Mood experience is comprised of at least two elements: the direct experience of the mood and a meta-level of experience that consists of thoughts and feelings about the mood. In Study 1, a two-dimensional structure for the direct experience of mood (Watson & Tellegen, 1985) was tested for its fit to the responses of 1,572 subjects who each completed one of three different mood scales, including a brief scale developed to assist future research. The Watson and Tellegen structure was supported across all three scales. In Study 2, meta-mood experience was conceptualized as the product of a mood regulatory process that monitors, evaluates, and at times changes mood. A scale to measure meta-mood experience was administered to 160 participants along with the brief mood scale. People's levels on the meta-mood dimensions were found to differ across moods. Meta-mood experiences may also constitute an important part of the phenomenology of the personal experience of mood.

Mood congruency refers to a match in affective content between a person's mood and his or her thoughts. The mood-congruent judgment effect states in part that attributes will be judged more characteristic, and events more likely, under conditions of mood congruence. Thus, the happy person will believe good weather is more likely than bad weather (relative to such a judgment in a state of mood ^congruence). Three studies showed that the effect generalizes to non-self-relevant judgments with natural mood. Study 1 (N= 202) generalized it across a variety of specific emotions, Study 2(N=\ ,065) generalized it across a variety of tasks, and Study 3 (N= 524) generalized it to a nonlaboratory, statewide sample. The three studies redefine mood-congruent judgment more broadly and thereby inform the debate about its underlying mechanisms. The relation between mood-congruent judgment and personality is discussed.

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