dhumeur

Dhumeur is a theoretical construct used in psychology to describe a sustained baseline affective state that persists over days to weeks and shapes perception, motivation, and behavior. It differs from momentary emotions and from short-term mood fluctuations by representing a person’s enduring mood climate rather than a single emotional episode.

Etymology and origins: The term dhumeur appears as a neologism in contemporary psychology, formed from the Danish/Norwegian word humør meaning mood, with an initial d- prefix used in some analytic accounts to denote dimension or deviation. The precise origin stories vary between authors, and the term is not universally adopted.

Conceptual features: Dhumeur encompasses baseline valence (predominantly positive or negative), baseline arousal, and regulatory tendencies. It is described as relatively stable across days but open to modulation through sleep, stress, social context, and deliberate regulation strategies. Some formulations also allow for dialectical or situational shifts that reframe the baseline without altering the core disposition.

Measurement and research: Researchers propose using longitudinal mood diaries, ecological momentary assessment (EMA), and composite mood inventories to estimate a person’s dhumeur. Studies focus on distinguishing baseline mood climate from transient events and from clinical mood disorders.

Relation to other constructs: Dhumeur overlaps with concepts such as temperament, affective style, and baseline arousal, but it remains a distinct construct in some theoretical frameworks. It is not itself a diagnosis and should not be equated with depressive or bipolar disorders, though those conditions may interact with or alter an individual’s dhumeur.

Applications and limitations: In organizational psychology and human–computer interaction, dhumeur can inform personalized feedback, user interface design, and workplace well-being programs. Critics caution that the construct may be difficult to measure reliably across cultures and contexts, and that overemphasis on a baseline mood can obscure important situational factors.

See also: mood, affect, mood variability, temperament.