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The bright side of brooding: State orientationincreases positive emotions about positiveoutcomesMarijke van Puttena

a Department of Social and Organisational Psychology, Leiden University,Leiden, The NetherlandsPublished online: 01 Dec 2014.

To cite this article: Marijke van Putten (2014): The bright side of brooding: State orientation increasespositive emotions about positive outcomes, Cognition and Emotion, DOI: 10.1080/02699931.2014.981250

To link to this article: http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/02699931.2014.981250

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The bright side of brooding: State orientation increasespositive emotions about positive outcomes

Marijke van Putten

Department of Social and Organisational Psychology, Leiden University, Leiden, The Netherlands

Research has by and large shown the negative effects of state orientation, that brooding over pastevents (i.e., state orientation) leads to more negative emotions and less well-being than quickly gettingover past events (i.e., action orientation). However, this past research has primarily focused on howpeople cope with negative events and bad outcomes. The present research focuses on how people copewith positive events with good outcomes. Study 1 found that state-oriented people felt better after awindfall than action-oriented people. Study 2 found that state-oriented people felt not only worsewhen things turned out bad but also better when things turned out well than action-oriented people.Study 3 replicated the positive effect of state orientation on positive emotions with an experimentalinduction of action vs. state orientation. These results show that in positive situations state orientationcan have emotional benefits – in other words, they show the bright side of brooding.

Keywords: Positive emotions; Action orientation; State orientation; Decoupling; Gain; Windfall.

Life is full of setbacks and windfalls. We mightoversleep, miss our train and hurry to work,discovering our appointment cancelled at the lastmoment. We might also find out our train isdelayed as well and be just in time for work for ourimportant meeting. The way we cope with allthese misfortunes and lucks determines how wefeel. Some people easily get over past events, whileothers brood over them for a long time havingdifficulty letting go (see for overviews, Diefen-dorff, Hall, Lord, & Strean, 2000; Koole & Kuhl,2007; Kuhl & Beckmann, 1994). Research hastime and again found that brooding over eventsfosters negative emotions and makes people worse

off in life and unhappier (see for overviews,

Koole & Kuhl, 2007; Kuhl & Beckmann, 1994).

However, this research has mainly studied this

difference in coping in situations where people

experienced setbacks and misfortunes. What will

be the effect of brooding over windfalls, or lucks?

Will brooding still make people unhappier? Or

will brooding increase happiness in these positive

situations? The present research conjectures that

having difficulty getting over events not only

increases negative affect in negative situations but

also might increase positive affect in positive

situations as well.

Correspondence should be addressed to: Marijke van Putten, Department of Social and Organizational Psychology, Leiden

University, P.O. Box 9555, 2300 RB Leiden, The Netherlands. E-mail: puttenmvan@fsw.leidenuniv.nl.

I would like to thank Dr Wilco van Dijk and Dr Karl Teigen for their comments and discussions on earlier drafts of this paper.

© 2014 Taylor & Francis 1

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This difference in coping is called action vs.state orientation. Action orientation is the abilityto detach oneself from situations and to let go ofthe past. The more action-oriented people are, theless troubled they are by misfortunes and the morequickly they take the plunge with difficult deci-sions. The more state-oriented people are, incontrast, the harder they can let go of misfortunesand the more they reflect on negative events (seefor overviews, Diefendorff et al., 2000; Koole &Kuhl, 2007; Kuhl & Beckmann, 1994).

As previous research has time and again shown,state-oriented people are more likely to be influ-enced by external cues. In other words, they aremore likely to attach these external influences totheir decisions and are more likely to attach theseexternal influences to their feelings. This is not adeliberate, active decision. State-oriented peopleare more vulnerable to automatic priming pro-cesses (Koole & Jostmann, 2004) and are unwarilymore influenced by the opinions of other peoplethan action-oriented people. State-oriented peopleare more likely to perceive externally assignedgoals as self-chosen goals (Baumann & Kuhl,2003). Moreover, compared to action-orientedpeople, state-oriented people are more influencedby previous investments when making a sub-sequent investment decision, and they are moreinfluenced by missed opportunities in theirdecision to act on subsequent opportunities (VanPutten, Zeelenberg, & Van Dijk, 2009, 2010; seealso Van Putten, Zeelenberg, & Van Dijk, 2013).Action-oriented people, on the other hand, havea tendency to detach these external influencesfrom their current states and decisions andinstead focus on their internal goals and motiva-tions. In demanding situations, their self-activationincreases (Koole & Jostmann, 2004) indicatingthat they increase the focus on their own goalsand needs rather than external influences (see alsoBaumann & Kuhl, 2003).

