Don’t Worry, Be Sad! On the Cognitive, Motivational, and Interpersonal Benefits of Negative Mood

This article reviews recent evidence for the benefits of negative affect for thinking and behavior, consistent with evolutionary theories suggesting an adaptive function for all affective states. Numerous experiments demonstrate that negative affect can improve memory performance, reduce judgmental errors, improve motivation, and result in more effective interpersonal strategies. These findings are interpreted in terms of dual-process theories that predict that positive affect promotes more assimilative, internally focused processing styles, whereas negative affect promotes a more accommodative and externally focused thinking strategy. The theoretical relevance of these findings for recent affect-cognition models is discussed, and the practical implications of recognizing the adaptive benefits of negative affect for social thinking and performance in a number of applied fields are considered.