Mixed-motive conflict in social dilemmas: Mood as input to competitive and cooperative goals.

Four studies using diverse manipulations demonstrated that moods interacted with competitive and cooperative goals to influence people's behaviors in social dilemmas. This was true whether moods were manipulated by films (Studies 1 and 2) or music (Study 4) or were assessed dispositionally (Study 3); whether specific or global goals were manipulated (Studies 1, 3, and 4) or were assessed dispositionally (Study 2); and whether participants' actions were tested in a resource dilemma (Studies 1, 2, and 4) or prisoner's dilemma game (Study 3). In 3 studies, bad moods led to more competition (less cooperation) with competitive goals in mind but to more cooperation (less competition) with cooperative goals in mind. A 4th study reversed this pattern with goals framed in terms of enjoyment. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)