This difference in action orientation determineshow well people cope with setbacks and howsuccessful they are at reaching their goals. Action-oriented people are better at regulating negativeaffect (e.g., Baumann & Kuhl, 2003; Koole &Fockenberg, 2011; Koole & Jostmann, 2004)

and in forming goal-directed intentions (Kuhl &Goschke, 1994). They experience less regret(McElroy & Dowd, 2007), less fears (e.g., Hautzin-ger, 1994; Kuhl, 1981), less depression (e.g., Keller,Straub, & Wolfersdorf, 1994), higher job attitudesand performance (Diefendorff et al., 2000) and lesscognitive dissonance (Harmon-Jones & Harmon-Jones, 2002). In general, their dispositional ability todetach themselves from negative experiences onlyseems beneficial for action-oriented people and tomake them happier. Question thus arises, if actionorientation will always increase happiness, or if thereare situations where the ability to detach from eventsdecreases happiness too?

An answer to this question might be found inthe behavioural decision-making literature. Spe-cifically, the decoupling literature has studiedsituational factors that enable people to detachoneself from previous events (Gourville &Soman, 1998; Soman & Gourville, 2001). Thisresearch shows that these situational factors havesimilar effects on behaviour as an action-orientedmindset. When two outcomes were situationallydecoupled, they influenced each other less. Forexample, decoupling reduced the likelihood thatthe outcome of a gamble was taken into account inthe decision to play a second gamble, and that aprevious missed opportunity was taken intoaccount in the decision to act on a subsequentsimilar opportunity (Tversky & Shafir, 1992;Van Dijk & Zeelenberg, 2003; Van Putten,Zeelenberg, & Van Dijk, 2007). In other words,situational decoupling factors enable people to letgo of previous outcomes and missed opportunitiesand to focus on the decision at hand. As onemight expect, situational decoupling has beenshown to dampen negative affect. However, inter-estingly, decoupling has also been shown todampen positive affect (Van Dijk & Zeelenberg,2006). Thus, situational factors that enable peopleto detach from previous negative outcomesdecrease negative affect about negative outcomes,but decrease positive affect about positive out-comes too.

This effect of decoupling seems highly relevantto the present question, what the effect of actionvs. state orientation is on positive affect in positive

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situations. Action-oriented people detach negativeoutcomes from current decisions. Previous resultsshowed that this ability is beneficial for them andcauses them to feel better and happier. However,decoupling positive outcomes from positive eventsalso makes people feel less good and less happywith their outcomes. The present studies use theseinsights from behavioural decision-making literat-ure to investigate the effect of action orientationon positive affect. The idea is that action-orientedpeople’s tendency to detach oneself not onlyreduces negative affect about situations that turnout bad but also reduces positive affect aboutsituations that turn out good. Consequently, theidea is that state-oriented people because they donot detach themselves but instead dwell on out-comes more, feel better after a good outcome thanaction-oriented people.

The general idea that state orientation mighthave benefits in itself is not new (for overviews, seeKoole, Jostmann, & Baumann, 2012; Koole, Kuhl,Jostmann, & Vohs, 2005). Especially relevant forthe present research is two previous studiesfocused on reported affective benefits. The resultsindicate that state-oriented people might feel morepositively in some conditions than action-orientedpeople. The first study (Koole & Jostmann, 2004;Exp. 1; but see also Exps. 2 and 3) showed thatunder relaxing conditions, state-oriented peoplereport less tension than action-oriented people.The second study tested the effects on well-beingof action vs. state orientation and the dispositionalreadiness to enter an emotional state, called affectsensitivity (Baumann, Kaschel, & Kuhl, 2007).The results showed that state-oriented people whoreadily dive into their emotions report higheremotional well-being than state-oriented peoplewho are more cautious about entering emotionalstates. In both studies, affect and well-being weremeasured by combining positive and negativeaffect. Question thus remains whether the positiveeffects of state orientation were caused by reduc-tions in negative affect or increases in positiveaffect. The present research extends these findingsby testing the effect of positive situations specif-ically on positive emotions.

Interestingly, preliminary direct evidence thatstate orientation makes people happier in positivesituations might be found in Jostmann, Koole,Van der Wulp, and Fockenberg (2005). Partici-pants rated the pleasantness of nonsense wordsafter subliminally being showed angry, happy orneutral faces. The idea was that action-orientedparticipants were better at regulating negativeaffect and would rate the nonsense words asmore pleasant than state-oriented participantsafter the anger prime. This is indeed whatJostmann and colleaugues found. However, unex-pectedly, they also found that state-orientedparticipants rated the nonsense words as morepleasant when being subliminally primed withhappy faces than action-oriented participants.Because this was not the scope of the article, thisresult was not further discussed. However, for thepresent purposes, this is very interesting, of course,because it confirms the idea that in positivesituations state orientation might increase positiveaffect.

OVERVIEW OF STUDIES

Three studies are presented that investigate theidea that state orientation increases positive affectin positive situations. The hypothesis was thatcompared to action-oriented participants, state-oriented participants showed not only highernegative emotion scores in the conditions thatturn out for the worse but also higher positiveemotion scores for situations that turn out for thebetter. Study 1 investigated the effect of actionorientation on positive emotions when participantsreceive windfalls. Study 2 consists of two scen-arios in which an outcome turns out for thebetter or for the worse. The idea was that state-oriented participants felt stronger negative andpositive emotions than action-oriented partici-pants. Finally, Study 3 investigated this effect ofpositive emotions in a scenario study manipulatingaction vs. state orientation.

