SGER: Emotional and Cognitive Carry Over from the September 11 Attacks

Carnegie Mellon University, Pittsburgh PA

Investigators

Abstract

Abstract: Emotional and Cognitive Influences on Responses to the September 11 Attacks PI: Jennier Lerner Proposal: 0201525 Sadly, the events of September 11 provide a natural laboratory for advancing emotion and judgment research, as well as testing the generalizability of the results of previous research. Emotion and judgment research might inform public policy by identifying measures that address people's cognitive and emotional needs in relation to the September 11 attacks. This panel study traces the same set of 800 participants (600 adults and 200 adolescents). The goal is to examine the differential effects of fear, anger, and sadness on risk perceptions, attributions of causality, preferences among policy options, intentions to take risk-mitigating actions, and economic behavior in response to the September 11 attacks. A second goal is to examine developmental differences in emotional reactions between adolescents and adults.More specifically, the project will use samples purchased from a firm that recruits for internet surveys through random-digit-dialing selection methods. The dataset has measures of health behavior and consumer decision-making both before and after the attacks. Wave 1 of the proposed survey and experiment consists of dispositional emotion measures, emotion-priming manipulations, and outcome measures of risk perceptions, attributions of causality, expectations of future feelings, consumer decision-making, health behaviors, and policy preferences. Wave 2 (3 months after the first wave or immediately after another national event, whichever comes first) will examine how changes in emotion over time affect the same outcome measures.