THE ROLE OF AFFECT IN INFORMATION SYSTEMS RESEARCH - Human-Computer Interaction and Management Information Systems: Foundations - page 283

encountered in a matching rather than a non-matching affect state, and bias the interpretation of
ambiguous social information (Forgas and George, 2001).
It is noteworthy that the impact of affect on cognition is situational, depending on personal
variables, task characteristics, and situational features. Specifically, Forgas (1995) identified the
factors that determine processing choice. Familiarity (with the target or stimuli), complexity and
typicality, personal relevance, specific motivation, and cognitive capacity have been found to
influence an individual's choice of processing strategies. Several previous studies suggest that
more prolonged, extensive, complex, atypical or unusual, personally relevant, and less motivated
processing increases the degree of affect infusion (Forgas, 1995; Forgas and George, 2001).
Marketing and consumer research also shows that affect, such as emotion (Chaudhuri, 2002)
and valence of experience (Chen and Dubinsky, 2003), influences cognitive concepts such as per-
ceived risk (Chaudhuri, 2002), and perceived product quality (Chen and Dubinsky, 2003), to
name a few. Affect has various effects on cognition, such as retrieval effects, encoding effects, and
state-dependent learning effects (Bagozzi et al., 1999). But basically, affect influences cognition
through a mood-congruence mechanism (Bagozzi et al., 1999; Chen and Dubinsky, 2003). From
a process perspective, Mattila and Wirtz (2000) argued that pre-consumption affect can be trans-
lated into post-purchase evaluations. Specifically, consumers' initial affective reaction may lead
them to mood-consistent information, which is used to form associated cognitive structures.
Mood-congruence has received much attention in the literature. Several theoretical and empirical
studies provided support to the principle of mood-congruence as the mechanism through which
affect influences cognition. For example, Wegener et al. (1995) discovered that happy (versus sad)
moods lead to more information messages in persuasive communication when a “pro-attitudinal/
uplifting” position is taken, and lead to fewer information messages when a “counter-attitudinal/
depression” position is taken.
Cognition influences affect as well. A task that requires more cognitive effort to evaluate can
lead to more negative affect (Garbarino and Edull, 1997). Therefore, perceived ease of use of the
artifact (e.g., Web sites) was proposed and empirically confirmed as an antecedent of affective
reactions such as valence of experience (Chen and Dubinsky, 2003). In their research on e-commerce,
ease of use of the Web site is the most influential factor among the three antecedents of valence
of experience (ease of use, relevant information, and customer service), with an affective factor
defined as “a consumer's emotional or attitudinal state aroused by the pre-purchase on-line shopping
experience” (p. 327).
Affect, Attitude, and Behavior
Attitude often has been a dependent variable in organizational psychology, marketing, and con-
sumer research. Attitude is normally defined as and often measured by “an individual's positive
or negative feelings (evaluative affect) about performing the target behavior” (Fishbein and
Ajzen, 1975, p. 216). It is one of the few concepts that have an affective component. Thus, it is
important to examine the relationships between affect and attitude.
Marketing and consumer research shows that a person's affect such as his mood (e.g., Garbarino
and Edull, 1997) or valence of experience (Chen and Dubinsky, 2003), can influence various
aspects of cognitive information processing, including encoding and retrieval of information about
the products, brands, services, and promotions, the advertisements, and customer loyalty (Bagozzi
et al., 1999; Dube et al., 2003; Kroeber-Riel, 1984; Lu and Lin, 2002; Zhou and Bao, 2002).
Marketing and consumer researchers have historically taken the view that consumers' evalua-
tions are based primarily on reason-based assessments of the target's characteristics (see Bettman