Task effort and the regulation of mood: The absorption hypothesis

Abstract

Three studies were conducted to test the hypothesis that effort exerted under conditions of high task orientation or in response to a difficult task can neutralize previously induced negative and positive moods. In the first study a negative or neutral mood was induced in subjects through exposure to film clips with either a sad or neutral content. Then, in an allegedly unrelated experiment subjects exerted effort in preparation for an upcoming task. Half were told that effort was instrumental for their performance on the subsequent task (high task orientation); the other half were told that effort was only weakly related to performance (low task orientation). Subjects in whom a negative mood had been induced reported feeling better after having engaged in the instrumental effort than subjects who had engaged in the noninstrumental effort. Study 2 explored the impact of task effort on positive mood. As hypothesized, high task orientation had a detrimental effect on previously induced positive moods. In Study 3, the processing demands of the task were manipulated directly (rather than through subjects' orientation toward the task). The results showed that subjects who completed a cognitively difficult task reported fewer mood-related thoughts and a more attenuated mood than subjects who performed a simple task or no task. The results are discussed in terms of their implications for mood maintenance and mood repair.