1. Jinling Zhao, Mary Harris, and Ronaldo Vigo*
Department of Psychology, Ohio University, Athens, OH 45701
The Effects of Specific Emotions on Intertemporal Decision
Making
References
Abstract Discussion
Acknowledgements
Introduction
This work was supported by
the Ohio University
Department of Psychology
and the Office for Research
and Sponsored Programs.
Gray’s (1987) personality theory integrates the well-known approach/
avoidance motivation model with two personality traits, impulsivity and
anxiety. The current studies proposed the approach/avoidance (inhibition)
motivation model would predict and explain the effects of fear, happiness,
and state and trait anxiety on intertemporal decision-making. Two
different studies were done and conclusions were compared. Participants
(N=237) in one study were randomly assigned to three conditions: fear,
happy, or neutral. Movie clips were used to induce the corresponding
emotion. Happiness activates the approach motivation and fear activates
avoidance motivation. Intertemporal decision making was measured by
having participants choose between receiving a sooner, smaller reward or
loss and a larger, but later reward or loss. Results indicated that
participants in the happiness condition took smaller but immediate
rewards and took larger but delayed losses more frequently. Participants
in the fear condition avoided smaller, sooner rewards but favored smaller,
sooner losses. However, there was no significant difference between the
fear and neutral condition. The other study had participants (N=106)
randomly assigned to an anxiety or control condition. Anxiety was
induced by having participants read a paragraph about the panicked
thoughts after forgetting that they had an exam until the night before and
then wrote a paragraph putting themselves in the situation. Music was
being played in the background to help induce emotions. While there was
a failure in activating higher anxiety in the anxiety condition than the
control condition, there were some interesting findings. Results indicated
that participants with high trait anxiety scores chose less immediate and
smaller rewards when they were anxious than those with low scores
when they were not anxious. In accordance with Gray’s (1987) model, the
effect of trait anxiety and state anxiety on intertemporal decision making
might be inhibition-driven rather than impulsivity-driven.
Background:
Methods
Fear and Happiness:
State and Trait Anxiety:
• Participants - 237 Undergraduates at Ohio University, recruited through
online Sona system
• Randomly assigned to 1 of 3 conditions - Fear, happiness, or neutral
• State affect assessment - Positive Negative Affect Schedule (PANAS,
Watson, Clark, & Tellegan, 1988) was used to asses state emotion
• Emotion induction - Participants asked to find a list of 9 words related to
either fear, happiness, or neutral in a 10x9 letter matrix then shown a
movie clip also relating to the condition
• Second state affect assessment
• Intertemporal decision making task - Monetary Choice Questionnaire
(MCQ: Kirby, Petry, & Bickel, 1999 ) used
• Reward and loss
• Participants - 106 Undergraduates at Ohio University, recruited through
online Sona sytem
• Randomly assigned to 1 or 2 conditions - Anxiety or control
• State-Trait Anxiety Inventory - STAI; Spielberger, Gorsuch, Lushene,
Vagg, & Jacobs, 1983
• 20 item self-report measure of state and trait anxiety
• Emotion Induction – Participants in anxiety condition read a paragraph
about the panicked thoughts after forgetting that they had an exam until the
night before and then wrote a paragraph putting themselves in the situation
while listening to Stravinsky’s “the Rite of Spring.” The control condition read
a paragraph about cleaning a computer lab and then wrote a paragraph
putting themselves in the situation while listening to Reich’s “Variations for
winds, strings, and keyboards.”
• Second State-Anxiety Inventory
• Intertemporal decision making task - Monetary Choice Questionnaire
(MCQ: Kirby, Petry, & Bickel, 1999) used
Results
Hypotheses:
Fear and Happiness -
• Participants in the fear condition would have a significantly
greater preference for delayed, larger rewards and
immediate, smaller losses than those in happy or neutral
condition
• Participants in the happy condition would have a significantly
greater preference on immediate, smaller rewards and
delayed, larger losses than those in the happy or neutral
condition
State and Trait Anxiety -
• Participants with high trait anxiety would be be less likely to
choose immediate, smaller rewards compared to participants
with low trait anxiety
• Participants in the anxiety condition would choose immediate,
smaller rewards more than those in control condition
• Intertemporal choice are decision making dilemmas in which
there is a trade off between the magnitude and the immediacy
of gains
• The approach/avoidance motivation model leads to either
feelings of anxiety and fear, or happiness
• Gray’s personality theory suggests that anxiety is driven by
inhibition rather than impulsivity
• Participants in the anxiety condition (M = 36.18) did not report significantly
higher anxiety scores than those in the control condition (M = 35.63).