In all studies, the aim was to get at least 20participants per cell, following the recommenda-tions of Simmons, Nelson, and Simonsohn

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(2011). All manipulations and measures areincluded in the methods and results sections.The specific methods and results of exploratorymeasures are reported in the Appendix. In allstudies, it is reported how the sample size, dataexclusions manipulations and measurements of thestudy were determined.

STUDY 1

In Study 1, students were invited to the lab toparticipate in a lab session consisting of severalstudies. During the session, they were informedthat payment for participation was higher thanexpected. The hypothesis was that positive emo-tions were affected more strongly by this windfall instate-oriented than in action-oriented particpants.

Method

Participants and design

Ninety-four students (70 women, Mage = 21 years)accepted the invitation to participate in this study.This study was part of a larger session filled withseveral unrelated studies. For this session, the labwas reserved for a week. The aim was to run aminimum of 40 participants per cell totaling to 80participants, but the study kept running for theremainder of the week to have as many partici-pants as possible. Participants were randomlyassigned to one of the two-outcome conditions(positive vs. control). Time of measure (begin vs.end of session) was a within-subject measure andaction orientation was measured.

Procedure and materials

Participants were invited to the lab where theyreceived a booklet with general instructions on thecover. First, current emotional state was measuredfor the first time with the M-DES (Fredrickson,Tugade, Waugh, & Larkin, 2003). The M-DESconsists of 20 triads of emotion words. For example,the item measuring joy was: To what extend do youfeel joyful, glad or happy? And the item for sadnesswas: To what extend do you feel sad, downhearted orunhappy? All items were answered on 5-point scales

ranging from 0 (not at all) to 4 (very much). The 20M-DES items measure amusement, anger, shame,awe, contempt, disgust, embarrassment, gratitude,guilt, hate, hope, inspiration, interest, joy, love,pride, sadness, fear, contentment and stress.

After completing the M-DES, participants’habitual action vs. state orientation was measuredwith the ACS-90, a questionnaire consisting of 24short descriptions of situations where action- andstate-oriented people typically react differently(Kuhl, 1994). Twelve of these situations are aboutinitiating new projects or making difficult deci-sions, the other 12 describe failures and othernegative events. Respondents are in each casegiven the choice between an action-oriented anda state-oriented response as characteristic of theirown behaviour. Examples of items are (state-oriented answer in italics): “When I am facing abig project which has to be done: (1) I often spendtoo long thinking about where I should begin; (2) Idon’t have any problems getting started”; “When Ihave lost something that is very valuable to me andI can’t find it anywhere: (1) I have a hard timeconcentrating on something else; (2) I put it out ofmy mind after a little while”; “When somethingreally gets me down: (1) I have trouble doinganything at all; (2) I find it is easy to distractmyself by doing other things; ‘When I am toldthat my work has been completely unsatisfactory:(1) I don't let it bother me for too long; (2) I feelparalyzed’. State-oriented answers are coded 0;action-oriented answers are coded 1. These scoresare summed to one continuous action-orientationscore (0–24) with higher scores indicating higherdegree of action orientation and lower scoresindicating a higher degree of state orientation.

After filling in the action-orientation measure,participants continued participating in other unre-lated studies. Then, the experimenter came in tocollect their questionnaires. To the participants inthe positive condition, the experimenter informallytold there was a windfall. The reward for thepresent study was not €1.50 as previously thought,but turned out to be €3. Next, the participants inthe positive condition filled in the M-DES for thesecond time. In the control condition, participantsfirst filled in the M-DES for the second time and

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then the experimenter told them about the wind-fall. After they filled in the M-DES, theyindicated their age and gender. Finally all partici-pants were debriefed, thanked and paid forparticipating.

Results

The 10 positive items of the first and second M-DES measure were each totaled to form two M-DES Scales, one measure at the beginning of theexperiment (α = .90; M = 19.82, SD = 7.86) andone at the end (α = .91; M = 20.29, SD = 8.04).Participants were classified as action- vs. state-oriented by means of a median split (median =11.50). The results are summarised in Figure 1. Arepeated measures analysis of variance (ANOVA)was conducted with time of M-DES measure(beginning vs. end of experiment) as a within-subject variable and outcome (positive vs. control)and action orientation (action- vs. state-oriented)as between-subject variables. The results showed amain effect of action orientation (F (1, 86) = 6.80,p = .01, η² = .073), indicating that on average,state-oriented participants scored lower on positiveaffect than action-oriented participants. Therewere no main effects of outcome (F (1, 86) =0.83, p = .37, η² = .01) or time (F (1, 86) = 0.21,p = .65, η² = .002). There was, however, a two-wayinteraction between time and outcome (F (1, 86) =5.94, p = .02, η² = .065), indicating that thechange in positive affect in the positive conditiondiffered from the change in positive affect in thecontrol condition. There were no two-way inter-actions between outcome and action orientation(F (1, 86) = 0.02, p = .90, η² < .001) or time andaction orientation (F (1, 86) = 0.29, p = .59, η² =.003). However, the results showed the expectedthree-way interaction between time, outcome and

