Fear, anger, and risk.

TLDR

The study uses an appraisal‑tendency framework to predict and confirm that fear and anger produce opposite effects on risk perception, extending prior work linking affective valence to judgment by emphasizing the importance of specific emotions. Fearful participants reported pessimistic risk estimates and risk‑averse choices, while angry participants reported optimistic estimates and risk‑seeking choices, a pattern that held for both naturally occurring and experimentally induced emotions, with angry estimates resembling happy ones more than fearful ones, and these effects were mediated by appraisals of certainty and control.

Abstract

Drawing on an appraisal-tendency framework (J. S. Lerner & D. Keltner, 2000), the authors predicted and found that fear and anger have opposite effects on risk perception. Whereas fearful people expressed pessimistic risk estimates and risk-averse choices, angry people expressed optimistic risk estimates and risk-seeking choices. These opposing patterns emerged for naturally occurring and experimentally induced fear and anger. Moreover, estimates of angry people more closely resembled those of happy people than those of fearful people. Consistent with predictions, appraisal tendencies accounted for these effects: Appraisals of certainty and control moderated and (in the case of control) mediated the emotion effects. As a complement to studies that link affective valence to judgment outcomes, the present studies highlight multiple benefits of studying specific emotions.