Subjective probability is modulated by emotions.
Year: 2025
Type: article
Abstract: Information about risks and probabilities is ubiquitous in our environment, forming the basis for decisions in an uncertain world. Emotions are known to modulate subjective probability when probabilistic information is desired (as in gambles) or undesired (as in risks). Yet little is known about the role of emotions in shaping the subjective probability of affectively neutral events. We investigated this in one correlational study (Study 1, N = 162) and one experimental study (Study 2, N = 119). As predicted, we found that participants higher in emotional dominance were more conservative in their probability estimates, avoiding the extremes. Remarkably, this pattern also transferred to realistic risk assessments. Furthermore, respondents' tendency to use the representativeness heuristic as a proxy for probability was increased in high dominance individuals. Our findings suggest that emotional dominance may be a unifying construct explaining previously reported effects of emotions on probabilistic cognition.
Source: Apollo (University of Cambridge)
DOI: 10.17863/cam.116427
Authors: Abel, Lara, Schulz, Eric, Nelson, Jonathan D
Language: English
Subfield: General Decision Sciences
Field: Decision Sciences
Domain: Social Sciences
Open Access status: green
OpenAlex ID: W6925140726
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