action orientation (F (1, 86) = 5.41, p = .02, η² =.059). T-tests show that in the control conditions,action-oriented participants were not happier thanstate-oriented participants at the beginning of theexperiment (t (41) = –1.04, p = .30). At the end ofthe experiment, action-oriented participants werehappier than state-oriented participants (t (41) =–2.39, p = .02). In the positive conditions, action-oriented participants were happier than state-oriented participants at the beginning of theexperiment (t (45) = –2.21, p = .03). At the endof the experiment, this difference was reduced tonon-significance (t (45) = –1.41, p = .17). To testhow the changes in positive affect due to outcomewere different for state-oriented than for action-oriented participants, differences between positiveaffect at the beginning and the end of theexperimental session were computed. Simple slopeanalyses show that there was an effect of conditionfor state-oriented participants (–1 SD; β = .37,p = .01) but not for action-oriented participants(+1 SD; β = .12, p = .42). The windfall gain thuspositively affected state-oriented people, but notaction-oriented people.1

Neutral condition 4

3.5

3

2.5

2

1.5

1

0.5

0

Positive condition

Beginning of the experiment State Action State Action

End of the experiment

Figure 1. Means and standard errors of positive emotions at the

beginning and end of the experiment depending on outcome

(neutral vs. positive) and action orientation (state vs. action) in

Study 1.

1 Regression analyses of condition and action orientation on the difference scores were done using the two subscales ofthe Action Orientation Scale separately; AOD (α = .61, M = 6.21, SD = 2.51) and AOF (α = .70, M = 5.34, SD = 2.74).AOD. The results on the difference scores with the AOD subscale showed main effect of outcome (β = –.24, p = .02), nomain effect of AOD (β = .16, p = .12) and a marginally significant interaction effect (β = –.23, p = .09).AOF. The results on the difference scores with the AOF subscale showed only a main effect of outcome (β = .24, p = .02), nomain effect of AOF (β = .05, p = .67) and no interaction effect (β = –.02, p = .91). The effects of action orientation in thisexperiment thus seem to be driven by the Decision subscale, which measures the difficulty to initiate new projects and maketough decisions and not by the Failure subscale, which measures coping with failures and negative events.

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Discussion

The aim of Study 1 was to test if there is adifference in positive affect between action- andstate-oriented people as the result of a windfall.The results show the expected difference. Theemotions of action-oriented people did not appearto be affected by receiving a windfall gain. State-oriented people, however, showed a significantincrease in positive emotion after receiving awindfall gain. This thus confirms the idea thatstate-oriented people are affected by positive out-comes more than action-oriented people.

The presence of a neutral condition in Study 1proved to be very insightful, as it showed theinitial differences between moods of action- andstate-oriented participants. Studies 2 and 3 arelimited in this sense because the neutral conditionis omitted. The reason was that the aim of thesestudies was to show the increasing effect of stateorientation on both positive and negativeemotions.

STUDY 2

Study 1 showed the expected effect of stateorientation on positive emotions. In Study 2, theeffect of state orientation on both negative andpositive emotions was investigated. Two scenarioswere used with either good or bad outcomes.Action orientation was measured before thescenarios and positive and negative emotionswere measured after the scenarios. State-orientedparticipants were predicted to feel more nega-tively about bad outcomes and more posi-tively about good outcomes than action-orientedparticipants.

Method

Participants and design

The aim was to get 40 participants per cell,totaling to 80 participants for this study. Fivebooklets were printed extra and were run extra tocompensate for possible missing data. Partici-pants were 85 students recruited in cafeterias and

hall of the faculty. They were randomly assignedto one of the two outcome conditions (goodvs. bad).

Procedure and materials

On agreement of participation, participants re‐ceived a booklet with general instructions on thecover. On the first page, their habitual action vs.state orientation was measured with the ACS-90(Kuhl, 1994; see also Study 1). Upon completionof the ACS-90, they turned the page and readinstructions that they were going to read scenarios.They were asked to imagine themselves in thedepicted situation. After each scenario, questionswere asked about their thoughts and their feelingsin this situation. The first scenario described asituation where participants wanted to buy thelatest smartphone. They saw an opportunity to buythe phone marked down from €525 (regular price)to €425. Their parents advised them to wait. Inthe good-outcome condition, they took theirparent’s advice, in the bad-outcome condition,they ignored the advice and bought the phone for€425. A week later the phone is offered for €325.The second scenario was a Dutch translation ofKahneman and Tversky (1982)’s flight scenario,where participants were on their way to theairport, but due to a traffic jam arrived too late.On arrival on the airport, they learned that theirplane was also delayed. They decided to run. Inthe bad outcome condition, they just missed theirplane; in the good outcome condition, they justcaught their plane.

