Florian Morin

I investigate why access to positive affect becomes rarer after childhood, and how it can be reversed.

Independent researcher examining how monitoring shapes access to positive affect.

Current empirical direction

Development of the M-ZRT, an Evaluation/Z Reduction Task

Childhood play contains suspensions of optimization, thought to reflect lower monitoring and access to positive affect.

Hypotheses

To test if briefly suspending optimization alters access to a regime, where:

joy is the baseline;
vividness of imagination occasionally happens;
completion of positive memories occasionally happens;
odors, colors, and tastes are recruited from simple cues.

Z tracks how much behavior is being optimized. High Z increases monitoring and blocks entry into joy. Attempts to measure or reproduce the state also raise Z. The task introduces short breaks in optimization, at the point where perception would normally become a decision about what to do next.