MOODS
It seems that we're always chasing the high of a good mood or
struggling to lift ourselves out of a bad one. But it may be that the
mood we're meant to be in most of the time is somewhere in the
middle.
Psychologist Charles Kimble, Ph.D., and his student Lourdes Maria
die la Uz, both of the University of Dayton, found that people could
quite easily put themselves in a positive mood by watching a Robin
Williams skit or by listening to classical music (in this case, an
appropriately-titled "divertimento" by Mozart). Reading a series of
upbeat statements, such as "I'm full of energy and ambition," and "1 feel
happy and playful today," also worked.
But these good vibrations didn't last long. After a short while,
people began to neutralize their positive feelings, sometimes by
recalling negative memories from their own lives. "l don't know why
someone would want to get out of a good mood, but we seem to have a
built-in tendency to restore a neutral state," remarks Kimble. "People
are psychologically inclined to moderate their emotional
reactions."
The only exception' when the experimenters told their subjects they
were trying to get them into a good mood, study participants obliged them
by remaining in high spirits and generating positive memories. It was
only when people were left on their own to regulate their mood--a state
of affairs that is closer to real life--that they brought themselves
down.
"There's a theory in psychology that contends that whenever your
feet an emotion, you later experience the opposite emotion in a milder
form," Kimble comments. This phenomenon could explain why we feel
exhilarated after being very anxious (think of the experience of a
first-time skydiver), or why we. feet unexpectedly down after an
enjoyable event.
PHOTO (COLOR): Psychologist Charles Kimble, Ph.D., and his student
Lourdes Maria die la Uz, both of the University of Dayton, found that
people could quite easily put themselves in a positive mood by watching a
Robin Williams skit or by listening to classical music (in this case, an
appropriately-titled "divertimento" by Mozart).
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