After each scenario, participants rated howmuch they felt gratitude, regret, relief, disappoint-ment, happiness, sadness, shame, guilt, pride,good luck and bad luck (1 = not at all, 7 = verymuch). Additionally, exploratory supplementalmeasures of counterfactual thinking were taken(see Appendix). Finally, they filled in their age andgender and were thanked for participating.

Results and discussion

The data of four participants were discarded due tomissing variables. The remaining 81 participants

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(48 females, three participants did not indicategender, Mage = 21 years) obtained a mean action-orientation score of 12.42 (SD = 4.64, α = .77) onthe ACS-90 Scale. All data were analysed withregression analyses with condition (dummy-codedas 0 for bad outcome and 1 for good outcome),the z-score of action orientation and theirinteraction.

All negative emotions (regret, disappointment,sadness, shame, guilt and bad luck) were averagedto form a Negative Emotion Scale (α = .91) and allpositive emotions (gratitude, relief, happinesspride and good luck) were averaged to form aPositive Emotion Scale (α = .97). Results aresummarised in Figure 2a and 2b.

Negative emotions

The results of the regression analyses show thatcondition had a main effect on negative emotions(β = –.82, p < .001) such that people in the bad-outcome condition felt stronger negative emotionsthan people in the good outcome condition. Therewas also a main effect of action orientation (β =–.18, p < .01). State-oriented people felt morenegative emotions than action-oriented people.However, these effects were qualified by a mar-ginally significant interaction effect (β = .19, p <

.07). The results of simple slope analyses showedthat the effect of condition on negative emotionwas stronger when the score on the action-orientation measure was low (–1 SD; β = –.95,p < .001) than when the action-orientationscore was high (+1 SD; β = –.69, p < .001).This shows that state-oriented participants feltworse about bad outcomes than action-orientedpeople.

Positive emotions

A similar regression analysis was done on thePositive Emotions Scale. Condition had a maineffect on positive emotions (β = .93, p < .001),such that people in the positive outcome conditionfelt stronger positive emotions than people in thebad outcome condition. There was also a maineffect of action orientation (β = –.07, p = .05).State-oriented people felt generally more positive

emotions than action-oriented people. However,these effects were qualified by a significant inter-action effect (β = –.14, p = .01). The results ofsimple slope analyses showed that the effect ofcondition on positive emotion was stronger whenthe scores on the action orientation measure werelow (–1 SD; β = 1.03, p < .001) than whenthe action orientation scores were high (+1 SD;β = .84, p < .001). This shows that state-orientedparticipants felt better about good outcomes than

Positive emotions (a)

(b)

7

6

5

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–4 –2 0 2 4

Standardised action-orientation score

Negative condition

Positive condition

Negative emotions

Negative condition

Positive condition 7

6

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Standardised action-orientation score

Figure 2. Mean ratings with confidence intervals of positive

emotions (a) and negative emotions (b) depending on action

orientation (x-axes) and condition (positive vs. negative) in

Study 2.

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action-oriented people. Thus, people with a state

orientation were more strongly affected both by

good and bad outcomes.2

STUDY 3

Study 3 was conducted to replicate the effect ofstate orientation on positive emotions with aninduction of an action- or state-oriented mindset.The idea again was that activating a state-orientedmindset would lead to not only more negativefeelings about undesirable outcomes than activat-ing an action-oriented mindset but also to morepositive feelings about desirable outcomes.

Method

Participants and design

The aim was to get 20 participants per cell,totaling to 80 participants for this study. Eightystudents (Mage = 21 years; 57 females) wererandomly assigned to one of the four conditionsof a 2 (outcome: good vs. bad) × 2 (mindset:action- vs. state-oriented) between-participantsdesign.

Procedure and materials

Participants were students recruited in cafeteriasand hall of the faculty. On agreement of parti-cipation, they received a booklet with generalinstructions on the cover. They were asked toimagine themselves in the smartphone scenario asin Study 2. Again they learn the phone is offeredcheaper a week after they initially saw it. In thenegative condition, they accepted the first favour-able offer, and in the positive condition, theywaited for a second, even more favourable one.

(a) Positive emotions

State-oriented Action-oriented

Negative condition Positive condition

7

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1

(b) Negative emotions

State-oriented Action-oriented

Negative condition Positive condition

7

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1

Figure 3. Means and standard deviations of positive emotions

(a) and negative emotions (b) depending on condition (positive vs.

negative) and action orientation in Study 3.

