Incidental affect
Also known as: Incidental emotion
A leftover feeling from one source that bleeds into an unrelated decision.
What it means
Incidental affect is an emotional state that is irrelevant to a judgment or decision at hand yet carries over to influence it, such as letting a foul mood from traffic color an evaluation of a job candidate. It contrasts with integral affect, which is the feeling generated by the decision target itself and is normatively relevant. Incidental emotions exert their effects through misattribution and through emotion-specific appraisal tendencies, so incidental anger and incidental fear push risk judgments in opposite directions. Because the carryover is typically outside awareness, people rarely correct for it unless the true source is made salient. Identifying and neutralizing incidental affect is central to debiasing emotional decisions.
Examples
Still rattled by a frightening news segment, you rate an ordinary investment as riskier than you would in a calm state.
People phoned on sunny days report being happier with their lives overall than those phoned on rainy ones — unless the caller mentions the weather first, which lets them discount the mood.
Still angry from a row at home, you take a hard line in a negotiation you would normally have split down the middle. Anger shrinks the felt risk and sharpens blame.
First described in Distinction articulated by Lerner, Loewenstein, Han and colleagues (2000s).