Nadine S J Stirling, Victoria M E Bridgland, Melanie K T Takarangi
{"title":"Online consent risk-warnings about negative psychological side-effects do not change participant expectations or cause negative psychological side-effects.","authors":"Nadine S J Stirling, Victoria M E Bridgland, Melanie K T Takarangi","doi":"10.1080/02699931.2026.2660165","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1080/02699931.2026.2660165","url":null,"abstract":"<p><p>Risk-warnings delivered as part of informed consent in psychological trauma-related research potentially cause negative outcomes for participants (e.g. Abu-Rus et al., 2019; Bridgland & Takarangi, 2021). For instance, risk-warnings might suggest psychological side-effects (e.g. distress) to participants, causing them to expect to experience, and subsequently manifest, these side-effects (<i>i.e. nocebo effects</i>; Benedetti et al., 2007). But, in a psychological trauma-related context, there is scant research addressing this possibility. Therefore, we randomly allocated online participants (<i>N</i> = 200) to encounter a risk-warning (e.g. \"you may experience distress\") or no warning during informed consent procedures, prior to an online trauma analogue paradigm. Opposing our predictions-and signalling good news for Institutional Review Boards and researchers-we found no evidence that warned participants reported more negative expectancies or experienced psychological nocebo effects (e.g. distress). Because risk-warnings are used as a harm mitigation strategy, and we did not find that people's expectancies differed, our findings raise concerns over how effective risk-warnings are in guiding people's decision-making during the consent process. Thus, our research has implications for informing and warning participants in trauma-related research.</p>","PeriodicalId":48412,"journal":{"name":"Cognition & Emotion","volume":" ","pages":"1-18"},"PeriodicalIF":2.2,"publicationDate":"2026-04-21","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"147785929","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"心理学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Is seeing believing? Linking fixation bias and flexibility with interpretation flexibility.","authors":"Wisteria Deng, Yannick Vander Zwalmen, Yutong Zhu, Hope Galusha, Tyrone D Cannon, Jutta Joormann","doi":"10.1080/02699931.2026.2661708","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1080/02699931.2026.2661708","url":null,"abstract":"<p><strong>Background: </strong>Interpretation flexibility allows individuals to update their interpretations of ambiguous information as new evidence becomes available. Attention allocation to novel information underlies interpretation flexibility. This study examined links between interpretation flexibility and attentional allocation to newly revealed information using eye-tracking metrics of fixation bias and fixation flexibility.</p><p><strong>Method: </strong>Participants (<i>N</i> = 90) viewed ambiguous images that were progressively unblurred while their visual attention to specific screen areas was monitored using eye-tracking. The number of fixations and total dwell time on blurred and unblurred sections of valenced images were examined.</p><p><strong>Results: </strong>Participants showed greater attentional allocation to newly revealed information in negative versus positive scenarios, evidenced by longer dwell time across all stages and more frequent looks to the novel region at the fully unblurred stage. Fixation flexibility was also reduced for negative images, indicating less reallocation of gaze as additional information became available. However, fixation bias and fixation flexibility did not significantly correlate with interpretation flexibility.</p><p><strong>Conclusion: </strong>Together, these findings suggest more rigid attentional patterns when the emerging context involves negative emotional content, while attentional and interpretational flexibility operate as separable processes. Future research should integrate additional cognitive and neural measures to better understand attentional biases and fixations.</p>","PeriodicalId":48412,"journal":{"name":"Cognition & Emotion","volume":" ","pages":"1-10"},"PeriodicalIF":2.2,"publicationDate":"2026-04-20","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"147730200","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"心理学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Operant evaluative conditioning is sensitive to US-revaluation.","authors":"Andreas B Eder, Anand Krishna","doi":"10.1080/02699931.2026.2656735","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1080/02699931.2026.2656735","url":null,"abstract":"<p><p>Two experiments investigated EC effects produced by pairing neutral stimuli (CSs) with instrumental responses that had acquired evaluative properties via operant conditioning. In Experiment 1, participants (<i>N </i>= 176) learned to associate pressing one key with a higher monetary reward and another key with a lower monetary reward. In a subsequent stimulus conditioning phase, the same responses were performed to categorise CSs without receiving monetary outcomes (instrumental extinction). Brands paired with the higher-value response were evaluated more positively than brands paired with the lower-value response. Experiment 2 followed a similar procedure but rewarded responses with token currencies of equal value during the operant conditioning phase. Additionally, participants (<i>N</i> = 368) were informed after stimulus conditioning that one currency had doubled in value while the other had lost all value. This postconditioning revaluation significantly shifted brand evaluations in favour of the response linked to the upvalued currency. The revaluation effect indicates that CS evaluations depended on the current value of the conditioned outcome, supporting an S:R-S account in which the US serves as a referent for CS evaluation. Findings highlight the role of action-outcome relationships in shaping preferences and attitudes.