Definition
Chain of thought here means the psychological sequence: words you think → emotion → behaviour → action — not only AI prompting jargon.
Origin
Cognitive-behavioural and appraisal models treat cognition as the upstream lever on affect and action.
Mechanism
Quality of the thought (precision, energy, structure) cascades downstream; fuzzy language keeps fuzzy weeks. Appraisal dimensions (pleasantness, effort, certainty, control) shape which emotion lands before behaviour fires.
Applications
Journal the actual sentence before the switched task; rewrite the thought when recalibrating a Battle.
Failure modes
- Fuzzy week-start — soft intention language (“be better”) with no rewrite — emotion and behaviour stay soft too.
- Confusing AI CoT with Club chain — prompting jargon without journaling the human thought that drives the day.
- Downstream-only fixes — changing behaviour apps while the appraisal sentence that fires emotion stays unnamed.
Sources
Cite
- Smith, C. A., & Ellsworth, P. C. (1985). Patterns of cognitive appraisal in emotion. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 48(4), 813–838.
- Smith, C. A., Haynes, K. N., & Lazarus, R. S. (1993). In search of the “hot” cognitions: Attributions, appraisals, and their relation to emotion. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 65(5), 916–929.
Adjacent
Personal Definitions · Self-observation · Quality of Questions