Structure of self-reported current affect: Integration and beyond.

pleasantness and activation. These 4 structures each presuppose bipolar dimensions and have been thought of as interchangeable or 45 ° rotations of one another, but past data were inconsistent. Huge but not perfect overlap among these four structures was found here in 2 studies of self-reported current affect (Ate = 198 and 217) that controlled for random and systematic errors of measurement. The 4 structures were integrated into a common space defined by 2 bipolar dimensions. Current affect has been described with various dimensions and structures, including Russells (1980) circumplex, Watson and Tellegens (1985) positive and negative affect, Thayers (1989) tense and energetic arousal, and Larsen and Dieners (1992) eight combinations of pleasantness and activation. In this article, we argue that it is possible to integrate these various concepts in a simple scheme, thereby taking a large step towards unifying dimensional approaches to affect as a person experiences and reports it. There have been three major approaches to the broad, general dimensions of reported affect. One approach has focused on acti-vation (also known as arousal, energy, tension, and activity). Sleep, drowsiness, alertness, activation, hyperactivation, and, fi-nally, frenzied excitement describe increasing degrees of activa-tion. Activation was prominent in psychological writing through-