</p>","PeriodicalId":48412,"journal":{"name":"Cognition & Emotion","volume":" ","pages":"1-14"},"PeriodicalIF":2.2,"publicationDate":"2026-04-16","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"147692848","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"心理学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Vilma Pullinen, Louise H Phillips, Patric Bach, Marius Golubickis, Aimee Newlands, Margaret C Jackson
{"title":"Expression ambiguity leads to greater influence of predictive context during face emotion perception.","authors":"Vilma Pullinen, Louise H Phillips, Patric Bach, Marius Golubickis, Aimee Newlands, Margaret C Jackson","doi":"10.1080/02699931.2026.2656729","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1080/02699931.2026.2656729","url":null,"abstract":"<p><p>Context has been theoretically proposed to exert greater impact on face emotion processing when expressions are ambiguous. However, evidence for such \"context-weighting\" as a function of expression ambiguity is very limited. We investigated the presence of context-weighting using emotive sentence cues that provided a predictive context for a neutral face that changed expression in response. Emotional expressions were either congruent or incongruent with the sentence cue. To modulate expression ambiguity we manipulated expression intensity: low (80%-intensity) and high (20%-intensity) ambiguity in Experiments 1a/b using angry and happy faces, with medium ambiguity (50%-intensity) added in Experiment 2 using disgust and sad faces. Participants categorised the face emotion. Error rates were lower when face expressions were congruent vs. incongruent with the predictive context. Crucially, congruency effects were larger when expressions were more ambiguous (Expts 1b and 2 especially), thus indicating greater context-weighting. Drift Diffusion Modelling revealed that this effect was underpinned by use of predictive context to improve the efficiency of face expression evidence accumulation. Our findings provide the first empirical evidence that emotion perception is based on flexible integration of both face and prior context within a predictive processing framework, with the degree of context-weighting determined by the level of expression ambiguity.</p>","PeriodicalId":48412,"journal":{"name":"Cognition & Emotion","volume":" ","pages":"1-19"},"PeriodicalIF":2.2,"publicationDate":"2026-04-14","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"147692885","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"心理学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
H J Bragt-De Jong, A Karreman, T Smeets, E Van Roekel, E Dejonckheere
{"title":"Momentary emotion differentiation and emotional clarity predict emotion regulation strategy use in adolescents.","authors":"H J Bragt-De Jong, A Karreman, T Smeets, E Van Roekel, E Dejonckheere","doi":"10.1080/02699931.2026.2650805","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1080/02699931.2026.2650805","url":null,"abstract":"<p><p>Understanding the key prerequisites for successful emotion regulation (ER) may identify strategies to strengthen adaptive ER skills. However, it is unclear how two proposed mechanisms, momentary emotional clarity and emotion differentiation, relate to ER processes. Accordingly, this study investigated whether momentary emotion differentiation and emotional clarity are associated with concurrent momentary ER strategy selection and strategy differentiation in a child and adolescent (8-17 years) sample. Using experience sampling methodology, 47 participants (<i>M</i><sub>age</sub> = 13.81 years, <i>SD</i><sub>age</sub> = 2.27; 55.3% girl) repeatedly completed surveys (5×/day, 4 weeks) about their emotions, perceived emotional clarity, and their use of six ER strategies in daily life: acceptance, distraction, expressive suppression, thought suppression, forgetting and rumination. Emotion ratings were used to calculate momentary emotion differentiation, and the ER strategies were used to calculate momentary ER strategy differentiation. Results showed that both emotion differentiation and emotional clarity relate to concurrent use of specific ER strategies. Moreover, higher emotion differentiation, but not clarity, predicted higher ER strategy differentiation. These observations support the notion that both clarity and differentiation are essential for subsequent ER. Future research should focus on crucial contextual and between-person factors that influence the ER process, as well as its subsequent effect on momentary well-being.</p>","PeriodicalId":48412,"journal":{"name":"Cognition & Emotion","volume":" ","pages":"1-13"},"PeriodicalIF":2.2,"publicationDate":"2026-04-09","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"147647061","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"心理学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Maximilian Blomberg, Wentje Lübbing, Lina Grävemeyer, Timo Brockmeyer
