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When does familiarity trump novelty? Novelty prevail over familiarity? De Vries and her colleagues conclude that mood influences the answers to these questions: “People often prefer familiar stimuli, presumably because familiarity signals safety. . . . Compared with a sad mood, a happy mood eliminates the preference for familiar stimuli.” Some spaces and objects will generally be used by people in happy (wedding reception) or unhappy (funeral) moods, and this finding should influence design strategies used to create those objects and place.
Marieke de Vries, Rob Holland, Troy Chenier, Mark Starr, and Piotr Winkelman. “Happiness Cools the Warm Glow of Familiarity: Psychophysiological Evidence that Mood Modulates the Familiarity –Affect Link.” Psychological Science, in press.
