Affect-as-Information about Processing Styles: A Cognitive Malleability Approach Linda M. Isbell*, Elicia C. Lair, and Daniel R. Rovenpor University of Massachusetts Amherst Abstract Over the past three decades research has overwhelmingly supported the notion that positive affect promotes global, abstract, heuristic information processing whereas negative affect promotes local, detailed, and systematic processing. Yet despite the weight of the evidence, recent work suggests that such a direct relationship may be highly tenuous. In line with the affect-as-information account, we maintain that affective cues are adaptive and serve to provide individuals with infor- mation about their current psychological environment. We argue that these cues do not directly produce specific processing styles, but instead confer value on whatever processing inclination is dominant at the time. Positive affect (e.g., happiness) tends to promote reliance on currently dom- inant processing inclinations, whereas negative affect (e.g., sadness) tends to inhibit such reliance. Thus the impact of affect on processing is highly malleable and depends on both the type of processing that is currently active and the information provided by affective cues. The cognitive revolution, which took hold of psychology in the 1960’s and 1970’s, focused extensively on the cognitive factors that influence our attitudes, judgments, and behaviors. At this time, researchers gave little thought to the role that affect might play in cognition. Soon, however, research demonstrated that affect can influence judgments in reliable ways (e.g., Griffit & Veitch, 1971; Isen, 1984). From the beginning though, researchers held the view (that is still held more often than not today) that affect is an irrational influence on cognition – one that can bias our thinking and lead to poor judg- ments. Although the idea that affect might also have adaptive influences on cognition was slow in coming (e.g., Damasio, 1994; Salovey & Mayer, 1990), research eventually began to demonstrate that affect provides critical information for decision making. For example, researchers found that in a gambling task in which some card decks provided worse rewards than others, individuals with brain lesions detrimental to emotional experience did not stop drawing from the ‘‘bad’’ decks, whereas those with normal emotional pro- cessing did (Bechara, Damasio, Damasio, & Anderson, 1994; Damasio, 1994). A volumi- nous body of research now supports the view that affective experiences are adaptive and play an important role in guiding and informing our thought processes (for reviews, see Isbell & Lair, forthcoming; Schwarz & Clore, 2007). Today, many adopt the perspective that cognition and affect are inextricably linked (e.g., Damasio, 1994; Davidson, 2003; Schwarz & Clore, 1983; Storbeck & Clore, 2007), with some suggesting that they are actually part of the same phenomenon (e.g., Barrett, 2012; Lindquist & Barrett, 2008). The majority of the research on the affect-cognition relationship has been guided by two themes. On the one hand is the notion that our emotional reactions serve as valuable information that can directly shape our judgments and decisions – that is, they influence what we think (i.e., if we feel good about an object, we like it more than if we feel bad about it). On the other hand is the notion that emotions shape the thinking styles that we Social and Personality Psychology Compass 7/2 (2013): 93–114, 10.1111/spc3.12010 ª 2013 Blackwell Publishing Ltd