If you need to proofread or build an IKEA shelf, it’s best to be in a bad mood first, scientists say.
Then again, if you’re trying to get that shelf built, maybe you’re there already.
Nevertheless, researchers out of the University of Arizona have found a link between a person’s mood and their ability to excel at detail-oriented tasks. Long story short, the worse your mood, the better off you’ll be.
Vicky Lai, an assistant professor of psychology and cognitive science at UArizona, and scientists in the Netherlands studied how the brain processes information depending on what emotional state a person is in.
A group of test subjects was asked to watch clips of upbeat material — specifically, Friends — and then Sophie’s Choice, an obvious downer. They were then tasked with analyzing specifics in a spoken word story. Lo and behold, those who were negatively impacted by the latter did better in the analytical test.
Lai explains in a university release, “We show that when people are in a negative mood, they are more careful and analytical. They scrutinize what’s actually stated in a text, and they don’t just fall back on their default world knowledge.”
“These are the same stories, but in different moods, the brain sees them differently, with the sad mood being the more analytical mood,” Lai explained.