• Participants who scored 42 or higher were in the high trait condition (n = 24)
while those who scored 28 or lower were in the low trait condition (n = 27).
• A 2 (high trait vs. low trait) X 2 (male vs. female) ANOVA on the summed
preference for the immediate and smaller option over the delayed and larger
option showed significant main effects.
• Participants with high trait anxiety scores chose less immediate and smaller
rewards (M = 15.42) than those with low trait anxiety scores (M = 18.44), F
(1, 47) = 4.975, p = .031, partial η2 = .096.
• Males chose more immediate and smaller rewards (n = 21; M = 18.86) than
females (n = 30; M =15.73), F (1, 47) = 4.975, p = .031, partial η2 = .096.
• T test showed that participants in the high trait anxiety condition had
significantly higher state anxiety scores (M = 45.25), compared to those in
the low trait anxiety condition (M = 30.22), t (49) = -5.716, p < .001.
State and Trait Anxiety:
Fear and Happiness:
• 3 (conditions: fear, happiness, and neutral condition) X 2 (sign of
payoffs: gains and losses) X 2 (gender: female and male) ANOVA
was conducted on the summed choices of SS rewards (R1) and the
summed choices of LL losses (L2).
• Both condition, sign of payoffs, and gender are between-subject
factors. The main effect for condition was significant, F (2, 225) = 5.011,
p = .007, partial η2 = .043.
• The simple effect tests with Bonferroni correction (using .0167 as a
cut-off) were performed on summed choices among the 3 conditions.
• Participants in the happy condition (Mean = 12.422) chose smaller
but immediate rewards and larger but delayed losses with a greater
frequency than those in the fearful (Mean = 10.794) and neutral
conditions (Mean =10.659), p = .019; p = .008.
• The fearful condition and the neutral condition had no difference, p =
1.00. The sign effect was significant, F (1, 225) = 14.061, p < .001,
partial η2 = .059. Participants discounted rewards significantly greater
than they discounted losses.
• The main effect for gender was not significant, F (1, 225) = 2.892, p = .
090. There were no significant interactions among condition, sign of
payoffs, and gender, all ps > .
Descriptive information of baseline fear and
happiness for all 3 conditions
Descriptive information of fear and happiness for all 3 conditions
Summed choices in 3 conditions for both rewards and losses
Between the two studies, we can see the effects of three specific emotions on
intertemporal decision making. Induced happiness activated the approach
motivation and induced fear activated the avoidance (inhibition) motivation. Thus,
participants in the happy condition tried to approach incentives as soon as
possible and punishment as late as possible; and participants in the fearful
condition tried to avoid potential threats (smaller rewards and larger losses) as
possible as they could. The results supported the predictions that participants in
the happy condition did choose smaller but immediate rewards and larger but
delayed losses with a greater frequency than those in the fearful condition and in
the neutral condition, and that participants in the fearful condition chose larger but
delayed rewards and smaller but immediate losses with a greater frequency than
those in the happy condition. While there was a failure to induce significantly
higher anxiety in the anxiety condition over the control condition, there was a
significant difference between participants with high and low trait anxiety
consistent with Round et. al. (2007).
Limitations to the studies:
• Habituation - Participants were asked to listen to the movie clip until they
finished the emotion induction check and decision making tasks. Their induced
emotions could have collapsed during this time
• Neutral condition -The movie clip for the neutral condition seemed to cause
boredom which could induce feelings such a boredom, anger, frustration, or
other avoidance system emotions
• MCQ - Due to the questionnaire being out of date the differences in the
amount of money could be too small to cause a significant difference even if
the emotion induction was successful
• Differences in emotion induction - Movie clips are believed to have a high
capacity of inducing emotion but could still influenced by individual differences
• Defense mechanisms for anxiety - Participant feedback indicated that some
comforted themselves while reading the paragraph about the unexpected
exam by believing they could stay up and get through all the material during
the night
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Gray, J. A. (1981). A critique of Eysenck's theory of personality. In H. J. Eysenck
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Gray, J.A. (1987a). Perspectives on anxiety and impulsivity: A commentary.
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Gray, J.A. (1987b). The psychology of fear and stress. Cambridge, England:
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Rounds, J.S., Beck, J.G., & Grant, D.M. (2007). Is the delay discounting
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Results