ABSTRACT
T he judgments that make up the most pivotal points in our lives are seldom made dispassionately. When we await news from our beloved regarding her deliberations on a proposal of marriage, news from our doctor regarding the results of a medical test, or (perhaps as important to many of us) news from a journal editor regarding the fate of our latest manuscript, we do not approach that information with the cold detachment of a computer awaiting its next input. When we process information about valued aspects of self like our attractiveness, health, or intelligence, we almost always have clear preferences for what we want that information to hold. Rather than being indifferent to whether information suggests that we are loved or spurned, healthy or ill, published or one step closer to perishing, our processing of self-relevant information is usually accompanied by strong hopes and fears-hope that the information will favor the judgment conclusion we want to reach and fear that it will not.
