### abstract ###
anchoring effects  the assimilation of numerical estimates to previously considered standards  are highly robust
two studies examined whether mood and expertise jointly moderate the magnitude of anchoring
previous research has demonstrated that happy mood induces judges to process information in a less thorough manner than sad mood  which means that happy judges tend to be more susceptible to unwanted influences
however  this may not be true for anchoring effects
because anchoring results from an elaborate process of selective knowledge activation  more thorough processing should lead to more anchoring  as a result  sad judges should show stronger anchoring effects than happy judges and happy judges may even remain uninfluenced by the given anchors
because information processing of experts may be relatively independent of their mood  however  mood may influence anchoring only in non-experts
results of two studies on legal decision-making study  NUMBER  and numeric estimates study  NUMBER  are consistent with these expectations
these findings suggest that  at least for non-experts  positive mood may eliminate the otherwise robust anchoring effect
### introduction ###
human judgment is shaped by affective influences
how people judge and evaluate a given target critically depends on how they feel  CITATION
judges' mood  for example  influences how they judge their own lives  CITATION   other persons  CITATION   or the frequency of risks  CITATION
these effects might occur because judges tend to use their mood as information in the judgment process  CITATION
however  moods influence human judgments not only because they are used directly as information  but also because they exert a more indirect influence by changing how judges process information
in particular  judges who are in a happy mood tend to process information in a more superficial or heuristic manner  whereas those in a sad mood tend to process information more thoroughly  CITATION
for example  judges in a happy mood rely more on the use of stereotypes  CITATION  and other heuristic strategies  CITATION  than judges in a sad mood  CITATION
to the extent that the use of such heuristic strategies leads to judgmental biases  CITATION   these findings suggest that happy judges are typically less accurate and more biased than sad judges
however  there appears to be at least one notable exception to this rule - judgmental anchoring
