Mood and recall of autobiographical memory: the effect of focus of self-knowledge.
Mood state facilitates recall of affectively congruent memories (i.e., mood-congruent recall). Mood state may also promote motivation to alleviate a negative affective state, leading to retrieval of affectively incongruent memories (i.e., mood incongruent recall). The present study demonstrates that the focus of self-knowledge influences the occurrence of both mood-congruent recall and mood-incongruent recall. Three experiments found that mood-congruent recall occurred when participants recalled their experiences from a self-aspect that was related to the elicitor of moods, whereas mood-incongruent recall occurred when they recalled their experiences from a self-aspect that was unrelated to the elicitor of moods. These results suggest that the nature of the self-aspect from which persons recall their experiences determines whether mood-congruent or mood-incongruent recall occurs.
Sakaki
Michiko
M
University of Tokyo, Japan. msakaki@p.u.tokyo.ac.jp
D000328:Adult; D000339:Affect; D001325:Autobiographies as Topic; D005260:Female; D006240:Happiness; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D011939:Mental Recall; D012153:Retention, Psychology; D020377:Self Efficacy; D013315:Stress, Psychological / Q000523:psychology