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Antecedents of everyday positive emotions: An experience sampling analysis

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Abstract

The focus of this study is on everyday positive emotions and their relations to critical appraisal antecedents. Following from classical appraisal theory and Pekrun’s (2006) control-value theory of achievement emotions, two research questions were addressed, namely whether cognitive appraisals of control and value were related to discrete positive emotions in everyday situations and whether control and value antecedents interact in predicting these emotions. We further investigated whether control/value and positive emotion relations changed as a function of situational factors (achievement vs. non-achievement settings). 50 university freshmen (78% female) were assessed by use of the experience sampling method for a period of 1 week, with intraindividual analyses conducted using a multilevel, idiographic approach. Consistent with our hypotheses, the emotions of enjoyment, pride, and contentment were positively related to control and value appraisals. Further, control and value interacted to predict these positive emotions. The strength of appraisal/positive emotion relations was equivalent across achievement vs. non-achievement settings. Implications for future research are discussed.

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Notes

  1. E.g., “Men are disturbed not by the things which happen, but by their opinions about the things” (Epictetus; Long 1991, p. 14).

  2. An additional brief report by Tong et al. (2005) is not presented due to including a subset of variables subsequently evaluated in Tong et al. (2007).

  3. Very few participants’ reports (1.8% of 2,026 fully or partially completed questionnaires) referred to situations that were not learning or achievement-related in the classical sense (e.g., studying), but may have been perceived by the individual as achievement-oriented in nature (e.g., sports, playing an instrument, playing chess). However, to avoid potential confounds involving the leisure-oriented nature of such activities, they were coded as non-achievement situations in the present analyses.

  4. In the present study, multiple constructs were assessed using single items (cf., Goetz et al. 2007; Wanous et al. 1997). Although multi-item measures are generally preferable for assessing multi-faceted constructs, such measures take longer to complete than single-item measures and could compromise the assessment of state emotional experiences. More specifically, when participants are asked about state emotions, longer self-report measures could confound participants’ responses by introducing greater reflection time and recall bias. In addition, by taking more time to respond, multi-item scales might be in danger of assessing participants’ emotions with respect to completing the questionnaire, rather than emotions concerning the activity they are currently engaged in. For these reasons, single-item measures were assumed to be more appropriate than multi-item measures for use in this study.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. University of Konstanz, Universitaetsstr. 10, 78457, Constance, Germany

    Thomas Goetz

  2. Thurgau University of Teacher Education, Thurgau, Switzerland

    Thomas Goetz

  3. University of Munich, Munich, Germany

    Anne C. Frenzel

  4. University of Regensburg, Regensburg, Germany

    Heidrun Stoeger

  5. University of Maryland, College Park, MD, USA

    Nathan C. Hall

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Goetz, T., Frenzel, A.C., Stoeger, H. et al. Antecedents of everyday positive emotions: An experience sampling analysis. Motiv Emot 34, 49–62 (2010). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11031-009-9152-2

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