggest that acute psychosocial stress alters affective habituation to odors in a valence-dependent manner, with cortisol responses potentially contributing to this modulation. Future research with larger, mixed-gender samples is needed to examine the generalizability of these results. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2026 APA, all rights reserved)
Publication date: Thu, 08 Jan 2026 00:00:00 GMT Access the article >>