Document Type
Article
Publication Date
2018
Digital Object Identifier (DOI)
https://doi.org/10.1080/02699931.2017.1321527
Abstract
Experimental induction of sad mood states is a mainstay of laboratory research on affect and cognition, mood regulation, and mood disorders. Typically, the success of such mood manipulations is reported as a statistically significant pre- to post-induction change in the self-rated intensity of the target affect. The present commentary was motivated by an unexpected finding in one of our studies concerning the response rate to a well-validated sad mood induction. Using the customary statistical approach, we found a significant mean increase in self-rated sadness intensity with a moderate effect size, verifying the “success” of the mood induction. However, that “success” masked that, between one-fifth and about one-third of our samples (adolescents who had histories of childhood-onset major depressive disorder and healthy controls) reported absolutely no sadness in response to the mood induction procedure. We consider implications of our experience for emotion research by (1) commenting upon the typically overlooked phenomenon of nonresponse, (2) suggesting changes in reporting practices regarding mood induction success, and (3) outlining future directions to help scientists determine why some subjects do not respond to experimental mood induction.
Rights Information
Was this content written or created while at USF?
Yes
Citation / Publisher Attribution
Cognition and Emotion, v. 32, issue 3, p. 431-436
This is an Accepted Manuscript of an article published by Taylor & Francis in Cognition and Emotion on 03 May 2017, available online: https://doi.org/10.1080/02699931.2017.1321527.
Scholar Commons Citation
Rottenberg, Johnathan; Kovacs, Maria; and Yaroslavsky, Ilya, "Non-response to Sad Mood Induction: Implications for Emotion Research" (2018). Psychology Faculty Publications. 2434.
https://digitalcommons.usf.edu/psy_facpub/2434
