火上浇油，不失为一剂良方

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Repeatedly we found that people who got mad first were more successful than the other participants in the challenges that followed. Angry people persisted longer and did better at solving word problems, for instance. They also scored better on a challenging video game and were more likely to sign a petition to stop student tuition increases.

Across our studies, anger helped achieve challenging goals. When the goals were not challenging, getting angry did not improve outcomes. For example, when participants had to solve easy word puzzles or play a simple video game that involved making a single jump, participants who were angry fared no better than those in other conditions. But what does this mean for people’s life? Here the story becomes more complicated. The findings do not mean that everyone should get riled up in order to achieve their goals. But anger clearly can be useful in overcoming obstacles.

Part of the challenge with learning from our emotions is that they are not directional—that is, they do not necessarily push us toward a specific type of action to resolve a situation. We designed our experimental studies to have a clear goal with only a singular action or choice involved (such as persist or give up). Life is typically much more complicated, and people have many actions to choose from. Some of those options can have serious negative consequences.

Rage at a crashing computer could motivate someone to take it to a repair shop. But it could also motivate them to smash the computer on the floor. Both actions have removed the obstacle: the crashing computer. Yet only one is truly beneficial in completing the larger project—whatever the person was doing on the computer. This complication in using our negative emotions contributes to their bad reputation. Anger can lead people to do things they would rather not do that don’t match their long-term goals.