Emotion Appraisal Tendencies and Carryover: How, Why, and … Therefore?

The effects and ideas described by Han, Lerner, and Keltner (2007) are fascinating and important. Rightly so, they are likely to capture researchers’ and practitioners’ attention for some time. This commentary offers several questions (and speculations as to possible answers) that hopefully will be the focus of some of that attention. One theoretical question concerns the mechanisms whereby emotional carryover effects occur and the purposes that such effects might serve. A practical one is about the prescriptive implications of carryover effects and appraisal tendency influences more generally, particularly in concrete, real-life decision situations.