Emotional Contagion

Last week, I stumbled onto a magazine in a waiting room that gave me an “A-ha!” moment. The article helped me crystallize a concept that's quite intuitive, but that we don't often discuss. So today, we're taking a break from the series on parts so I can share this with you.

The concept is so simple that we take it for granted and often over look it: the idea that your emotions are contagious. Think about the last time you had a great day, and came home to a partner who was sad and depressed. What happened to your mood? Or what about the last time your boss was in a bad mood and managed to drag you down to that level as well. Or your workplace when everyone has “a case of the Mondays”.

Feelings are Catching

In case you want to look it up, the article is called “Emotional Contagion” and it is in the August 2019 issue of Psychology Today. In a nutshell, Elaine Hatfield of the University of Hawaii co-authored a paper which concluded that people frequently catch each other’s emotions. The stronger the emotion, the more emphatically expressed, the more likely it will be transmitted to another. She also found something called counter-contagion. Instead of matching someone else's feeling, we substituted a different feeling. This is particularly tru