Affective and cognitive control of persons and behaviours David Trafimow 1 *, Paschal Sheeran 2 , Bridget Lombardo 1 , Krystina A. Finlay 1 , Jennie Brown 1 and Christopher J. Armitage 2 1 New Mexico State University, USA 2 University of Sheffield, UK Three studies assessed the relative contribution of affect and cognition to determining behavioural intentions for a variety of behaviours using both between- participants and within-participants analyses. The between-participants analyses showed that affect tends to make more of a contribution than does cognition for more behaviours. However, the within-participants analyses indicated that there are strong individual differences among people. Some people are more under affective control, across behaviours, whereas other people are more under cognitive control. The most interesting finding was that, despite the potential independence of between-participants and within-participants analyses (Mischela, 1990), between- participants analyses on subsamples created from the within-participants analyses showed significant dependence. The predictive validity of affect vs. cognition depended upon whether participants were affectively or cognitively controlled. During the last couple of decades, the classical dichotomy between feeling and knowing as two facets of human experience has been invoked in order to understand better why people perform behaviours. More specifically, it has become fashionable for researchers to distinguish between ‘affective’ (i.e. feeling) and ‘cognitive’ (i.e. knowing) determinants of behaviours. Affect seems to be more important for determining some behaviours whereas cognition seems to be more important for others, though there is a lack of systematic research pertaining to this issue. There may also be individual differences in whether, across a wide range of behaviours, people are more under affective or cognitive control. This article is concerned with both issues: do behaviours tend to be more under affective or cognitive control (across people) and are particular people more under affective or cognitive control (across behaviours)? *Correspondence should be addressed to David Trafimow, Department of Psychology, MSC 3452, New Mexico State University, PO Box 30001, Las Cruces, NM 88003-8001, USA (e-mail: trafimow@crl.nmsu.edu). British Journal of Social Psychology (2004), 43, 207–224 © 2004 The British Psychological Society www.bps.org.uk 207