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Category: Project

Description: We examine whether the accuracy of people’s predictions about their future emotions (affective forecasting) is related to individual differences in the ways one experiences and manages their emotions throughout daily life, including individual differences in emotional granularity, emotional complexity, emotional intelligence, and emodiversity. Participants predicted how they would feel while viewing a series of evocative pictures based on descriptions; one week later they rated their felt emotion while viewing the pictures. Participants also completed a 7-day experience sampling protocol in which they rated their current emotions throughout the day, and this data was used to derive individual difference measures. Results revealed less error predicting emotions for those higher in emotional intelligence and negative emotional granularity (for negative emotions only), but greater error for those higher in emodiversity. Findings shed light on individual differences in affective forecasting accuracy, a skill which has important implications for people’s daily choices and well-being.