Attunement of Encoding Affect, Attention and Their Effect on Memory of Mood of Narrative

Two explanations have been postulated by Bower (1981) to account for the findings from studies on the effect of mood on memory. First a “mood-congruity” explanation, indicates that material whose mood matches the mood of a learner at encoding is recalled more than when the mood and material are mismatched. Second a “Pollyanna” explanation indicates that material that induces or enhances a happy mood will be recalled better than material that inhibits a happy mood. The present study attempted to explore the aforementioned explanations and findings reported by Bower, Gilligan and Monteiro (1981). Fifty-four graduate students were blocked on sex and randomly assigned to one of 9 conditions comprised of 3 mood induction treatments (happy, sad or neutral). Subjects, run individually, initially filled out a mood adjective checklist and were then instructed to read a one page biography (affect induction) about a “happy”, “sad” or “neutral” person. Subjects in the “happy” condition were also instructed to “smile” when they read the story, in the “sad” condition to “frown” and in the “neutral” condition “just to read the story”. Immediately after reading the story, subjects were asked to rate their mood on a 5-point scale (from “happy” to “sad”). Then all subjects were told to listen to a taped story and told (attention orienting) to “pay careful attention to the happy elements of the story.” The story, an adaptation of the “Happy Andre, Sad Jack” story (Bower et al, 1981), consisted of 34 ideation elements that were “happy”, 34 elements that were “sad” and 12 elements that were “neutral.” Subsequent to listening to the story, subjects were asked to recall as much of the story as they could remember. Each response, scored by two judges, was correct if it matched an ideation element of the story. Preliminary data analysis reveal: (1) that the independent index of affect induction (the 5-point happy-sad rating) resulted in the “happy” condition being significantly different from “neutral”, which was significantly different from “sad.” (2) Females recalled overall more than males. (3) “Happy” material overall was recalled significantly better than “sad” material. (4) The highest recall was obtained with the “happy” affect conditions for both “happy” and “sad” materials, whereas the “sad” affect condtions resulted in the lowest recall of both “happy” and “sad” materials. More specifically the worst condition for recall (for both “happy” and “sad” material) was a “sad” affect coupled with the “sad” attentional orienting set, even though the “sad” attentional instructions specifically called for subjects to attend to the “sad” material. The best combination of affect and attention were for the “happy” affect and “neutral” or “happy” attention conditions (for both “happy” and “sad” material). The results raise questions concerning the mood congruency and Pollyanna explanation. It appears that the influence of affect and the internal state it produces effects memory in a complex manner, especially when attentional processes are evoked which inevitably produce motivational changes — the notion of an attunement of affect, attention and memorial processes provide a framework for modifying Bower’s explanation.