The effects of anger and fear on persuasiveness

Abstract

Past research based on the unrelated-affect paradigm has demonstrated that distinct emotions exert specific influences on cognition (e.g., Keltner, Ellsworth, & Edwards, 1993). This study investigated the effects of anger or fear on the perceived persuasiveness of an unrelated statement. Under anger, fear, or neutral conditions, participants read two statements, one critical and the other threatening, regarding a bad debt situation. The participants then made judgments about the pursuasiveness of these statements. As predicted, anger enhanced the persuasiveness of the critical statement by increasing the tendency to think that justice had been violated, whereas fear enhanced the persuasiveness of the threatening statement by increasing the tendency to think there would be negative repercussions. These results suggest that emotions increase the persuasive impact of affect-arousing communication by producing specific cognitive tendencies.