The Message Within

This provocative book provides the first comprehensive and informative overview of the role of various subjective experiences in social cognition and behavior, and argues that the study of such experiences may be one of the key unifying themes of social psychology. Based on recent theoretical and empirical developments in the discipline, this select group of leading international researchers surveys extensive evidence and shows that subjective experiences play a key role in most aspects of social cognition and social behavior. The book contains five main sections, discussing the role of subjective experiences in social information processing (Part 1), their influence on memory (Part 2) and their role in intergroup contexts (Part 3). The role of affective experiences in social thinking and behavior is analyzed (Part 4), and the influence of subjective experiences on the development and change of attitudes and stereotypes is also addressed (Part 5).

Herbert Bless, Joseph P. Forgas

D.T. Gilbert, D.M. Wegner, Introduction: Subjective Experience as the Centerpiece of Social Psychology. Part 1. Subjective Experience And Information Processing. K. Fiedler, On Mere Considering. A. Dijksterhuis, J. Bargh, The Role of Awareness in Automatic Action. C.M. Brendl, C. Hardin, Norm Theory: Ease of Mental Simulation Affects Judgments of Surprise. F. Strack, Judgmental Regulation. Part 2. Subjective Experience and Memory Phenomena . R. Neumann, F. Strack, The Influence of Feelings of Approach and Avoidance on the Encoding of Affective Words. E.R. Smith, Subjective Feelings of Familiarity and Their Effects: Insights from Exemplar and Connectionist Models. N. Schwarz, Phenomenal Experiences as a Basis of Judgment: Ease of Recall and Perceptual Fluency. Part 3. Affect as a Subjective Experience and Social Cognition. C. Sedikides, The Rocky Road from Affect to Attentional Focus. Y. Trope, Mood as a Resource in Overcoming Defensive Self-Evaluations. J.P. Forgas, Affective Influences on Strategic Behaviors. T. Garcia-Marques, D. Mackie, The Hypothesis of Mood-as-a-Regulation-Mechanism and its Corollary Mood-as-Familiarity. G. Bohner, T. Weinarth, Emotion as Input: The Impact of Fear and Guilt on the Processing of Messages. Part 4. Subjective Experiences and Intergroup Relations. J.F. Dovidio, Subjective Experiences and Intergroup Relations. A. Abele, Positive Mood and Ingroup-Outgroup Differentiation in a Minimal Group Setting. G.V. Bodenhausen, Intergroup Affect and Social Perception: Affect as Inadmissible Information. Part 5. The Role of Subjective Experience in Attitudes and Stereotypes. B. Dardenne, V. Yzerbyt, Search versus Passive Reception of Information: The Impact on Stereotyping. M. Wänke, H. Bless, How Subjectively Experienced Difficulty Affects the Formation of Attitudinal Judgments. G. Haddock, Subjective Experiences and Political Judgements: It's Easy to Like (or Dislike) Tony Blair. H. Bless, J. Forgas, Feeling, Thinking and Doing: Subjective Experience in Social Cognition and Behavior.