Affect arousing and energizing properties of positive and negative reinforcing stimuli were investigated. Subjects received positive evaluations (PE), similar attitudes (SA), dissimilar attitudes (DA) or negative evaluations (NE) presented on slides. Pre- and post-slide semantic differentials were filled out by each subject. All subjects then learned a paired-associates (PA) list composed of both non-competitional and competitional pairs. Taylor-Spence drive theory predictions for performance on non-competitional and competitional tasks provided a sensitive measure of relative drive or energization levels induced by the reinforcing stimuli. Consistent with past research, semantic differential scores showed NE more powerful than DA in arousing negative affect and PE more powerful than SA in arousing positive affect. The PE and SA conditions were hypothesized to be energizing rather than drive reducing. Performance on the PA learning task showed a higher energization level for the NE condition than for the DA condition. In support of the hypothesis, the PE condition showed a higher energization level than the SA condition. (Author)