2 The same regression analyses were done using the two subscales separately; AOD (α = .70, M = 6.65, SD = 2.64) andAOF (α = .71, M = 5.77, SD = 2.92).AOD. The results on the negative emotions with the AOD subscale showed main effect of outcome (β = –.80, p < .001), nomain effect of AOD (β = –.12, p = .11) and no interaction effect (β = –.01, p = .95). The results on the positive emotionswith the AOD subscale showed a main effect of outcome (β = .94, p < .001), no main effect of AOD (β = –.04, p = .30) andan interaction effect (β = –.14, p = .01).AOF. The results on the negative emotions with the AOF subscale showed a main effect of outcome (β = –.81, p < .001), amain effect of AOF (β = –.18, p = .01) and an interaction effect (β = .28, p = .01). The results on the positive emotions withthe AOF subscale showed a main effect of outcome (β = .93, p < .001), a main effect of AOF (β = –.08, p = .03) and amarginally significant interaction effect (β = –.09, p = .10). The effects of action orientation in this experiment on thenegative emotions were mainly driven by the failure subscale, which measures coping with failures and negative events, andnot so much by the decision subscale, which measures the difficulty to initiate new projects and make tough decisions. Theeffects of action orientation in this experiment on positive emotions are driven by both subscales, but more strongly by thedecision subscale.

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After reading the scenario, action orientationwas manipulated as in Van Putten et al. (2009).This was done the same in the positive andnegative condition. Participants in the state-oriented mindset condition were instructed todescribe their thoughts and feelings in the situ-ation; participants in the action-oriented mindsetcondition were instructed to describe what theycould do to improve the situation. They weregiven half a page for this.

Then all participants rated their degree ofgratitude, regret, disappointment, happiness, sad-ness, relief, shame, guilt, pride, good luck and badluck (1 = not at all, 7 = very much). Additionally,exploratory supplementary measures of counter-factual thinking were taken (see Appendix).Finally, they filled in their age and gender, andwere thanked for their participation.

Results and discussion

All the negative emotions (regret, disappointment,sadness, shame, guilt and bad luck) were averagedto form a Negative Emotion Scale (α = .95) and allpositive emotions (gratitude, relief, happiness,pride and good luck) were averaged to form aPositive Emotion Scale (α = .95) Results aresummarised in Figure 3a and 3b.

Negative emotions

A 2 (good vs. bad outcome) × 2 (action- vs. state-oriented) ANOVA on the Negative EmotionScale revealed only a main effect of outcome(F (1, 75) = 343.09, p < .001). Negative emotionscore was higher in the bad outcome (M = 5.11,SD = 1.04) than in the good outcome condition(M = 1.49, SD = 0.62). There was no main effectof action (M = 3.28, SD = 2.16) vs. stateorientation (M = 3.31, SD = 1.89) or anyinteraction effect (F < 1). Thus, the manipulationof action vs. state orientation seemed not to affectnegative emotions.

Positive emotions

A 2 (good vs. bad outcome) × 2 (action- vs. state-oriented) ANOVA on the Positive Emotion Scale

found a main effect of outcome (F (1, 75) =408.03, p < .001) and no main effect of actionorientation (F < 1). However, there was a signi-ficant interaction effect (F (1, 75) = 9.29, p < .01).Simple contrast analyses showed that in the good-outcome condition, participants in the state-oriented condition scored higher on the PositiveEmotions Scale (M = 5.82, SD = 0.51) thanparticipants in the action-oriented condition(M = 5.24, SD = 0.97; t (75) = 2.24, p = .03). Inthe bad-outcome condition, people in the state-oriented condition scored lower on the PositiveEmotions Scale (M = 1.58, SD = 0.75) thanpeople in the action-oriented condition (M = 2.11,SD = 0.91; t (75) = 2.07, p = .04). These resultsthus show that a state-oriented instruction todescribe thoughts and feelings makes peoplemore positive about a good outcome and lesspositive about a bad outcome.

It is surprising that the negative effects of stateorientation were not replicated in this study. Thiscould be due to the difference between manip-ulating and measuring action orientation. Themanipulation is nice because it grasps the gist ofaction vs. state orientation as a difference betweenlingering on events vs. quickly deciding how toimprove the situation. However, this simulta-neously might be a reason why it is not the sameas an individual difference measure. The lattermeasures action- or state-oriented responses invarious ways and in various situations. The nullresult on negative emotions (and marginal effect inStudy 2) mirrors the results of Van Putten et al.(2009) though, which showed no difference in theaction- and state-oriented conditions in regret.Both action- and state-oriented participants simi-larly regretted missing a more attractive opportun-ity. There were differences though in the effectson the likelihood to act on a similar less attractiveopportunity. Even though in the present Study 3,there were no effects of action orientation on theNegative Emotions Scale, the results on thePositive Emotions Scale do indicate that com-pared to action-oriented people, state-orientedpeople feel worse (less positively) after a badoutcome but also better after a good outcome.

