Social Cognition Center Cologne, University of Cologne, Cologne, Germany.
Social Cognition Center Cologne, University of Cologne, Cologne, Germany.
Trends Cogn Sci. 2017 Feb;21(2):69-79. doi: 10.1016/j.tics.2016.12.006. Epub 2017 Jan 4.
Humans process positive information and negative information differently. These valence asymmetries in processing are often summarized under the observation that 'bad is stronger than good', meaning that negative information has stronger psychological impact (e.g., in feedback, learning, or social interactions). This stronger impact is usually attributed to people's affective or motivational reactions to evaluative information. We present an alternative interpretation of valence asymmetries based on the observation that positive information is more similar than negative information. We explain this higher similarity based on the non-extremity of positive attributes, discuss how it accounts for observable valence asymmetries in cognitive processing, and show how it predicts hitherto undiscovered phenomena.
人类对正面信息和负面信息的处理方式不同。这些处理过程中的价值不对称通常可以概括为“坏比好强”，即负面信息具有更强的心理影响（例如在反馈、学习或社交互动中）。这种更强的影响通常归因于人们对评价信息的情感或动机反应。我们基于正性信息比负性信息更相似的观察结果，提出了一种对价值不对称的替代解释。我们基于正性属性的非极端性来解释这种更高的相似性，讨论它如何解释认知处理中可观察到的价值不对称，并展示它如何预测迄今为止尚未发现的现象。
