The effects of emotional ambivalence on creativity

• 成果类型: Article
• 署名作者: Fong, Christina Ting
• 署名单位: University of Washington; University of Washington Seattle
• 刊物名称: ACADEMY OF MANAGEMENT JOURNAL
• ISSN/ISSBN: 0001-4273
• DOI: 10.5465/AMJ.2006.22798182
• 发表日期: 2006
• 页码: 1016-1030
• 关键词: MOOD; experiences; PSYCHOLOGY; judgments; people; work; bad

摘要

Emotional ambivalence, or the simultaneous experience of positive and negative emotions, is an underexplored emotional state in organizations. The results from two laboratory experiments demonstrate that individuals experiencing emotional ambivalence are better at recognizing unusual relationships between concepts, therefore showing an ability believed to be important to organizational creativity. Informational theories of emotion suggest that individuals interpret emotional ambivalence, which is perceived to be an unusual emotional experience, as signaling they are in an unusual environment, which in turn increases sensitivity to unusual associations. These results yield important implications regarding how to influence creative performance at work.