anger leads to more rational decision making

Imagine you're in a room with four people, one is lip-snarling angry, the others are calm. Who among them would you consider the most likely to think rationally?

via bps-research-digest.blogspot.com

Surprisingly, new studies indicate that when people are angry, they are more willing to consider and review information that runs contrary to their own biases, and more willing as a result to modify their original positions. I'd have figured angry people were more close minded, but not so. However, the study doesn't seem to measure degrees of anger. I'd want to know whether there is a point where rage closes the mind down. Personal experience would say it does. Full story at the link above.

Filed under: Miscellany