ABSTRACT
Imagine that you are hearing a marching band performing a cheerful, upbeat tune while you are thinking about a serious conflict you need to resolve with your partner. Would the mood induced by the music influence your thoughts, plans, and eventual conflict management strategies? This chapter will explore the psychological mechanisms responsible for such effects, describing a series of experiments demonstrating the influence of mood on various conflict behaviors. It is well known that affect is an integral component of most social conflicts and also plays a crucial role in many aggressive encounters (Forgas, 2002, 2007; Zajonc, 2000; see also Chapter 9 in this volume). Affective states are likely to influence a variety of strategic conflict-related behaviors, such as assertiveness (see Chapter 5 in this volume), forgiveness (see Chapter 14 in this volume), goal setting (Chapters 6 and 12 in this volume), perspective taking (Chapter 7 in this volume), and reactions to ostracism (Chapters 3 and 13 in this volume). Returning to our introductory example, military music has been used ever since antiquity to influence soldiers’ mood states, in the hope that upbeat, energetic music creates a more assertive and confident mindset that can influence behavior in conflict situations. In another literary example, Thomas Mann in a short story describes how chess players’ decisions whether to use a defensive or aggressive strategy is markedly influenced by the upbeat or downbeat mood of the background music played by an orchestra in the background.
