Contrasting effects of hot and cool system in anger regulation in cooperative behaviors

Abstract

Objectives: The present study examined the relationship between anger and social functioning. Both trait anger and state anger were investigated.

Methods: The hot and cool system model was employed as a mood regulation strategy to investigate state anger. Participants were instructed to focus either on the emotion (hot-focus) or the context (cool-focus) of their personal experience of being rejected. The hot- and cool- focus participants were then compared on their cooperative behaviors. Self-report questionnaires were used to investigate the relations between the participants’ trait anger and their social functioning.

Results: The results showed that the hot-focus participants expressed their aggression in a punitive pattern whereas the cool-focus participants expressed their aggression in a cooperative pattern. High trait anger participants were prone to be more aggressive. Both trait anger and state anger were shown to be detrimental to social functioning.

Discussion: The results suggest a mood regulation strategy that may be helpful in facilitating people with high trait anger and/or those who engage in hot thinking, to cooperate with others and to cope with their self-defeating social processing. By refraining from hot responses, the person would be able to engage in cool cognitive processing such that any ambiguous social cues would be processed once again in a more logical reasonable, rational, and intellectual way.