The Affective Control of Thought: Malleable, Not Fixed Jeffrey R. Huntsinger Loyola University Chicago Linda M. Isbell University of Massachusetts, Amherst Gerald L. Clore University of Virginia Despite decades of research demonstrating a dedicated link between positive and negative affect and specific cognitive processes, not all research is consistent with this view. We present a new overarching theoretical account as an alternative— one that can simultaneously account for prior findings, generate new predictions, and encompass a wide range of phenomena. According to our proposed affect-as- cognitive-feedback account, affective reactions confer value on accessible information processing strat- egies (e.g., global vs. local processing) and other responses, goals, concepts, and thoughts that happen to be accessible at the time. This view underscores that the relationship between affect and cognition is not fixed but, instead, is highly malleable. That is, the relationship between affect and cognitive processing can be altered, and often reversed, by varying the mental context in which it is experienced. We present evidence that supports this account, along with implications for specific affective states and other subjective experiences. Keywords: affect, emotion, cognition, affect-as-information, cognitive processing There are trivial truths and great truths. The opposite of a trivial truth is plainly false. The opposite of a great truth is also true. Niels Bohr (cited in McGuire, 1973) Something of a great truth in the affect-cognition literature might be the idea that the cognitive consequences of affect are etched in psychological stone. Affect has distinct cognitive and perceptual effects: Positive affect is thought to trigger heuristic processing (Schwarz & Clore, 2007), a global focus (Fredrickson & Branigan, 2005), and widened attention (Derryberry & Tucker, 1994; Rowe, Hirsh, & Anderson, 2007). Negative affect is thought to elicit systematic or elaborated processing, a local focus, and narrowed attention. Despite the extensive evidence consistent with this truth, the opposite also appears to be true. Emerging evidence indicates that positive and negative affect can also have cognitive effects opposite to those obtained in past research. Rather than viewing the existence of these conflicting truths as problematic, following McGuire’s (1989) perspectivist approach, we propose that they present an opportunity to clarify our under- standing of how affect regulates cognition. Because existing the- ories predict fixed effects of positive and negative affect on cog- nition, a different perspective on how affect regulates cognition may be useful, one that can simultaneously account for the estab- lished truth and its opposite. Our purpose here is to provide such an account. In what follows, we first briefly review research regularly taken as evidence of a direct or dedicated link between positive and negative affect and styles of cognitive processing. In the second part, we provide a historical review of the major theoretical accounts for these findings. In the third part, we present an “affect as cognitive feedback” account that predicts that the impact of affect on cognition is malleable. We then present studies that demonstrate this malleability. In the last part, we describe extensions of this account to specific emotions and other subjec- tive experiences. Before we continue, we define some key terms. The first con- cerns what we mean by affect. Affect is a general term that we use to refer to any evaluative reaction. Such reactions are representa- tions of value; they are about the goodness-badness of something. Thus, there are affective feelings, affective thoughts, affective expressions, and so on. Common terms referring to different kinds of affective conditions include emotion, mood, attitude, and tem- perament. They can be distinguished by whether they are states and whether they have a salient object (Clore & Schnall, 2005). Emotions represent affective states with salient objects. The nature of the object (i.e., what the emotion is about) gives structure to the emotion. Thus, a negative reaction focused on an external threat, fear, is different than a reaction focused on one’s own blamewor- thy action, guilt. Moods, in contrast, are diffuse affective states without salient objects and hence without much structure. From the present view, any number of reactions and experiences may signal that something is good or bad in some way. Thus, the actions of Jeffrey R. Huntsinger, Department of Psychology, Loyola University Chicago; Linda M. Isbell, Department of Psychology, University of Mas- sachusetts, Amherst; Gerald L. Clore, Department of Psychology, Univer- sity of Virginia. The first two authors contributed equally to this work. This work was partially supported by National Science Foundation Research Grant BCS- 0956309 to Linda M. Isbell and by grants from the National Institute for Mental Health (MH 50074) and the National Science Foundation (BCS- 1252079) to Gerald L. Clore. Correspondence concerning this article should be addressed to Jeffrey R. Huntsinger, Department of Psychology, 1032 West Sheridan Road, Loyola University Chicago, Chicago, IL 60660. E-mail: jhuntsinger@luc.edu This document is copyrighted by the American Psychological Association or one of its allied publishers. This article is intended solely for the personal use of the individual user and is not to be disseminated broadly. Psychological Review © 2014 American Psychological Association 2014, Vol. 121, No. 4, 600 – 618 0033-295X/14/$12.00 http://dx.doi.org/10.1037/a0037669 600