Comparing Indices of Mixed Emotions: Associations with Depression, Anxiety, and Stress in Daily Life

Mixed emotional experiences, marked by the co-occurrence of positive and negative affect, are viewed as indicators of emotional complexity and are theorized to influence psychological adjustment. However, empirical research often uses different indices of mixed emotions and relies on cross-sectional or long-interval longitudinal designs. To address these gaps, the present study directly compared three widely used indices—the Griffin’s emotional ambivalence formula, the MIX Index, and the MIN index—and their associations with depression, anxiety, and stress across four daily diary datasets (Study 1: 110 adults, 2,060 observations; Study 2: 447 adults, 16,128 observations; Study 3: 299 adults, 3,796 observations; Study 4: 756 adults, 7,378 observations). To determine whether these indices can be used interchangeably in research, or whether they capture meaningfully distinct aspects of mixed emotional experiences, we examined (a) the short-term variability of each index, (b) their intercorrelations, and (c) their associations with daily affective outcomes (i.e., depression, anxiety, and stress) in daily life. Results indicated that all three indices exhibited substantial between-person variability. The Griffin and MIX indices were nearly perfectly correlated (rs = .93-.99 between-person; rs = .93-.98 within-person), suggesting their equivalence. After controlling for both state- and trait-level positive and negative affect, all three indices were consistently associated with higher levels of anxiety and stress, yet, in contrast, greater mixed emotions were associated with lower levels of depression. A mini meta-analysis across datasets further supported these patterns. These findings highlight the dynamic and paradoxical nature of mixed emotions in daily life, pointing to the need for greater conceptual clarity and context-sensitive approaches in future research.