{"title":"Short-term effects of activating cognitive control processes on emotional interference: an experimental study.","authors":"Maximilian Blomberg, Wentje Lübbing, Lina Grävemeyer, Timo Brockmeyer","doi":"10.1080/02699931.2026.2655186","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1080/02699931.2026.2655186","url":null,"abstract":"<p><p>Cognitive control is crucial for effective emotion regulation. This study investigates whether engaging cognitive control reduces emotional interference using a task frequently employed in cognitive control training procedures. In this preregistered experiment, 80 participants completed tasks varying in cognitive control demands. Emotional interference was measured by changes in reaction times in a simple discrimination task following the presentation of emotional images. Self-report data on rumination, emotion regulation difficulties, and mental distress were collected to explore moderation effects. Negative emotional stimuli increased reaction times, indicating emotional interference. However, the degree of interference did not vary with cognitive control demand, nor did self-report measures moderate this relationship. The same pattern emerged for arousal instead of emotional valence. Unlike previous findings, our results suggest that the impact of cognitive control on emotional interference may be smaller and context-dependent. Factors such as specific cognitive control processes, activation levels, and sensory modality might influence outcomes. These findings highlight the need for careful experimental designs and statistical approaches.</p>","PeriodicalId":48412,"journal":{"name":"Cognition & Emotion","volume":" ","pages":"1-10"},"PeriodicalIF":2.2,"publicationDate":"2026-04-07","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"147634637","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"心理学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Renee Timmers, Landon S L Peck, Yuko Arthurs, Makiko Sadakata
{"title":"Introducing and testing a Bayesian emotions-in-music model (BEiMM): a cross-cultural investigation of Japanese and UK younger and older listeners.","authors":"Renee Timmers, Landon S L Peck, Yuko Arthurs, Makiko Sadakata","doi":"10.1080/02699931.2026.2649306","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1080/02699931.2026.2649306","url":null,"abstract":"<p><p>What is the basis for listeners to perceive music as expressive of emotions? For almost three decades, the cues-based lens model has been the primary method to predict perceived emotions from musical properties. This paper introduces a much-needed updated model that integrates listeners' subjective conceptualisations with cues-based signification. Our Bayesian Emotions in Music Model (BEiMM) uses Bayes' rule to predict emotion in music from the product of emotion concepts and expected relations between musical cues and emotion dimensions, moderated by characteristics of the musical genre. It acknowledges the role of active sense-making in affective responses and variations in emotion concepts participants may hold. A proof of concept is offered using a cross-cultural comparative study of listeners who have similar levels of familiarity with the presented stimuli. The results showed overlap and significant variations in emotion concepts and perceived emotions in music between Japanese and UK listeners, younger and older adults. The findings demonstrate the ability of BEiMM to accurately predict perceived emotion in music, and highlight the important role of listeners' emotion concepts and their cross-cultural variation. Implications relate to the need to update how we understand emotions in music, with relevance for the modelling of emotions in other art and everyday domains.</p>","PeriodicalId":48412,"journal":{"name":"Cognition & Emotion","volume":" ","pages":"1-24"},"PeriodicalIF":2.2,"publicationDate":"2026-03-31","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"147582902","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"心理学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"The dissociative effects of contextual diversity in adult novel word learning under different emotional contexts.","authors":"Zhiwei Zhai, Jingjing Guo","doi":"10.1080/02699931.2026.2650797","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1080/02699931.2026.2650797","url":null,"abstract":"<p><p>While contextual scaffolding plays a pivotal role in adult lexical acquisition, the synergistic effects of affective and informational contextual dimensions remain poorly understood. To address this gap, this study investigates the interactions between contextual emotionality (positive / negative / neutral) and diversity (multi-context / single-context) in novel word learning through two behavioural experiments using Chinese language materials. Experiment 1 employed a block design with concentrated exposure to emotional contexts, whereas Experiment 2 randomised material presentation to approximate naturalistic learning scenarios. Results revealed a robust cross-experimental consistency in interaction pattern: multi-context learning significantly enhanced accuracy in positive emotional conditions, while single-context exposure proved more effective in negative emotional conditions. These findings can be interpreted within the affect-as-information framework, which posits that emotional valence adaptively shifts cognitive processing styles. Positive emotions promote a global, integrative style advantageous for synthesising information across diverse contexts, whereas negative emotions induce a local, analytical style better suited to focused learning within a single context. Thus, the efficacy of contextual diversity is contingent upon emotional valence. This study refines the Context Variation Hypothesis by introducing emotional context as a critical boundary condition and underscores the need for adaptive pedagogical strategies that align instructional design with emotional factors.