The Undoing Effect of Positive Emotions: How positive emotions impact psychophysiological recovery in esports context

This project investigates whether positive emotions optimize recovery from stress in competitive esports. Drawing on the undoing hypothesis, which proposes that positive emotions facilitate physiological recovery after stress, two psychophysiological experiments were conducted using the game Counter-Strike 2. Participants played competitive matches designed to induce physiological arousal and then watched video clips intended to elicit amusement, excitement (only in Study 2), or a neutral emotional state during recovery. Cardiovascular activity and self-reported affect were measured throughout. Across both studies, positive emotions did not consistently optimize cardiovascular recovery, and in some cases neutral condition outperformed positive emotions. These findings suggest that the undoing effect may not reliably occur in high-pressure esports environments. Project funded by the National Science Centre in Poland (grant no. UMO-2024/53/N/HS6/01615) and by the Adam Mickiewicz University “Excellence Initiative – Research University” program (102/13/SNS/0004).