TOWARD A PROCESS ANALYSIS OF EMOTIONS - THE CASE OF SURPRISE

Based on an earlier model of the processes elicited by surprising even ts, the present studies provide evidence for one of these processes, t he evaluation of the surprising event's relevance for ongoing activiti es (action-relevance check). The central prediction tested was that, i f unexpected events elicit among other processes an action-relevance c heck, then response delay on a concurrent task will be more pronounced in a condition where this process is more elaborate and hence takes m ore time. lit accord with this prediction Experiment 1 found that an u nexpected appearance change of the imperative stimulus in a choice rea ction time (RT) task caused greater response delay than an equivalent appearance change of a distracter stimulus. Experiment 2 replicated th is finding and tested several additional predictions that concerned th e effects on response delay of a second appearance change of either th e imperative or the distracter stimuli. These predictions, which were also mostly confirmed, were derived by combining the logic underlying the first study with the assumption that once made, appraisals of unex pected events are stored as pall of the situational schema and are reu sed when the same or similar events reoccur leading to an abbreviation of appraisal processes. Experiment 3 once more replicated the basic f inding of the previous studies and ruled out a possible alternative ex planation. It is suggested that the proposed RT method of process veri fication may be of broader interest as a tool to study appraisal proce sses in emotion.