In the present chapter, we examine the various types of effects that feelings have been found to have on cognition and behavior. In the course of doing this, we distinguish between powerful emotion and more mundane feeling states, consider the relationship between affect and arousal, note the contrast between the effects of positive versus negative feeling states, and discuss some of the methods that have been used to study affect, considering some implications of the different results obtained with the various techniques used. This chapter cannot hope to present all of the recent work relating to the topic of affect. Its goal is to summarize representative research on the influence of affect on cognition and social behavior, to discuss some central issues that have emerged from this work, and to stimulate further thought and empirical investigation of these issues.(PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2019 APA, all rights reserved)