What moods are people experiencing?

Moods are short-term feeling states that impact our well-being, behavior, and health. Unlike emotions, moods are often unrelated to external events and can vary widely in intensity (Searight et al., 2017). The POMS is a widely used and accepted way to measure these fleeting and short-term mood states across six distinct dimensions: Tension, Anger, Depression, Fatigue, Vigor, and Confusion (McNair et al., 1971). Measuring moods has applications in many branches of psychology including clinical, cognitive, developmental, and social psychology.

Resources

• McNair, D. M., Lorr, M., & Droppleman, L. F. (1971). Manual profile of mood states.
• Searight H.R., Montone K. (2017) Profile of Mood States. In: Zeigler-Hill V., Shackelford T. (eds) Encyclopedia of Personality and Individual Differences. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-28099-8_63-1

Parameters
This survey cannot be tweaked.

What data is collected? How is it scored?
The following variables are recorded:

• POMS_tension
• POMS_anger
• POMS_fatigue
• POMS_depression
• POMS_esteemRelated
• POMS_vigour
• POMS_confusion

Raw data: 38 questions in a 5-point likert scale format. Questions fall into 7 categories (tension, anger, fatigue, depression, esteemRelated, vigour, confusion). Two items are reverse-scored (in the esteem category). Subscores are calculated by taking the sum of scores in each category.