</p>","PeriodicalId":48412,"journal":{"name":"Cognition & Emotion","volume":" ","pages":"1-15"},"PeriodicalIF":2.2,"publicationDate":"2026-03-30","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"147582840","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"心理学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Moral anger accelerates misinformation sharing: evidence from experimental manipulations and hierarchical drift-diffusion modelling.","authors":"Haoyang Jiang, Hongbo Yu, Shenyuan Guo, Xiaozhe Peng","doi":"10.1080/02699931.2026.2647351","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1080/02699931.2026.2647351","url":null,"abstract":"<p><p>Moral outrage is a powerful motivational force that drives social change and collective action. Social media has become a primary arena for the expression and amplification of moral outrage, where users' emotional reactions often translate into rapid information sharing. Yet this process also amplifies the spread of moralised misinformation, posing substantial social challenges. While moral outrage plays a central role in such dynamics, the distinct roles of its core components, moral anger and disgust, remain unclear. Grounded in the Elaboration Likelihood Model and moral emotion theories, our study aimed to investigate how moral anger and moral disgust interact with source credibility to influence online information sharing. Across three experiments, we systematically manipulated message features (source credibility, moral transgression severity) and participants' cognitive-affective states (attention to morality versus accuracy, moral emotional states). Results indicated greater transgression severity increased willingness to share (WTS), particularly when morality was emphasised (Study 1). While higher source credibility generally increases WTS (all studies), moral anger (not disgust) overrode credibility cues (Study 2). Drift-diffusion model revealed that anger induction accelerated decision-making and lowered decision thresholds (Study 3). These findings identify moral anger as a peripheral cue that facilitates impulsive sharing and offers insights for emotion-based misinformation interventions.</p>","PeriodicalId":48412,"journal":{"name":"Cognition & Emotion","volume":" ","pages":"1-18"},"PeriodicalIF":2.2,"publicationDate":"2026-03-27","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"147522509","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"心理学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Lijeong Hong, Girim Yoon, Yoonkyung Kim, Sang Chul Chong
{"title":"The visual nature of social interaction and its impact on overall mood judgments.","authors":"Lijeong Hong, Girim Yoon, Yoonkyung Kim, Sang Chul Chong","doi":"10.1080/02699931.2026.2644244","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1080/02699931.2026.2644244","url":null,"abstract":"<p><p>Humans can rapidly assess a crowd's overall mood, allowing socially adaptive behaviour. Prior work suggests that an interacting individual's emotional judgment is shaped by the facial expressions of their interaction partner. However, research has yet to systematically investigate how social interactions - and the visual cues signaling them - influence judgments of overall mood in naturalistic scenes. To address this, we examined the visual nature of social interaction and its role in evaluating crowd mood. Using natural photographs of groups (over five people) either interacting or not, we manipulated visual cues such as context, facingness, and mutual gaze. Participants judged the degree of social interaction and the overall mood among the people in photographs. A deep learning algorithm was used to estimate the emotional intensity of the images. Across five experiments, participants utilised social cues when evaluating a crowd's overall mood. Crowds engaged in social interaction were judged as more positive and as having greater sensitivity to positive emotion than non-interacting crowds. However, perceived social interaction, bias, and sensitivity gradually decreased as these social cues were removed. These findings highlight the importance of social visual cues in mood perception and suggest that humans intuitively integrate social context to interpret group emotions.</p>","PeriodicalId":48412,"journal":{"name":"Cognition & Emotion","volume":" ","pages":"1-16"},"PeriodicalIF":2.2,"publicationDate":"2026-03-19","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"147487815","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"心理学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}