| This study investigated relations between mood, empathic process (accuracy, attention, elaboration), and altruistic elicitation, the ability to persuade others to behave altruistically. Associations between mood and empathic process were hypothesized to adhere to one of two theories: mood congruity or mood specificity. Mood congruity predicted that observers' empathic process would be greater for target persons' mood congruent over incongruent expressions, where happy observers would be more empathic for positively than negatively valenced target expressions and sad observers would be more empathic for negatively than positively valenced target expressions. Mood specificity predicted that sad observers would demonstrate more empathic process and altruistic elicitation than happy observers.; The experimental design was a 2 x 2 x (2) factorial, including two between-subject variables of observer mood and gender and the within-subject variable of target expression valence. The procedure was divided into two phases: in Phase 1, 634 observers (M age = 18.80) were screened for the presence of happy or sad moods. Those meeting the criteria for these moods were invited to participate in Phase 2. In Phase 2, 64 observers (32 females, 32 males, M age = 19.14) were asked individually to watch videotaped clinical interviews and make guesses as to targets' thoughts and feelings. Four raters judged the degree of match between observers' and targets' reports of targets' thoughts and feelings, with an interrater reliability of .96. Experimenters also recorded observer completion time and the number of words used for each response. Finally, observers generated reasons to contribute to a charity which were later rated by 285 different participants (M age = 18.77) for the degree to which they felt persuaded to make charitable contributions.; Results revealed scant support for hypotheses, though observers were significantly more accurate and elaborate in their responses to targets' negatively than positively valenced expressions, and there was a significant positive association between empathic accuracy and altruistic elicitation. Possible reasons for the lack of significant findings with respect to hypotheses are discussed, and theoretical and methodological alternatives are suggested for future research. |