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GENERAL DISCUSSION

The main question driving the present researchwas if action orientation makes people less happywhen things go right than state orientation. Threestudies found that this is indeed is the case. Study1 found that a windfall affected positive emotionsof state-oriented people, who are natural dwellers,but not of action-oriented people, who more easilyget over past events. Study 2 found that state-oriented people indicated higher positive emotionsin scenarios with good outcomes than action-oriented people. Finally, Study 3 showed thatpeople who were instructed to be state-orientedabout a good outcome also indicated strongerpositive emotions than people who were instructedto be action-oriented. These three studies thusconvincingly show that in situations with goodoutcomes, an action orientation leads to lesspositive emotions than a state orientation.

Implications

Action vs. state orientation

This finding makes an important contribution tothe action- vs. state-orientation literature, whichhas primarily studied the effect of state orientationin negative or difficult situations. The previousliterature, therefore, mainly showed the dark sideof state orientation. The present findings showthere might be a bright side of state orientation. Itseems that state-oriented people not only feelworse than action-oriented people in negativesituations. They seem to feel better in positivesituations as well.

This is the first article explicitly studying actionvs. state orientation under positive conditions andconjecturing that dwelling on the past might makestate-oriented people happier than action-orientedpeople when things go right. However, this is notthe first article discussing the positive sides of stateorientation, or finding positive effects on affect forstate-oriented people. In an interesting overview,Koole et al. (2005) earlier discussed that stateorientation and lingering on one’s emotions hastrade-offs such that it has costs and benefits. For

example state-oriented people’s higher reliablity onother people’s opinions leads to a stronger socialnetwork. Another example is that state-orientedparticipants are better at reducing stress in non-demanding, or non-threatening situations thanaction-oriented people (Koole & Jostmann, 2004;see also, Koole, Jostmann, & Baumann, 2012).This overview discusses the “hidden benefits” ofstate orientation. It is not directly tested howstate-oriented people react in positive situationsand whether they feel more positively then.However, it clearly shows that state orientationhas its trade-offs.

Although some studies found positive effects ofstate orientation with implicit (Jostmann, Koole,van der Wulp, & Fockenberg, (2005) and explicitmeasures (Koole & Jostmann, 2004) of affect, themajority of previous studies seem to indicate thataction-oriented people are happier than state-oriented people. The present findings are aninteresting extension of these previous findingsand seem paradoxical: If state-oriented people arehappier in positive situations, why are theyunhappier in general?

Experiencing more positive affect in positivesituations does not lead to more happiness in life,in general. Next to pleasure, people need a sense ofmeaningfulness to feel happy (e.g., Diener, Oishi,& Lucas, 2003; Kahneman, Diener, & Schwarz,1999; Ryan & Deci, 2001). Positive emotions caneven have negative effects on well-being. It can bedistracting, and the arousal that stems frompositive affect can give rise to feelings of stressand restlessness (Pressman & Cohen, 2005). Itmight even be dangerous to focus on positiveaffect in situations where it could prevent payingattention to possible dangers, or drawbacks(Koole, 2009; Rothermund, Voss, & Wentura,2008; Schwager & Rothermund, 2013). It isuncertain how the present findings on feelingbetter about good outcomes relate to overallhappiness ratings. Study 1 showed that state-oriented people started the experimental sessionwith lower scores on positive emotions, butbenefited from the windfall gain such that therewere no differences in positive emotions at the endof the session.

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These results confirm that state-oriented peo-ple are not necessarily happier than action-oriented people, but that they clearly benefitmore from positive outcomes in positive situations.Of course, it could be that these studies showspecific examples of positive situations wherestate-oriented people are happier than action-oriented people. However, there might be otherpositive situations where action-oriented peopleare happier than state-oriented people (e.g., whenan inaction turns out more favourably thanexpected; cf. McElroy & Dowd, 2007). Further,research should test the generalisability of theseeffects. For example, the present studies only usedself-report measures to directly measure positiveaffect. It could be that these results are only foundin self-reports because they only manifest them-selves in subjective experience (see Koole &Jostmann, 2004; but see also Jostmann et al.,2005). Further, research could test these effectswith implicit measures of positive emotions orwith behavioural tests.

Underlying mechanisms

The present research showed that state-orientedpeople’s inability to let go of prior emotions leadsthem to feel happier when they learn they receiveda good outcome than action-oriented people.Question remains, what could cause this increasein positive affect? The model proposed by Kooleand Jostmann (2004, see Figure 1) could explainthese findings. It predicts that under relaxingconditions, action-oriented people will maintainpleasant affect at a moderate level and counter-regulate pleasant affect at high intensities. State-oriented people are predicted to show no affectregulation and therefore show passive priming ofthe positive emotions. They might even focus ontheir positive affect. The present results indirectlyconfirm these predictions, by showing higherpositive affect for state- than for action-orientedparticipants in positive circumstances. However,focus on affect, or affective maintenance was notdirectly measured. Future research could moredirectly test these causal processes of the positiveeffect of state orientation on positive affect.

Another question that could shed light on theunderlying process is, what are state-orientedpeople brooding on that makes them happier inpositive situations? One answer is provided by theemotion and decision-making literature. Whenstate-oriented people are lost in their thoughts,they are reflecting on the current state andcomparing this to other possible current states.(Kuhl, 1981; Kuhl & Beckmann, 1994). Fromthe regret and disappointment literature, weknow that such comparisons can instigate negat-ive emotions. For example, comparative negativeemotions, such as regret, or disappointment, areincreased by so-called “counterfactual thoughts”;thoughts about what might have been. However,comparative positive emotions are increased bycounterfactual thougths too (Koo, Algoe, Wilson,& Gilbert, 2008; Teigen, 1995, 1997; Teigen &Jensen, 2011). For example, happiness with theirrelationship was amplified after people thoughtabout how things would be different if theirpartner was absent than when they thought aboutthe presence of their partner (Koo et al., 2008).But also, Norwegian tourists who survived thetsunami in South-east Asia in December 2004 feltpredominantly lucky thinking back to the eventafter 9 months because they tended to think abouthow things could have been much worse (Teigen& Glad, 2011). It might be that state-orientedpeople have more or stronger counterfactualthoughts and that this intensifies their counter-factual emotions. The results of Study 2 confirmedthat state-oriented participants reported morecounterfactual thoughts than action-oriented par-ticipants. The manipulation of action vs. stateorientation in Study 3 did not lead to differencesin counterfactual thinking (see supplemental mea-sures in Appendix). Thus, the present resultspartly confirm these ideas.

Interestingly, counterfactual emotions arehighly motivating. For example, the more peopleregret their mistakes, the more they are motivatedto undo their mistake and actively make sure theywill not make the same mistake again (Zeelenberg,Van Dijk, Manstead, & van der Pligt, 1998).Especially when people know what the out-come would have been had they chosen differently

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(i.e., a strong counterfactual), they are morelikely to make choices that avoid future regret(Zeelenberg, Beattie, van de Pligt, & De Vries,1996) and are more likely to learn from theirregret and make different subsequent choices(Avrahami & Kareev, 2011). Research has indeedshown that state-oriented people regretted mis-takable actions more than action-oriented people(McElroy & Dowd, 2007). However, actions ormotivations stemming from this regret were notmeasured. It would be interesting to study if state-oriented people also act more on regrets thanaction-oriented people. If so, this would counter-argue a common belief that action-oriented peopleis simply more active in general, by showing thatstate-oriented people become more active after aregrettable mistake than action-oriented people.Future research might shed light on the effect ofstate orientation on counterfactual thoughts andtheir motivating effect on behaviour.

Manuscript received 12 February 2014

Revised manuscript received 21 October 2014

Manuscript accepted 22 October 2014

First published online 01 December 2014

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APPENDIX

Supplemental measures

Counterfactuals

In Study 2, after measuring the emotions for both scenarios,

participants’ counterfactual thoughts were measured with four

items. All items were measures on 7-point scales (1 = not at all,

7 = very much). In the smartphone scenarios, participants

indicated in the negative [positive] conditions to what extent

they thought: If only I had [Luckily I] listened to my parents;

what if I had [not] listened to my parents, if only I had

[Luckily I] waited buying the phone; what if I had [not] waited

buying the phone. In the plane scenarios, participants indicated

in the negative [positive] conditions to what extent they

thought: If only I had [Luckily I] caught my flight; what if

I had not [had] caught my flight, if only [Luckily] the plane

was delayed; what if the plane was not [more] delayed.

The mean of the scores on these items formed a reliable

Counterfactual Thinking Scale (α = .82; M = 5.32, SD = 1.08).

The results of regression analyses showed no main effect of

condition (β = –.05, p = .64), a main effect of action orientation

(β = –.39, p < .001) and an interaction effect (β = .31, p = .05).

Simple slope analyses showed that there was a marginally

significant effect of condition on counterfactual thinking for

state-oriented participants (–1 SD; β = –.26, p = .09), but not

for action-oriented participants (+1 SD; β = .15, p = .30). The

results show a trend that state-oriented participants showed

more counterfactual thinking, but especially in the positive

condition.

In Study 3, after measuring the emotions, participants’counterfactual thoughts were measured with the same four

items as in Study 2. Next, they turned the page and filled in the

action-orientation score.

The mean of the scores on the counterfactual thinking items

formed a reliable Counterfactual Thinking Scale (α = .73; M =

5.60, SD = 1.12). The results of a 2 × 2 ANOVA showed only

a marginally significant main effect of condition (F (1, 76) =

3.36, p = .07, η² = .04). There was no main effect of action

orientation (F (1, 76) = 0.001, p = .98 η² < .001) and no

interaction effect (F (1, 76) = 0.120, p = .90 η² < .001).

Participants in the negative condition showed somewhat

stronger counterfactual thoughts (M = 5.83, SD = 1.20)

than participants in the positive condition (M = 5.38,

SD = 0.99).

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